“There is no evidence that any Muslim woman anywhere ever wore the jilbab before the disco era, when it was taken up by the Muslim Brotherhood and others in the Arab world. It is no more ancient and traditional than platform shoes, bell bottoms, and cheesecloth shirts” (Mark Steyn, America Alone, p. 74).
Crowns Roll in the Dust
“The world’s way of responding to intimations of decay is to engage equally in idiot hopes and idiot despair . . . In Christian terms, such hopes and fears are equally beside the point. As Christians we know that here we have no continuing city, that crowns roll in the dust and every earthly kingdom …
A Snarling Defense
“Nothing is a man’s own so much as his lusts. Man aims wholly at himself in satisfying his lust. A dog will bark and bite and fly in a man’s face to preserve his own whelps” (Burroughs, Irenicum, p. 152).
Because My Brain Burbles
It used to be possible for believers to have a brain, but no more. This is because our ancestors lived in the blackest of ignorance, and theologians like Aqinas or Maimonides were just playing cards with the hand they were dealt. Ya know? I said in an earlier post that I was going to point …
Grab Them By Their Baptism
It has been said that, in the Bible belt, everyone is a Christian until they get their drivers’ license. As soon as a child is old enough to leave his upbringing, he does so. And, after a time of wild living, he frequently comes back to the church so that his kids can go to …
The MulitCulti Schmooze
“By contrast, contemporary multiculturalism absolves one from knowing anything about other cultures as long as one feels warm and fluffy toward them” (Mark Steyn, America Alone, p. 71).
Clutching at Novelty
“A dying civilization, Christendom, on a swiftly moving, ebbing tide, clutches at any novelty in art and literature, ready to accept and then almost at once reject whatever is new no matter how perverse or abnormal. We have a ‘weariness with striving to be men,’ as the American critic Leslie Fiedler put it” (Malcolm Muggeridge, …
Would There be a Vice Squad in Hitchensville?
Okay, so the next chapter is Hitchens on health, to which health the religion of your choice is almost certainly hazardous. We are only on the fourth chapter, and it is of average length, but the mistakes Hitchens makes are starting to accumulate, so it might take a little bit of extra time to get …
Foolishness to the Greeks
Chapter Three is “A Short Digression on the Pig; or, Why Heaven Hates Ham.” Since it is a brief chapter, it warrants a comparable response. In this chapter, Hitchens has a case of the cutes — there is a lot here to make fun of, this is something he is good at, and so he …
Wet Streets Cause Rain
The second chapter of Hitchens’ book is entitled “Religion Kills.” Well, in this world of hardscrabble Darwinism, nature red in tooth and claw, what doesn’t? Religion kills, but so does cancer, old age, hunting accidents, radiation from the sun, other predatory species, too much mayonnaise, and the music of Andrew Lloyd Webber. Actually, we need …