Christopher Hitchens came very close to elucidating why Jesus chose to be our vicarious atonement;
Why does the British national health service never run out of blood, though you’re not allowed to charge for it, you have to give it free, and it never runs out of blood? Because people like to give blood. They want to feel useful. I like to do it, I like it very much and I’m not a masochist and I don’t particularly like being stuck, but someone gains a pint and I don’t lose one because I replenish it quite quickly.
Someone’s instantly better off, I haven’t had to abnegate myself by giving anything away. I like the fact that I’m helping someone who I don’t know and as it happens I have a very rare blood group…1
Indeed, good show ol′ chap!
Now, note that he actually end with the atheist qualifier for recommending ethical actions, “…and indeed, and one day I’m going to have to count on other people feeling the same way.”
This is very, very common in atheist attempts at justifying the recommendation of ethical behavior; they know that they need to ultimately appeal to the self, the selfish, the individual. Thus, even beginning with a premise of selflessness, he ends up revealing that the motive that most appeals to atheists is the expectation of gaining in benefit of the self, the individual.
This derives from viewing humans as animals and applying to them and ethics evolutionary concepts. What I mean here is that we see what happens when a theory that is supposed to be about biology is turned into a worldview and made to apply to all issues.
Thus, ethics is asserted to have developed as a Darwinian self preservation tactic whereby the individual benefits the in-group only due to expectations that the in-group will ultimately benefit the individual. Yet, ethics is not about self-preservation, fitness and reproduction of genes.
Christopher Hitchens concluded this statement by stating,
So, human solidarity will get you quite a long way ethically and there’s every reason why that should be in our genes, in our, so to speak, inscribed, we wouldn’t have gotten this far if we didn’t have these qualities.
Indeed, good show ol′ chap!
Now, he considers that “human solidarity” is “in our genes” and “inscribed” because “we wouldn’t have gotten this far if we didn’t have these qualities.” In other words, this is another it just is of the gaps: it must be because if it were not we would not be here to discuss it. Moreover, it is so because of Darwinian self preservation and reproduction. What Christopher Hitchens has hit upon is an affirmation of the Bible’s statements about ethics, some of which are: “I will put my law in their minds and write it on their hearts” (Jeremiah 31:33, reiterated in Hebrews 10:16).
“the requirements of the law are written on their hearts, their consciences also bearing witness, and their thoughts now accusing” (Romans 2:15).
Thus, “human solidarity” is “in our genes” and “inscribed” but not because of animalistic concerns of self preservation and reproduction but due to humans being an expression of God’s image; God who is relational and loving in nature.
Consider this clip from my debate with an atheist on morality:
The main difference between a generic atheistic view of ethics and the Christian view is that on atheism ethics is based on selfishness and on Christianity ethics is based on love. Following are some examples of this:
“For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life” (John 3:16).
“Greater love has no one than this, that he lay down his life for his friends” (John 15:13).
“I lay down my life–only to take it up again. No one takes it from me, but I lay it down of my own accord” (John 10:17-18).