Violent Grace: Christopher Hitchens and Peniel

This post has been on my mind for some time.  I have been avoiding writing it mainly because I wanted to give it the kind of attention it deserved.  Alas, I may not have enough time to give it any time soon.  Nevertheless, I think it is worth writing.

Not long after Christopher Hitchens was diagnosed with cancer, he gave an interview with The Atlantic wherein he discussed his experience since his diagnosis.  


As Hitchens is known for his intense atheism, it is no surprise that the discussion eventually came around to religion.  Hitchens discussed his reaction to people who said they were going to pray for him.  He said he put them into three groups with three different reactions.  The first group are those who were praying for him to die and go to hell.  "To hell with you" was his response.  The second group were those who were praying that this illness would somehow lead him to a conversion.  "Thanks but no thanks" was his response.  The third group were those who were genuinely concerned about him and simply praying for him to recover.  "Fine by me, it's a nice gesture" was his response to them.


I generally enjoy listening to Hitchens.  I often find him reasonable and humorous.  Other times I find him infuriating.  I think one of the reasons I appreciate him most is that he doesn't seem to be driven by some vitriolic hatred for Christians.  Listening to Richard Dawkins, one gets the idea that not only does he want to prove Christians wrong, but he wants to cause them the most pain possible in the process.  Dawkins is the classic atheist with the mantra "There is no God ... and I hate him!"  For the most part, Hitchens avoids this.  He seems genuinely convinced that there is no God and genuinely concerned that people believe that.


It is for that reason that I found the following quote provacative.  During his interview with The Atlantic, Hitchens was asked what people would think if they were to hear that he had made a death-bed conversion.  He said:

"The entity making such a remark might be a raving, terrified person whose cancer has spread to the brain. I can't guarantee that such an entity wouldn't make such a ridiculous remark, but no one recognizable as myself would ever make such a remark."

It is that last bit, "no one recognizable as myself would ever make such a remark," that gets me.  It gets me because I think he's right.  If he were to encounter the Triune God in such a way that he could no longer deny God's existence, I think that encounter would leave a mark.  If it were a genuine encounter, he would no longer be recognizable by the same features on which his identity now rests.  It would leave him forever changed.


Genesis 32:22ff gives an account of Jacob (son of Isaac, brother of Esau) wresting with an unnamed man throughout the night.  Verse 25 says: "When the man saw that he did not prevail against Jacob, he struck him on the hip socket; and Jacob's hip was put out of joint."  Nevertheless, Jacob continued to wrestle.  Jacob refused to let the man go until he gave him a blessing.  The man responds by giving Jacob a new name: "You shall no longer be called Jacob, but Israel, for you have striven with God and with humans, and have prevailed." (verse 28).  


Jacob named the place "Peniel," which means "The Face of God" because there he saw the face of God, and lived.

However, he wasn't the same entity he was before the meeting. His entire identity was changed.  He walked away with a limp and a new name.

In light of that, I find myself in two of the three groups Hitchens mentioned above.  I pray that in the midst of his battle against cancer, he might see the face of God and be changed forever.  I also pray that he, like Jacob, would live.