In the last post we explored the nature of the New Atheism. Now, let’s consider the tactics of the New Atheists and why we must respond to their attacks.

Why the New Atheism Matters

One of the reasons the New Atheists have been so effective is that today’s students can’t think well. As Mark Bauerlein has argued in The Dumbest Generation, the dawn of the technological age that promised to produce a brighter, more intellectually sophisticated young people has had the opposite effect. This generation has grown up in a society driven by images and slogans, not carefully reasoned discourse or critical analysis. It’s not that they are incapable, or even unwilling to engage difficult issues (from my experience, I believe they are both capable and willing). They simply haven’t been trained or properly motivated. And so many fall for the shallow, emotionally charged diatribes of the New Atheists.

How does someone come back from a place so dark that not only does he hate what was done to him there, but also hates himself for what he did there?

Interestingly enough, the CW’s weekly scarefest Supernatural is asking that question this season.

Supernatural tells the story of Dean and Sam Winchester, brothers who, for reasons that are too complicated to go into here, battle ghosts, goblins, and things that go bump in the night. Last season, older brother Dean, also for reasons too complicated to go into here, literally went to hell.

You don’t see that every day on a tv show.

At the beginning of this season, Dean was pulled out of hell by an angel of the Lord because God had work for him to do.