During a week when I was feeling philosophically vulnerable, I took a virtual stroll to Authors@Google on youtube.com. Amongst the clips of economists and business professionals, I found a provocative speech by the British atheist, Christopher Hitchens. He had just written his new book, God is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything,and spoke to the Californian headquarters the seemingly despicable nature of religion.

Being the young and impressionable religio-consumer that I am, I could not give up the opportunity to watch Hitchen's one hour speech to America's techno-elite. His unbuttoned collar and Oxford swagger charmed the Google audience with each and every three lined anecdote. The experience was both appealing and alarming.

His claim came in the form of several long-debated questions tempting listeners to conclude that religious values can be replaced by humanist qualities. "Are there any reasons to do good works within a faith that you could not do without a God?” he blatantly asked the audience. Is the human emotion of compassion and empathy an innate human trait, or religiously instilled by a church community? Ignoring my childhood background in Christian principles, if I had atheistic tendencies, I would still feel the need to be altruistic towards my fellow man. We see many celebrities in the limelight aiding the global less fortunate in the name of goodwill without mentioning a spiritual incentive to do so.

He then questioned how intellectual, rational people could accept the religious explanation for the origins of the universe and the origins of human nature. To him, scientific knowledge has left the Genesis account without any social utility, and is therefore absurd.

Considering Hitchens' point, it's true that things probably didn't happen literally the way it states in the Scripture. The stories of the Bible are almost all metaphorical, leaving vast room for interpretation. This grey area unfortunately is the cause of so many diversions and complications among religious peoples.

Despite his self-assured argument, I had to stop and think of my rebuttal. If God created the universe with all its rational principles and laws, then surely religion, the study of God and his nature, must also include science. There can not be one without the other. God is found in each miniscule cell and immaculate order of nature. Even Einstein could not deny the existence of God because there was no possible way that such an incredible perfect order could be random.

The Q&A session brought out some meek skeptics, though none dare
battle with Hitchens' Oxford backed authority. A slightly braver soul asked, "What about the fundamental human need for the spiritual." Mr. Hitchen quipped, "Yes mankind needs it, but human need for spiritual is not a need for the supernatural." He then proceeded to trounce on belief in fairies, angels, voodoo, vampires and other mystical rabble.

It is careless to cast aside these powers. Many people can give testament to the validity of angels, demons, fairies and such. The only way of understanding the ‘supernatural’ is to take into account the legitimacy of the world beyond and how our physical lives are entangled with an intangible spiritual realm.

Although I am half way smitten with his British wit and colorful stories, I've slowly extricated my affinity to the arguments. Somehow no matter his rationality, a world without hymns of praise, prayers for the deceased, matrimonial ceremonies, coming of age rituals, moral standards, blessings for the less fortunate, redemption and God-centered charity would not be so great. Why give that up, when they are deemed the most important things in life? It keeps mankind humble and drives us to be resilient.

Supernatural phenomena, I'll give you a second chance.