He appears to me a sincere, dedicated evangelist, a Jerry Falwell type if you will, Capella's Guide to Atheism, perhaps, in his hand, pacing the podium, quoting chapter and verse, mostly from the Bible, to validate and vindicate each tenet and credo of religious skepticism, agnosticism, nihilism, and disbelief available. Lacing his discourse with historical resources, direct quotes, and reason-his raison d'etra-he is almost impossible to dispute. Actually, I found myself in total agreement with his assertions, not so much because of his beautiful postulation as the fact that he was bang on.

It is banality that religion has caused the most pain and anguish by and for human beings throughout recorded history, and animals if we include their sacrifices at our hands. No other institution or creation of human kind has brought more destruction, torment and misery. Even politics is tied irrevocably to religion, which becomes its coda. “For G-d and country,” comes the cry, in that order. Hitchens points out indisputably that most all major wars in history were fought over religion, from the Crusades and before to World War II, in which he shows the religiosity of fascism. Our present war in Iraq is unquestionably a religious war, Muslims against Oil Worshippers.

So, Hitchen's treatise is unassailable by theologians, philosophers, logicians, and thinkers, except that it is full of guano. He is a dogmatic evangelist in his pursuit of atheism, no different than fundamental Christians, Hassidic Jews, extremist imams, or any other religious absolutists. Ironically, he whacks the Holy Bible in his ministry and quotes its texts from both the Old and New Testaments that support his opinion, as well as tomes of history, philosophy, and literature. Don't underestimate him; he is superbly knowledgeable of scripture from most religions.

But, I continue to agree with him. Religion, in its general definition, has been then bane of human existence. Simply put by radical zealots, believe in G-d as I do or die. It may not be by my sword that you die, but G-d will get you by and by. You cannot escape. To which Hitchens and his atheists say, nonsense. We don't need no stinking G-d to rule our lives.

It is interesting to speculate when we human beings created G-d in our image. As Hitchens opines, it may have come from a simple need to explain the unexplainable, or it may have come from the need to entertain with stories that stimulate the imaginations of listeners. G-d may have been born from fear of death or fear of the dark. James Michener, in The Source, might have come closest in showing that humankind explained natural phenomena via G-ds, or spirits because the unknowable was unknowable. A G-d, or a spirit, must be behind this thing, this river overflowing, this growth of crops, this catastrophe, because nothing in the real world can explain it, so ponders Michener's prehistoric theologian. Or, sitting in the desert listening and feeling the wind, our theologian might have considered it the breath of G-d, ruahkh in Hebrew. (C. G. Jung warned us not to rely only on science and logic, ergo reason as Hitchens does, to explain everything, but to explore spirituality and the unconscious realm as well.)

But as our ancient theologian learned more about how his environment worked, G-d's hand-he made sure G-d had hands like his-was seen less and less in the phenomena of nature. Indeed, he continued to use G-d to explain the unexplainable until he discovered the science of it, and we, his progeny, continue to use G-d to explain a myriad of things and events until we know the science of it.

Probably the best use for G-d we've ever found is to control our fellow creatures, whom Hitchens loves to refer to as mammals. Again, he's right on. Observe how Allah, as defined by fundamental imams in Iraq and Iran today to control their people by fear of their G-d if they do not convert or destroy infidels, or unbelievers. Torah is filled with stories of G-d's wrath against idol-worshippers and the cowering of the Chosen People before their G-d who would smite them as quickly for their disobedience. And all Christians have to do is study the Inquisition to find control by the Church.

Hitchens is also right on when he says we are capable of knowing more today and need less explanation or interference from G-d. Certainly we know Earth is not flat because we have photographed our blue egg from outer space. We know without question that outer space is not created by holes in a celestial curtain through which the light of a G-d shines by night. When the “curtain” is lifted, we know that our planet revolves around the sun, which we know is a star and not a ball of fire pulled on a chariot across the sky by Apollo. We've been to Olympus and found a dead volcano, but no G-ds or evidence of G-ds. Again, give a hand to Hitchens.

