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Harvard’s New Atheist Chaplain: Like Hiring a Plumber Who Denies the Existence of Water

Zo Rachel explores the credentials of this anti-God Ivy League spiritual advisor with Bill Whittle and Stephen Green on this Right Angle.

Harvard's New Atheist Chaplain: Like Hiring a Plumber Who Denies the Existence of Water

Harvard chooses an atheist as its new chaplain. It’s like hiring a plumber who doesn’t believe in the existence of water. Zo Rachel explores the credentials of this anti-God Ivy League spiritual advisor with Bill Whittle and Stephen Green on this Right Angle.

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28 replies on “Harvard’s New Atheist Chaplain: Like Hiring a Plumber Who Denies the Existence of Water”

How does a Trans person become a bishop? God put you in the wrong body or god does not make mistakes. Pick one so we can know what is it we should believe

All of this language we’re using about what’s going on at Harvard and other schools: “indoctrination,” i.e., “doctrine,” “belief,” “dogma,” and so forth, are explicitly religious terms.

Zo’s point about the establishment of a state religion is really important. These are the new Tests, which are explicitly prohibited by our Constitution.

But this is just one more example of the Left’s determination to invert everything. If something is traditional, objectively true, or held up as a virtue, Leftists must turn it into the opposite of what it is. This is Leftism, trans-humanism, and marxism in a nutshell.

Atheists, or I prefer that they are more correctly called “Anti-Theists”, are not confined to the Left. We have plenty of them right here on this site.

One person whose political opinions and socio-political thinking are very well thought out and very correct claims he has “proof” that there is no God and every chance he gets he cites that “proof” like a Bibliography. It’s the same references every time.

Yet he claims that he’s “studied” the topic exhaustively. He has said he wants to understand how people who seem reasonably intelligent like me, Zo, Bill, Scott and a whole lot of other conservatives here … etc. can believe in something he cannot acknowledge.

Is such a person applying his own intellect, honestly and thoroughly to the issue?

No … He’s read the things that he feels support his anti-theist stance and ignores everything else.

That’s not exhaustive study, it’s exhaustive confirmation bias. It is a self imposed blindness. Such people make themselves so blind to they don’t even realize, nor will they admit, they’ve done it to themselves.

Why?

It’s not just a worship of Science. Science with a capital “S” is the dogma and scientists the priests but there’s a lot more to it than that.

What do these people on the Left, Right and everywhere in-between have in common?

That’s easy. They worship intellect. Either their own (which is most commonly the case with Conservative anti-theists) or someone else’s (much more prevalent among the Left).

If you ask them they will give you some version of “If I can’t grasp it and you can’t prove it then it does not exist. I will only accept as fact the things that can be demonstrated, deduced or extrapolated unless the demonstration, deduction or extrapolation involves a Supernatural Judeo-Christian God.”.

Let me give you an example.

On August 17th, Linda Hopkins linked a video here on this site in a member blog post titled “The Fundamental Constants and Quantities are Fine Tuned”.

Here’s a link to that post. Go there and watch that video now if you want to understand the points I’m making. It’s only 6 minutes, it won’t waste an undue amount of your time and I would argue you’ll learn something well worth the time it takes to learn it. The rest of what I have to say will still be here when you get back. Read the comments too, so I don’t have to repeat myself.

https://billwhittlecom.wpenginepowered.com/the-fundamental-constants-and-quantities-of-the-universe-are-fine-tuned/#comment-46238

That video proves beyond all “science”, beyond all logic and beyond all intellectual argument — That scientifically and statistically there is no way we should be here, that the universe would not exist, if science and statistical probability were reliable yardsticks that can be applied from a purely intellectual position. The very existence of the observable universe crushes the Second Law of Thermodynamics (the law of increasing entropy wherein all things if left to themselves will eventually achieve equilibrium) while at the same time making that Law an observable fact. If that kind of thing is what your argument relies upon then you have no argument in the face of those unequivocal facts. So …

Obviously intellect is not something that can be counted upon to supply a foundational, well rounded view of reality.

Does that video prove there’s a God? Nope, it does not prove the existence of God nor does it disprove the same.

What it does prove is that there are things that well exceed our ability to understand and those things are so unlikely as to be for all reasonable, non-absurd purposes impossible from an intellectual standpoint. It proves that intellect is not sufficient to understand the observable universe without some underlying design which of course necessitates a designer. Seriously. You did watch that video, didn’t you?

