Unitarian minister, Marilyn Sewell asked renowned atheist, Christopher Hitchens the following question:

Sewell: The religion you cite in your book [god is not Great] 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 any (sic) 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.

(Posted on Portlandmonthlymag.com, Dec. 17, 2009)

What is fascinating is that Christian scholar, J. Gresham Machen, and Christopher Hitchens agree on this very point.  In his brilliant and beautifully written book, Christianity and Liberalism, Machen said “liberal Christianity” was a contradiction in terms.