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God and the New Atheism: A Critical Response to Dawkins, Harris, and Hitchens. By John F. Haught. Louisville, Ky.: Westminster John Knox Press, 2008. 156 pp. $17.00 (paper).
A Reasonable God: Engaging the New Face of Atheism. By Gregory E. Ganssle. Waco, Tex.: Baylor University Press, 2009. 165 pp. $24.95 (paper).
In recent years, there has been an increase in the literature that explicitly argues for the embrace of atheism over any form of religion. This has been deemed the "new atheism" and includes authors like Richard Dawkins, Sam Harris, Christopher Hitchens, and Daniel Dennett. This group has spawned a directed, heated reaction from many theistic theologians, philosophers, and scientists. Such are the two works reviewed here.
Haught and Ganssle share many similarities in their approaches to confronting the thought of the new atheism. Both center their argument on critiquing the approaches embraced by the likes of Dawkins, Harris, and Hitchens. Haught and Ganssle address the problems of the new atheism through an analysis of recent writings but they try not to offer any constructive, theological guidance by focusing almost exclusively on critique. Thus, the texts take a very negative tone.
Haught's text follows a series of questions that are ultimately put forward by the "new atheists" and thus addresses them on their own ground. By doing this, much of Haught's argument is meant to show the ultimate inadequacies of his interlocutors. He begins by noting that the new atheism is not entirely new and that its atheism is quite weak. Haught believes...