Uh, huh … not so fast … There’s an interesting conundrum here.

That conundrum is that we can reach conclusions by intellectual endeavor so … What that video also proves is that we can grasp intellectually the conclusive improbability of our own existence. Neat, huh?

Actually, to be consistent with known facts, there would be no atheists. Only agnostics. The best anyone could hope for along those lines is to say “I don’t know. I don’t know how to explain the fact that we exist and I don’t know if there’s a God who created all of reality”.

Anything else would be inconsistent with the observable universe. Which would be a denial not an affirmation of their own intellect.

How can this be? That’s not hard to figure out either.

An anti-theist, aware of the fact or not, worships his own intellect. He places his understanding ahead of known facts.

This is like a person blind from birth trying to argue with a sighted person that there is no such thing as color. The sighted person can see colors no matter what intellectual, experiential, philosophical or other argument the blind person makes. Because the blind person cannot directly experience color, color does not exist to him. The sighted person can insist that yes, there are colors and describe them to the blind person. The sighted person’s world view is based on obvious, observable, provable facts. The sighted person’s opinions are based on more information than the blind person has available.

The difference here is that the blind person cannot experience colors no matter what the sighted person might say. The blind person is limited in intellectual ideation regarding colors and has no choice. His only real option if he wants to be correct and consistent is to take the word of the sighted person and proceed from there. “Taking the word of” is another way of saying “Faith”.

Whereas an anti-theist has intentionally limited his own intellect. He must use the very intellect he worships to deny or absurdly explain away the profound statistical improbability demonstrated in the video you should have watched in order to understand what I’m saying.

The anti-theist is saying in effect “I cannot taste a color, hear a texture or smell a sound therefor those things do not exist.”

He can do this because despite his claims to have exhaustively studied the issue he hasn’t really done that at all. He needs to seek, understand and argue both sides of the issue in order to do that and be consistent.

This is why I generally do not argue the existence of God with an anti-theist. There’s no point in discussing something with someone who refuses to see a color or taste a flavor and is so bound up in that position that he will never admit to himself that colors and flavors exist. He keeps his eyes and his mouth firmly shut. He will only open his eyes at night when all colors fade to shades of gray. He will only taste water because if he has to admit hot sauce exists he has to finally become intellectually honest with himself.

He thinks he has the killer argument, the final conclusion of his vast intellect and why should I waste my time on such people? He’s already blinded himself so what would be the point of arguing colors?

No one, to my knowledge in my entire experience of well over sixty years of my highly unlikely existence, has ever been persuaded to any sort of Faith by intellectual argument. This is the fault in the nature of persuasion simply because it is possible for a human mind not to be persuaded no matter what argument is brought to bear. Doing that is using the wrong perception for all the reasons I states above. You can describe a color to a blind person but you cannot make him experience red, white and blue. He has to do that for himself. Which is yet another argument for a Personal God.

I’m fine with that. I don’t have to answer for people who have willfully blinded and compartmentalized their intellects. I don’t care enough about you to make the slightest bit of difference to me … If you’re that sort. What I will not tolerate is you trying to attack me as some kind of intellectual midget because I believe in God and you chose not to. I don’t worship my own intellect, it is a tool not a deity to me.

If you’re an anti-theist then in order to discuss this topic with me you have to learn some of the things I know. I don’t have to counter your arguments, you have to counter mine. You’re the one saying I’m wrong, all I’m saying is that you don’t know enough, certainly not as much as you think you do. You have to argue my points with me because I know your arguments already, I’ve been hearing them for north of 60 years. It’s my arguments that you are not familiar with even if you are telling yourself that you have “exhaustively studied” my side of the issue.

You can start by going to —

http://www.reasonablefaith.org/videos
and …
https://www.reasonablefaith.org/reasonable-faith-video-podcast

… and watching all the videos there. That would be a great start. That’s a lot but until you understand the concepts involved you cannot discuss this rationally. Unless you do this you cannot claim to have thoroughly examined the issue and all you’re going on is your own confirmation bias, which I’m not going to try to argue with you as it cannot be done.

I also highly recommend Dennis Prager’s “The Rational Bible“.