We know that the more we learn through scientific investigation, the more the unknown becomes the known, and the unknowable becomes knowable. Even evolution, probably the most perplexing discovery to ever plague religion, particularly Christianity, is fact, except to those too afraid of death and darkness to accept that we mammals, to use Hitchens' epithet, are not the clay figures sculpted by G-d in Genesis but creatures passing along a continuum, which began billions of years ago. Only egotistical humankind could set us apart as special-made by G-d himself, or herself, or itself. Hitchens preaches loudly that there is no G-d, never was a G-d, and never will be a G-d. And he is could right again.

But he continues to be gorged with guano, in my humble opinion. And let me emphasize that this is I speaking now. I am not talking, or writing, for anyone else, and I am not a theologian, religion expert, biblical scholar, or historian. I mostly do not know what I'm talking about in this realm of scholarship; I am simply an opinionated twit who pretends to be a great thinker. Judge me, as you will.

But, perhaps I am being too rough on Hitchens by saying that he is guano challenged, so I will amend my criticism by saying that I think he is missing the point of religion or G-d. Humankind, we mammals, is the only life form on this planet that needs G-ds. We need religion because of the myths it begets, from which we learn who we are as mammals. My cat, Millie, for example, does not need a G-d or a religion because she cannot question who or what she is. Millie knows her job is to pester me for food, eat it when I set it out, and sleep the rest of her day, or until she gets hungry again. If she was feral she would do the same thing only she would provide her own food by way of hunting and killing, which she is finely equipped to do. All animals, except for us, know what Millie knows, and that is who and what they are. And it doesn't matter where they are or where they come from. A cat from anywhere else in the world can relate to Millie, and that's true of all animals on this planet. A dog is a dog in his dogness, a horse in his horseness, etc.

However, that is not true of us. We are costumed, or set apart, by our particular cultures, and only recently in our journey along the continuum of evolution have we been able to, in a very limited way, accept and appreciate the plethora of costumes we confront around the world. For instance, not too long ago, say like yesterday in some places in America, those of us mammals costumed in black skin were enslaved, shunned, spat upon, lynched, beaten, and degraded. Likewise, today, no doubt, somewhere in the world, a follower of Allah would kill me because I am a follower of Jesus. Or, I might kill him or her because they follow Allah. The reasons being that their religious costumes are different and are scary. I love the T-shirt that says, “If you don't understand it, kill it.” It makes my point eloquently.

As I have studied myths from most all major and minor religions in my brief 68 years on Earth, I have learned one unassailable fact: we are all alike, except for our costumes that our cultures assign us. Case it point an Aleut from the Aleutian Islands is exactly like I am except for his culture, or costume. He explains his G-ds to me, and I explain mine to him. Just as I do, he reveals his G-ds through myths that have grown from his people as ways of explaining their opinions about who their G-ds are. If I was a Christian, imagine how he would react if I told him my G-d was born of a woman, impregnated by the one true G-d, lived and taught, then died an excruciating death for the sins of all humankind, but was raised alive from the dead three days later and is, in fact, alive right now. My Aleut friend may run away from me because he thinks I'm mad, or laugh heartily at my funny story. Perhaps, I would tell him the myths surrounding that G-d, and he would laugh more. However, he would begin to see my religious costume more clearly and, therefore, hopefully, understand who I am.

Now he tells me a story. The word Aleut is the name of the wife of the Moon, he tells me. Please, I have to say, the moon is the natural satellite of Earth.

“Yes,” he says, “I know. But Aleut was the wife of Moon in our mythology. She went to him and was disappointed that he didn't live on the actual moon but in a hut off to the side in space. Her life was not good with him because he was gone all night and slept all day, and he forbade her to see him when he was asleep. But she did, and found lying about his room masks of quarter moon, half moon, and various other masks of phases of the moon. He found out she had spied on him, so he made her wear the masks and go out each night while he lived a life of leisure, except when he went out once a month as full Moon.”

