Out of Touch, Out of Date

From masticating gleefully over Europe's near-empty churches and ignorant clergy to blasting Matthew for a "mistranslation" of Is. 7:14; from weeping about the Dark Ages and indulgences to assuming the JEDP theory true just because some liberal said so; from following the line about anonymity to the Gospels to hinting that Jesus was homosexual and/or self-delusional; from quoting Thomas Paine as an authority to calling ancient people stupid, All in the Mind is little more than a catalog of the most common skeptical arguments molded into sound bites, placed like cubes of meat and vegetables on a skewer and cooked until burnt to a crisp. Kennedy offers not a single original thought here; even his merely historical portions of the book, consisting of a very, very brief and simplistic look at the evolution of religious thought and the growth of atheism (you may as well speak of the "growth" of a bristlecone pine) are done far better, and in a far more interesting and complete way, in a variety of sources.

Kennedy thinks we're all deluded for believing in any God, especially the Biblical one. That estimation, coming as it does from someone who clearly used no more sources than he was able to find at the closest library, calls for no more than extended bout of laughter from our quarter. Since there is nothing within that has not already been refuted on this page and elsewhere, I see little in the book other than yet another angry apostate working out his frustrations over Sister Mary Mulch whacking him on the hand with a ruler for talking too loud during class. Give it a pass.