Take notes both for and against. Once you’ve done that we can discuss it if you can refrain from trying to proselytizing me into your “No God” religious beliefs and if you can discuss things civilly without the usual smarmy condescension oozed by anti-theists. Your willful denial of facts does not make you in any way superior, it just makes you feel that way. Which is why you probably won’t ever acknowledge something as simple as the fact you shouldn’t even be here if what you hold to be the ultimate truth were in fact true.

Just responding to your usage of “anti-theist.”

The word “Atheist” an English derivative of the Latin “atheos,” which is formed by the Latin prefix “a-” placed before the word “theist.” The Latin prefix “a-” means “from,” “away from,” “against,” or “the opposite of.” Or “anti.”

Another example is “amoral.”

(The Latin construction is in turn derived from a similar word in ancient Greek.)

Your choice of “anti-theist” may be more widely understood today, where unlike at early Harvard, few people know Latin or Greek.

All true however … Modern vernacular is the language we now speak, not classical Latin though of course many words we use today derive from that root.

For example take the word “homophobe”. In classical Latin “homo” means “man” and phobe means “fear”. In the application of classic Latin the word “homophobe” means “one who fears man” and thus “homophobia” means “the fear of man”. It’s an absurdity but … That’s not how the word came into being and that’s not what the word commonly means.

It’s not based on classical Latin as it would appear at first glance. It was coined by George Weinberg, a psychologist in the early 1960’s and is a blend of the words “homosexual” and “phobia”. It means “fear of homosexuals” and is a ridiculous concept in itself. The word is clearly a derogatory pejorative aimed at any opposition to the legitimization of homosexuality. I don’t know and have never met anyone who is afraid of homosexuals or homosexuality, the mere idea is as absurd as the Latin interpretation would be … were it derived from a Latin root

This absurdity is made even clearer when we do use Latin root words for commonly held fears. Arachnophobia (fear of spiders), Agoraphobia (fear of the market place/fear of crowds), Xenophobia (fear of others), etc. It’s clear that when “phobia” is the root it means “fear” and the idea of fearing homosexuals simply because they are homosexual is preposterous.

(Not that there’s nothing ever to fear from any homosexual. When I was a kid there was a known homosexual in my small town who had a thing for prepubescent boys. We young boys were all warned about him and told to stay away. He was not feared by us kids because he was homosexual, he was feared because he was known to hurt and do disgusting things to little boys. I can’t help wondering to this day if many “lost boys” are the result of someone like him taking his deviance a little too far resulting in a small body in a shallow grave somewhere. This is not a homosexual thing, this is a deviant pervert thing because it occurs among heterosexuals and little girls too.)

Your explanation of etymology of words like “amoral” having derived and taking meaning from classical Latin is correct. However, it is not how “amoral” is defined in most dictionaries. Here’s the entry from Websters Dictionary Online —

amoral
1a : having or showing no concern about whether behavior is morally right or wrong amoral politicians an amoral, selfish person
b : being neither moral nor immoral specifically : lying outside the sphere to which moral judgments apply Science as such is completely amoral. — W. S. Thompson
2 : being outside or beyond the moral order or a particular code of morals amoral customs

Note that there is nothing in the common definition that denotes active opposition to morality. The word “amoral” generally means without any morality or not subject to morality rather than actively opposed to morality.

In Webster’s we find a similar entry for atheism —

atheism1a : a lack of belief or a strong disbelief in the existence of a god or any gods
b : a philosophical or religious position characterized by disbelief in the existence of a god or any gods
2 archaic : godlessness especially in conduct

Again, while your etymology is correct, the definition does not denote active opposition to theism.

The reason I prefer to use “Anti-Theist” is that it more clearly conveys the idea of one actively and consciously pursuing a position against rather than indifferent to the idea of Theism.

Not all but most people I’ve come across who call themselves “atheist” are in fact actively and adamantly opposed to any sort of theism. They are themselves proselytizing their own religious belief and their religion is the “Church of No God”. They proselytize with all the fervor of a Jihadi or Calvinist missionary.

This is why I prefer to refer to such people as “anti-theists”. I didn’t coin that phrase and it is not original to me. It has been used in the English language since 1788.

It’s an important distinction to know which type, atheist or anti-theist, you’re dealing with. They’re not the same thing. On the one hand atheists simply do not believe in God and the subject doesn’t interest them. On the other hand anti-theists are actively opposed to any belief in God and actively “preach” against religious beliefs.