I have to say to my Aleut friend that his story is preposterous.

“A man, sired by a G-d, being killed for the sins of all humankind, then raised to eternal life in three days is not preposterous?”

I tell him my story illustrates the potential of goodness that is found in humankind and the love of G-d for his creation.

“Oh,” he says, “I understand now. My story shows that if you wish for the moon, you may not like what you get.”

He knows a little bit more about me, and I know a little bit more about him, and neither of us are as frightened as we were by our respective costumes. As we reveal more of our myths, our individual costumes will become more and more beautiful. But that wouldn't happen if we didn't tell our stories to one another.

This my elaborate way, emulating Hitchens elaborate way, of saying that in order for us mammals to cease being frightened of each other, we have to share our myths, which reveal who we are. We're not cats or other animals that understand each other because their costumes do not change as ours can. We can change costumes capriciously.

Human beings will always need G-ds and religion to explain who and what they are among themselves. I thoroughly agree with Hitchens that religion is never needed to bring morality into peoples' lives. I especially agree that the most dangerous person is the religious fanatic who will lop off your head if you're not praying in the right direction, Allah and Jesus be praised. But the mythology of our western culture involves religion, even in the broadest meaning of the term, which Hitchens explores brilliantly in his discussion of totalitarianism, showing that we mammals gravitate toward religious expression. Then, he dismisses religion as not necessary implies clearly that the religious are stupid to believe in a G-d.

I firmly disagree with him because I think religion is extremely important to most all of us mammals for the simple reason that it defines us. Most of us are not as strong as Hitchens, who can reject all religion without discomfort.

But it isn't fear of what a G-d will do to me if I don't believe. That I will let myself be drawn into the myths of religion as if they were history is what I fear most and what I see happening all around me. Once a myth becomes historic, it loses its truth precisely because of the inaccuracy of history, which, like religion, is made by us mammals. As long as my Aleut friend uses his myth of the wife of the moon to make a point about human foibles as Aleuts see them and doesn't lead me to the exact spot where she took off from Earth and show me artifacts that prove she existed in time and place, I can savor the truth that is conveys. I do not need to be proselytized.

I hope, too, he understands that the story of the raised G-d says that after death we go one influencing lives for good or bad as if we were alive. For example, Martin Luther King, Jr., lives today as much as he did before his assassination because of all that he did for us and all that he taught us. As time passes Dr. King's heroic life takes on the stuff of mythology, and a hundred years from now his life may become myth. I could go on forever with examples of people long dead, who speak to us and teach us as they did when their bodies were sentient, and who have become mythologized. Thomas a Beckett, stomped to death at the altar of Canterbury Cathedral because of his faith, later to become a saint of the church; Davy Crockett, a congressman and Indian fighter from our historic past, killed a bear when he was only three and continues to live in the legends that define us as Americans-just to name two. That, to me, is the truth I got from the myth of the raised G-d. But it is my perception of that myth, and I'm not proselytizing my Aleut friend. (It is important to know that G-ds who are killed and raised to life are found in the mythology of most all religions. It has become almost archetypical, and in most cases, the risen G-d returns to teach good.)

In summation, I am suggesting that Hitchens, for all his brilliance and scholarship, doesn't appear to understand the function of religion in the lives of us mammals. To follow his suggestion, that is throw religion away, I think would be disastrous to our understanding of one another. Am I recommending Hitchens book to you? Yes, for those who know who they are and will not be afraid. If you're not sure of yourself, particularly your religion, pass by this one because he is very persuasive. It is extremely well written and a joy to read from that perspective, but it is daunting because his scholarship is daunting, even though he may not understand religion as well as he thinks he does.

