The utter inconsequentiality of contemporary atheism is a social and spiritual catastrophe. Something splendid and irreplaceable has taken leave of our culture—some great moral and intellectual capacity that once inspired the more heroic expressions of belief and unbelief alike.

Yes, many of our lot have "grown up" and "grown out" of banal and baseless cultural superstitions and unfounded edicts from authority figures. That this has happened has been the result of an all too long battle against the ongoing forces of unreason and superstition.

I am always suspicious of any rebuke of this type that harkens back to times of lore; for that "splended irreplaceable" "something" that just seems to be missing from today's arguments. It could well be that it is absurd to try to compare the arguments of today to those of 200 or 300 years ago, since our collective state of science and knowledge has, well, progressed since then. Arguments -- at least the ones of any universal value -- are based on what is presently known, and we know so much more now than we did of Hume's time.

This vapid writer is clearly a "romantic" in the literary sense of the word. No doubt, he believes in the concept of the "nobel savage" as well.

The insouciance with which, for instance, Daniel Dennett tends to approach such matters is so torpid as to verge on the reptilian. He scarcely bothers even to get the traditional “theistic” arguments right, and the few ripostes he ventures are often the ones most easily discredited.

Right. So propound for us an argument that discredits what Dennet had to say. Your "say so" and unfounded proclamations won't do.

This article is not only the "Courtier's reply"; it's worse than that. It's also imbued with, how shall I say....with an air which can only be described by paraphrasing thusly: "These arguments are not how I would present my case, therefore I dismiss them all."

Vapid and insidious verbal masturbation. Move on.