The New Atheist Crusaders and Their Unholy Grail: The Misguided Quest to Destroy Your Faith

by Becky Garrison

A challenge has been issued on matters of faith and Becky Garrison meets it head on in this witty yet poignant answer to the Anti-God gurus Richard Dawkins, Sam Harris, and Daniel Dennett. Becky Garrison, religious satirist and senior contributing editor for The Wittenberg Door , is taking a stand. Where most Christians assume the character of the Cowardly Lion chanting, "I do believe, I do believe, I do believe," Garrison refuses to simply thrust...

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 084991972X
• ISBN13: 9780849919725
• Release Date: January 2008
• Publisher: Thomas Nelson
• Length: 256 Pages
• Weight: 0.60 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.7" x 5.5" x 8.2"

Customer Reviews

Funny, fast-paced, provocative

Whether you agree with Ms. Garrison's premise or not, this is great, roller-coaster of a read, funny, insightful, opinionated and always provocative (as are all of her books). It's definitely worth the cover price and more.

A wild ride

Prominent atheists like Sam Harris, Daniel Dennett and Richard Dawkins (known as the "New Atheists") have made quite a stir in recent years by attacking Christianity head-on, in part through a number of bestselling books. Becky Garrison makes quite a stir in the Christian world through her work as senior contributing editor for The Wittenberg Door ("Pretty Much the World's Only Religious Satire Magazine"). Most often, the targets of her biting satire are poufy-haired televangelists, Religious Right fundies, and even the occasional milquetoast, mainline liberal. Considering the way she lavishes her wit and sarcasm on the faithful, you can just imagine what she has in store for an assortment of atheists when they begin treading on her turf. Only you don't have to imagine that at all, since Garrison takes aim at said assortment in THE NEW ATHEIST CRUSADERS. And she does so with her usual gusto. Using their own words against them, Garrison skewers their arguments, pokes fun at their ignorance and exposes their distortions. And you can tell she has a lot of fun doing all that. But she also wisely points her finger where it often belongs --- leveled straight at Christians who give atheists too much fodder and pointing right back at herself when she behaves badly. "When confronted with aggressive atheists," she writes, "some Christians assume the mantle of the Cowardly Lion in The Wizard of Oz chanting, 'I do believe, I do believe, I do believe.'" Garrison goes on to describe the atheists' stepped-up efforts to dismantle the Christian faith. "As long as people continue to buy into the anti-God game, this junk is gonna come down the pike. Time to put an end to this. So, I guess I gotta put on my satirical shorts, get into the ring, and put up my dukes." Garrison aims her punches at her adversaries on such matters as their faulty theology, oversimplification and reliance on medieval clerics in an effort to try to prove their point --- as well as their many sins of omission. She takes them to task for sniffing out Christianity's lunatic fringe and positioning them as mainstream, and failing to acknowledge the tremendous amount of good done by Christians throughout history and in contemporary society. Amid all this scuffling, Garrison provides poignant anecdotes from her own life that offer glimpses into her journey of faith and activism. The book also features a witty timeline of atheism, an interview with Hemant the Friendly Atheist and extensive notes, some of which are a hoot. Readers familiar with Garrison's writing style (she is also the author of the equally satirical RED AND BLUE GOD, BLACK AND BLUE CHURCH) will be well prepared for her casual, sassy and slangy way with language. If playing fast and loose with English offends you, well, you may need to gear up for a wild ride. --- Reviewed by Marcia Ford

Becky strikes again

Becky Garrison takes aim at outspoken atheists like Sam Harris and Richard Dawkins with her usual gusto. Using their own words against them, Garrison skewers their arguments, pokes fun at their ignorance and exposes their distortions. And you can tell she has a lot of fun doing all that. But she also wisely points her finger where it often belongs --- leveled straight at Christians who give atheists too much fodder and pointing right back at herself when she behaves badly. Garrison aims her punches at her adversaries on such matters as their faulty theology, oversimplification and reliance on medieval clerics in an effort to try to prove their point, as well as their many sins of omission. She takes them to task for sniffing out Christianity's lunatic fringe and positioning them as mainstream, and failing to acknowledge the tremendous amount of good done by Christians throughout history and in contemporary society. Amid all this scuffling, Garrison provides poignant anecdotes from her own life that offer glimpses into her journey of faith and activism. The book also features a witty timeline of atheism, an interview with Hemant the Friendly Atheist and extensive notes, some of which are a hoot. Readers familiar with Garrison's writing style will be well prepared for her casual, sassy and slangy way with language. If playing fast and loose with English offends you, well, you may need to gear up for a wild ride. ([...].)

