Fail Quote: Fischer: Hitchens is in Hell “because God loves him”

From the crème-du-bigot Bryan Fischer:

Transcript from Right Wing Watch:

Let's assume for the sake of argument that Christopher Hitchens maintained his resolve and did not turn, he did not repent, he died an unrepentant and defiant atheist. That would mean today, if the Scriptures mean anything, that he is in Hell today.

But here's my point, the point I was making earlier is that if he is, if Christopher Hitchens is, in fact, in Hell, he's there because God loves him. Not because God hates him but because God loves him. And I explained what I mean by that. What I mean by that is that God loves us enough to, in the end, give us what he insist on having. If we are determined to have our own way then God, in the end, is going to give us what we insist on having, because that's what you do for people you love.

...

Now if you think about it, and I mention this earlier, to me it would not be a loving thing for God to say to Christopher Hitchens "you spent your entire life, you're still defying me. You died in defiance, you still are in defiance as you stand before me. You don't want anything to do with me. You don't want anything to do with my son. You don't want anything to do with my Gospel. You don't want anything to do with word of God. You don't want anything to do with other people that are followers of me." It would not be a loving thing to compel someone like Christopher Hitchens to spend the rest of eternity in a place that he hated, a place that he does not want to be, a place that he has no desire to be, a place that he has spent all of his life resisting, condemning, avoiding, refusing to embrace. To me, that's not love, that would be a form of cruelty.

So, in short, because God loves Hitchens, he sent him to Hell because that’s where Hitchens wanted to go by not believing in Heaven.

Y’see, there’s just one or two problems with that reasoning, Fischer. (Well, actually, there’s a plethora of problems, but I don’t have that much patience.) For one thing, Hitchens denied Hell, too. It’s kinda intrinsic to being an atheist. So how would it not be “a form of cruelty” for God to refuse to send Hitchens to one place he hated in favor of another place he hated?

Second, the idea of loving someone enough to let them have what they want against your better judgment (which sounds like one big fallacy in itself) relies rather obviously upon the assumption that they know what they want based on the knowledge and evidence they have. If God is real and Hell does exist and Hitchens is destined to damnation due to his blasphemin’ nonbelief, the real cruelty is, in fact, to cast him there due to his own (hypothetically) faulty assessment of his post-mortem fate.

Either way, God’s not exactly coming across as quite the loving ruler Fischer tries to paint him as.

Tags: Bryan Fischer • Christopher Hitchens • Hell • God • Heaven