Ayn Rand said her philosophy challenged 2,000 years of western tradition. It did. These essays explore Rand's Objectivism and casts a critical eye on one nemesis of Objectivism: Christianity. In the first half of the book, you learn:

How Rand's method of communication, novels, played a major role in challenging Christianity.

How Rand's sense of life� can change the life of an individual.

How Rand explained the motivation behind dictators such as Robert Mugabe, even before he took power.

Reasons modern intellectuals won't take Rand, or her ideas, seriously.

How Rand's insights on storytelling apply to modern culture as a strategy for changing cultural and political attitudes.

How diametrically opposite Rand's views are to those of some of her religious critics.

How Rand's heirs misinterpreted libertarianism and used very non-Objectivist standards to attack libertarians.

Rand was a staunch critic of Christianity but wrote little on the topic. The second section explores areas of the faith which indicate that Rand's conclusions were correct. Here you learn:

How natural law� theory, which Rand embraced, was taken over by the church and why it is actually unrelated to religion.

The attitude of Jesus and the New Testament toward wealth, material existence and economics.

How, and why, the church, Catholic and Protestant alike, was dominated by anti-capitalist attitudes and contempt toward free markets.

Why the claim that capitalism is the result of Christianity is false, and the real reason capitalism arose in the West.

Why pro-reason people today should be thankful for the barbarian� invasions of Rome.

Why fundamentalist Christians are so obsessed with hating gay people.

Why fundamentalism, whether Islamic or Christian, is a threat, and what keeps Christian fundamentalists relatively peaceful.

Why capitalism and conservatism are in unavoidable conflict with one another.

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