Culture

The sacred and the human

July 25, 2007
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In the new issue of Prospect, Roger Scruton responds to the recent spate of atheist polemics from the likes of Christopher Hitchens, Daniel Dennett and Richard Dawkins. Arguing that these books fail to comprehend the human need for the sacred, Scruton draws upon the insights of the "anthropology of religion," and in particular the French critic René Girard, to argue that religion is not, contra Hitchens et al, the cause of violence, but actually the solution to it. Let us know what you think below.