God meets Christopher Hitchens

I’m sure you remember the guy who used to write books and articles, essays and critiques, drank like a fish and smoked pretty much whenever he wanted. Who loved life - and his family. Who never ran away from a debate and who managed to instill fear into theists and pride into atheists.

I am, of course, talking about Christopher Hitchens.

He died from cancer end of 2011, yes, it’s that long ago already. He died as a non-believer, a kafir, an infidel, an atheist. He did not believe there was sufficient reason to believe that gods existed and even if they did, he did not need or want one, especially if it was the Abrahamic god. He despised the holier than thou community and their feeble excuses for their gods.

He respected those who were able to articulate their beliefs even if he did not agree with them, and detested those who simply lied or treated human dignity with contempt.

When he died, he did so as a proud man, a human being who had influenced millions and helped to shape the self-confidence of atheists on this planet and had injected energy into those who resist the fundamentalist religiosity we see so often today. He managed to sway religious people all over the planet with his dry wit and logical train of thought. He put doubt into many and received countless letters of gratitude from those who had realized there was no evidence for the existence of any god. That’s how good Christopher Hitchens was at convincing people using just his brain and words.

When Christopher Hitchens died, he went straight to hell. He did not pass go or spend time in a holding area while his fate was discussed or his deeds evaluated.

The Hitch caused so much damage to the reputation of gods that he would immediately be cast into the hottest pit in hell, where he was destined to burn and re-burn and then burn some more for eternity and good measure.

The devil had heard of the arrival of this illustrious guest and went to see what all the fuss was about. They chatted and then chatted some more the next day. Heaven and hell keep day and night periods just for convenience, you must know.

This debating carried on for some time and after a year, the devil took some sort of basic pity on the poor, wretched creature and he started lightening the load a bit, seeing that it was for eternity anyway.

A year after that, the devil was feeling a slight bit sorry for our poor Christopher Hitchens and he organized him some smokes. I am taking some liberties here as I maintain that people get their full bodies back. Burning a guy who died in a horrible train crash when he lost all limbs without legs and arms would only be half the pleasure so they are replaced as are the original body parts which were donated and transplanted or replaced by artificial ones. If you die in an explosion from dynamite strapped to your body and only a few cells are all that remains there is no fun just roasting these few cells. So these cells are refilled with the complete body. And then shipped off to heaven – they don’t go to hell, what was I thinkin?

So another year and many debates later, the Hitch has managed to get the devil feel outright sorry for him and so the devil built him a bar, where he can sit and smoke while he chats to some really interesting people, swirling the whiskey in his glass. It’s not yet Johnnie Walker Black Label, but they are getting there.

Now god hears about this. Bad news travels fast. God throws a temper tantrum and thinks to himself, “what? This guy has caused me so much grief. I have lost millions of paying members and now he’s sitting in a warm place, smoking and sipping on whiskey at a bar, debating people?”

He decides to visit hell and tell the devil he’s not doing his job properly. Give him a warning.

So, off he goes and descends into hell.

Here, I have a bit of a logical problem. God is supposed to be everywhere, omni-present. But there’s a throne, in Islam there’s even a house and the throne is above the waters, so there are some contradictory elements here, so anyway, logically, god, being omni-present and all, should be in hell anyway and all the time.

Let’s leave that and pretend any of this makes sense. So god packs his overnight case, the toothbrush, toothpaste, shampoo, condoms, well you never know, you know, Maria was quite a dish and look what happened there, so he makes sure to get it right. Shaver, shaving cream, erm does god prefer wet or electric?  some deodorant, nail clippers, a comb and a change of underwear – and off he goes.

I don’t actually know how a god travels. With reindeer? Unicorns? Several Buraqs?

If an angel takes a day, how long does a god take to get from the heavenly penthouse on the 7^th floor all the way to hell? So many questions….

Let’s just say he arrives, settles in, freshens up a bit and then talks to the devil. But the devil tells him to go lump it and see for himself how far he can get. So, god decides to go and talk to Christopher Hitchens himself to see if he can’t talk some sense into him. He goes up to the bar, grabs a chair and sits down to talk to the Hitch.

So they talk and talk and talk.

To this day, god has not been seen by anyone in heaven because he is still in hell. He is now an atheist.