From the "Unintentionally Entertaining" File

Here is an amusing article wherein Christopher Hitchens, atheist, demonstrates a deeper knowledge of orthodox Christianity that his interviewer, who happens to be a Unitarian Universalist minister. See especially the fourth question by Marilyn Sewell and Hitchens's response:

[Sewell]: The religion you cite in your book is generally the fundamentalist faith of various kinds. I’m a liberal Christian, and I don’t take the stories from the scripture literally. I don’t believe in the doctrine of atonement (that Jesus died for our sins, for example). Do you make and distinction between fundamentalist faith and liberal religion?

[Hitchens] I would say that if you don’t believe that Jesus of Nazareth was the Christ and Messiah, and that he rose again from the dead and by his sacrifice our sins are forgiven, you’re really not in any meaningful sense a Christian.

I respect Hitchens, who is generally a great thinker despite his tragic disbelief. It speaks volumes that he is so informed on the apostolic faith while the "minister," also tragically, is not.