Hauenstein Center for Presidential Studies

Hitchens vs. Hitchens: Faith, Politics & War

Christopher vs. Peter Hitchens

Gallery

 
April 3, 2008 - Brothers Christopher and Peter Hitchens debate the Iraq War and religion at an event organized by the Hauenstein Center for Presidential Studies with support from the Center for Inquiry and the Interfaith Dialogue Association.
 
Gleaves Whitney, director of the Hauenstein Center for Presidential Studies, welcomed the Grand Rapids audience to Fountain Street Church and introduced the debaters.
 
A capacity crowd of 1,400—and an online audience of 3,500—watched the debate live.
 
Peter Hitchens, one of Britain's most controversial journalists, blogs and writes a regular column for the Mail on Sunday.  Formerly a long-time writer for the Daily Express, Peter was once asked by former Prime Minister Tony Blair to "sit down and stop being bad," after an aggressive press conference confrontation.  Peter is author of The Abolition of Britain: From Winston Churchill to Princess Diana and The Abolition of Liberty: The Decline of Order and Justice in England.  He has also written for The Spectator, The Guardian, and the New Statesman.
 
Christopher Hitchens, one of the most controversial and compelling voices in Anglo-American journalism, has written twenty books, including biographies of Thomas Jefferson, Thomas Paine, and George Orwell, as well as scathing critiques of Henry Kissinger, Bill Clinton, and Mother Teresa.  Most recently, he wrote the book on atheism, God is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything, and edited The Portable Atheist: Essential Readings for the Nonbeliever.  A contributing editor to Vanity Fair, he also writes regularly for The Atlantic, The New York Times Book Review, The Nation, Harper's Magazine, Slate, and The New York Review of Books.