Garrison picks apart the new atheists

Reporter, writer, and satirist Becky Garrison who ably wields her MDiv from Yale steps into the ring to take on these atheist crusaders, who have set out to undermine religion, in her book The New Atheist Crusaders and Their Unholy Grail. Garrison is a Christian writer who contributes to the God's Politics blog, serves as contributing editor to the Wittenburg Door, among other projects. Though not a scientist, Garrison is an able researcher who carefully steps through the various levels involved in this issue: science, religion, politics, and some pretty flimsy, overblown accusations the new atheists level against Christians. Keep in mind that while Garrison is fighting the new atheists' writings toe-to-toe, she's not setting out to attack them personally. By adopting a kind of zany, light-hearted, tongue-in-cheek tone, Garrison avoids a combative tone, opting instead to kind of playfully slap around the views of the new atheists. She doesn't deal a knock-out blow, but carefully picks them apart with a wide smile, revealing the foolish bits of their arguments, while never leaving behind a bloody opponent on the mat. You could call it a humane mercy-killing of the new atheists. In addition, Garrison uses her journalistic expertise to assemble a carefully chosen group of scientists and religion experts to stand in her corner. She even finds atheists who want nothing to do with the closed-minded new atheists, but rather want a friendly, civil discussion about whether or not God exists (201). With friendly atheists, theologians, God-believing scientists, and Christian activists in her corner, she unleashes round after round of exploration and analysis of the new atheists. While the new atheists may dismiss Garrison because she's not credentialed into the academic elite, I assure you this book is a knock-out blow to the new atheists brand. Garrison isn't so much concerned about debunking all atheists though. She presents plausible explanations about God that will make any atheist think twice, but she isn't concerned so much with winning a fight to prove God once and for all. I stress this because many apologetic Christian books can adopt a combative, us vs. them tone. Garrison isn't up to that here. Rather, she's picking apart the sensational, absolutist claims of the new atheists who misrepresent God and religion. From: www.inamirrordimly.com (search for Garrison)

Garrison satirizes more than just the atheists in this delightful book

In the last few years, as anyone who has their finger on the pulse of popular culture should know, a new breed of atheists have emerged, who are vocal, popular (their books climb the bestseller lists), and most significant of all, aggressively hostile to religion. No more do atheists settle for, "No thanks, I'll pass on the believing in God bit." The new war-cry for today's nonbeliever is "I reject the notion of God and you should too." A situation like this calls for... a satirist! And so, into the fray comes Becky Garrison, fresh from The Wittenburg Door where she'll spoof just about anything that stands still long enough. And in The New Atheist Crusaders she does just that, because she aims her satirical wit not only at the likes of Richard Dawkins, Sam Harris, and Christopher Hitchens, but she also -- and perhaps, more importantly -- holds up a mirror to all the silly and stupid stuff that Christians do to give fuel to the atheists' ire. She goes after the blind spots in the new atheists' logic, with an overriding theme of her book being, "Why do you only pick on what's wrong with religion? That hardly seems fair." She points out that while the new atheists are renowned for their scientific acumen, they make for pretty lousy theologians -- since they're arguing against a caricature of religiosity that most informed believers would themselves disavow. Still, Garrison saves her best shots and most salients points for Christians (and other believers) themselves. She notes that what really fires up the new atheists is how Christianity has been reduced to sloganeering ("repent of your sins and you'll be saved), bad science (since evolution isn't in the Bible, it must not exist) and mass marketing. Exasperated, she asks, "Why would anyone in his right mind want to follow such a banal, bubble-gum belief system? I know I wouldn't." Garrison suggests that Christians need to spend less time defending their faith against atheists or other secularists, and more time following the examples of people like Shane Claiborne or Peter Rollins, who are so busy actually trying to live the Gospel that they don't have time for middle class prejudices or the latest Jesus jewelry. Her message is as simple as it is powerful: once Christians actually get down to the business of following Christ, most of what annoys the new atheists will disappear anyway. The New Atheist Crusaders and their Holy Grail proves that if laughter isn't the best medicine, it's still quite a good tonic. But believers, beware: even while she's busy skewering the naysayers, Garrison will not let you off the hook either.