When Christopher Hitchens died I could not help but be saddened.

His was a voice that cut through much of the garbage that is considered human dialogue and rhetoric today. Exceedingly sharp-tongued, witty and frighteningly intelligent he spent most of his journalistic life attacking human injustice, cowardice and hypocrisy head on.

While he may be remembered most for his staunch defense of atheism this truly does not come close to defining the person. As a follower of Christ I have come to learn a great deal about the nature of my own faith through the sharp edge of the debate that raged within myself as I would read his words.

He seemed at times a lion intent on consuming everything that stumbled into his path but of course this is the perspective of a person who never really knew him except through his words.

While many saw him as attacking faith, and he most certainly did not like religion of any sort, I would like to think much of his vitriol was directed rather at the darker parts of human nature…something we can both agree on if not on the source of this darkness.

If I have learned one thing from Hitchens it is that neither passion, nor intelligence are enough, by themselves, to engage the world in effective debate; However when you put the two together you get something formidable. I hope that in some way, myself and others would be able to present our views with passionate intelligence and not simply one or the other, alone and in isolation.

I for one am saddened at the silencing of Hitchen’s voice. The world will certainly be quieter for this loss…something that is not always be good.