The Dawkins Delusion? (2007)

You don't need to read this book. Any intelligent person can draw the same conclusions from "The God Delusion" and save the time. ( )

Atheism > Deism and Atheism > Religion > Theory

A thin defense of PC religion

I have zero sympathy for Dawkins's worldview or his anti-religious harangues, but I can't give McGrath's book much of a recommendation. One might reasonably expect that by reading McGrath's reply you'd learn a lot about Dawkins's arguments but that simply isn't the case. He uses this book's hundred or so pages to tell us more or less that Dawkins's arguments aren't worth responding to. Yet McGrath does find the room to make fun of Dawkins for, of all things, thinking that Paul wrote Hebrews and to speculate that _The God Delusion_ was written as a last gasp attempt by Dawkins to bolster his waning faith in atheism. This is just silly.

I don't know of a good alternative to recommend to those wanting a solid critique of Dawkins, but I just finished reading _C.S. Lewis: Essay Collection and other Short Pieces_ and I can't imagine that a theist armed with Lewis's ideas would find Dawkins very troubling at all. Besides having the clear advantage over McGrath in style, Lewis defends a full-blooded Christianity and is unafraid to grapple with the thorny issues. ( )

2008 Christian Bookseller's Covention Book of the Year Award winner! World-renowned scientist Richard Dawkins writes in The God Delusion: "If this book works as I intend, religious readers who open it will be atheists when they put it down." The volume has received wide coverage, fueled much passionate debate and caused not a little confusion. Alister McGrath, along with his wife, Joanna, are ideal to evaluate Dawkins's ideas. Once an atheist himself, he gained a doctorate in molecular biophysics before going on to become a leading Christian theologian. He wonders how two people, who have reflected at length on substantially the same world, could possibly have come to such different conclusions about God. McGrath subjects Dawkins's critique of faith to rigorous scrutiny. His exhilarating, meticulously argued response deals with questions such as:

Is faith intellectual nonsense?
Are science and religion locked in a battle to the death?
Can the roots of Christianity be explained away scientifically?
Is Christianity simply a force for evil?

This book will be warmly received by those looking for a reliable assessment of The God Delusion and the many questions it raises--including, above all, the relevance of faith and the quest for meaning.

This is actually only a 2.5, but since I can't give it a 1/2 rating, I chose to round it up. Review to follow later today or this weekend. ( )