Also in tonight's news a squadron of Vietnamese Potbelly Pigs flew from Little Rock to Denver for the Republican Convention. But worst of all children and adults who have read the Harry Potter books or have seen the movies made from them are convening a vast coven in New York City in preparation to take over the world by witchcraft, led by Potter himself now that Voldemort is dead.

Sadly, we have people in this country and other civilized places that might believe that. They are the ones, fundamental Christians mostly, stamping the Potter books and movies with the curse of witchcraft and trying forbid all children and adults from reading the books or seeing the movies. Especially if the children do, say the fundamentalists, they will be-not can be-will be made into witches and wizards and follow the dark arts themselves. Some say J. K. Rowling, the creator of Harry Potter, is the Anti-Christ, and that her sole purpose is to steal the minds of our children and establish the kingdom of Satan.

How can anyone believe such rubbish in the 21st Century? They can believe it because the Bible tells them so, and because they have to have a reason why everything, including their children, is going to hell in a hand basket because it couldn't be their fault. It's Rowling's fault. It's the devil feeding them drugs. It's soap opera with their uncontrolled sex on the screen. It's rampant communism leading them down the garden path. It's liberalism turning their minds. It's conservatism making them cold and heartless. It's rock and roll, hip hop, rap-it is anything but us, the adults responsible for our children's upbringing.

Denigration of witches is the product of our Judeo-Christian culture. Condemned by both the Old and New Testaments, witchcraft and sorcery have motivated atrocities against thousands, maybe millions, or people for millennia. Anyone who was different could be classified as a witch and be hunted and treated abominably, testified to by our history of Jim Crow and legislated segregation, the Salem witch trials, or the fight Wiccans have had recently to have Wicca recognized by the Federal Government as a religion with all the right and privileges there unto.

The classical image of a witch is an ugly old woman hunched over a cauldron in which floats eyes of newts, oil squeezed from rats, blood of zombies, or other such nonsense. Shakespeare has them seated on slimy ground predicting Macbeth and Duncan's fates. Likewise wizards are gnarled ancient old men with distorted faces and misty eyes reaching out with wands to condemned their prey. And if we can imagine living in a world dominated by superstition where the only occasional light at night was fire with its distortions and dancing shadows creating supernatural images to accompany stories of ghosts and goblins and the undead, which to gullible people were real, it is easy to understand belief in witchcraft.

But classical witches and wizards never existed, and they do not today. Anyone who is not addled knows that. Most children are not addled, and they know HARRY POTTER IS FICTION. If they do not know it is fiction and if their parents do not, then they are addled and need psychiatric help. Get real. How many little boys leap from tall buildings in attempts to fly after seeing any of the Superman movies? Do any of your children insist they are in Oz after seeing The Wizard of Oz, who turns out to be a bumbling charlatan? If they do, take them to a doctor.

My point is that J.K. Rowling created Harry Potter from her mind, one of most incredible, in my opinion, since C. S. Lewis died. And my second point is that the vast majority of children and adults know it.

I don't mean to insult anyone's belief, and I am not taking on the superstitious aspects of religion. But when religion, particularly fundamental Christianity in this case, stands between children and some of the finest literature created in this and the last century, someone needs to attempt to shake them to their senses. Witches and wizards, except for members of Wicca, do not exist.

People cannot cast spells like the characters in Rowling's novels. No one has ever exited who can do that, neither do they now nor will they ever in the future. We see life, or should see life, through the lenses of modern science. We see our souls through the lenses of religion. We know more now than those sad, deluded people in Salem, Mass., who condemned innocent men and women to death because they were found to be different and who could perhaps do something someone else could not do. Like the woman condemned a witch because she made apple dumplings. She had to make one in front of the court to prove she did not use magic to get the apple inside the pastry.

Finally, who am I to say all this with such great authority, condemning as a fool anyone who believes in the reality of magic and witchcraft? Read Harry Potter and the Deathly Hollows; I may be Lord Voltemorte.