Here’s a website that does a good job of comparing atheism to anti-theism if you want to learn more on this subject.
https://www.differencebetween.com/difference-between-atheist-and-anti-theist/

Here’s the summary and a graphic from that page just to make things clearer and easier.

Summary – Atheist vs Anti-theist

Atheists do not believe in god, but they also do not feel a need to oppose gods or those who believe in god. They may be indifferent to religion or may even feel that religion is beneficial to individuals and society. In contrast, anti-theism is more than just a disbelief in the existence of god. Anti-theists believe that religion negatively affects individuals and society. Thus, this is the difference between atheist and anti-theist.

There’s nothing new under the sun. Thomas Aquinas wrote Faith and Reason.

All of this atheism and scientism that you describe comes down to hubris, as you say: if you can’t prove it to my big brain’s satisfaction, then it’s not true or doesn’t exist.

And that is just the sin of pride.

Humility, on the other hand, accepts that I can’t know, much less understand, everything. I must leave open the possibility that there are beings out there who have greater capacities than I have.

Satan tempted Eve by telling her that she could be like God, and know everything. Her pride led her to believe him.

Today’s atheists, trans-humanists, and marxists likewise believe that they can know everything, that if it can’t be proven to their own personal satisfaction, it must not exist, or it must not be true.

They turn a tool, science, into an idol to be worshipped, because their pride prohibits them from humbly seeking. Things are only important in reference to their own selves. But then they have to virtue signal to show their adherence to their religion’s inverted dogmas.

(Insert paragraph about “antifa’s” lack of self awareness here.)

I’ve been pondering that word, “atheist”. “A” is a prefix that is used as “not”, and I suppose it could be used as “anti”.

Then there’s “theist”.

Definition of theology

1 : the study of religious faith, practice, and experience

especially : the study of God and of God’s relation to the world

What the major arguments against there being “a God” seem to boil down to, at least to the casual atheist, is that there’s not a dude floating around in space literally named “God” with a capital “G” (or “Allah” with a capital “A”, “Jehova”, etc) wearing a robe with long white hair and that looks humanoid and goes around literally proclaiming things into being by prefixing it with the words “let there be”, running around tsk-tsking certain activities that may seem innocuous to others.

If that were the case I’d have a lot more sympathy toward it. Growing up I was taught, by my religion, that there is no way we can comprehend God. That our religion is our best attempt at a practical understanding of our Creator and our relationship with “It”.

I think this is what all “legit” religions try to do (and by that I mean, if it’s not trying to do that in an earnest way, then it’s not a “legit” religion).

Hence the popular “Flying Spaghetti Monster” or “FSM” … “I might as well believe in The Flying Spaghetti Monster”.

In the end, FSM’s “explanation” of our Creator is that there is no Creator, and that there is nothing to have a relationship with, and so FSM, it would seem, vanishes in a puff of logic. A circular argument.

Where this video was posted on facebook, there were many comments from casual atheists berating Zo for being “prideful” and condescending, reasoning from the standpoint that he understands Zo’s religion better than Zo does (I love it when they do that … basically try to tell religious people what they believe and therefore why they should not be attacking, even verbally, those who disbelieve). One of them helpfully “pointed out” that the atheist “chaplain” has more in common theologically with the other chaplains than with those who go to the other chaplains…

Though, of course, if you are an atheist … by the very construction of the word … at best you your “theism” or “theology” is the null hypothesis. So what exactly can they possibly have in common?

So imagine I’m a troubled student going to my atheist chaplain for advice to sooth my troubled … well, psyche since I obviously have no soul.

Any helpful advice I get is going to have to be wrapped in some cloak of morality (for why should I be troubled about anything at all, even child sacrifice, if there is no morality?).

Anything that claims there is some underlying morality without acknowledging that a built-in morality has to come from a judge outside of ourselves is kicking the can down the road no less than those who stop at “there’s this dude out in space named ‘God’ with a capital ‘G’ wearing a robe and proclaiming things into being by prefixing it with the words ‘let there be’, running around tsk-tsking certain activities that may seem innocuous to others.”

In other words, they get to a place where they run out of the ability to explain and they stop and give a hypothesis about it. His hypothesis on any morality outside of our own individual selves would have to be “it just is” if he is truly without a theology (a-theist).

But in a universe where they believe that there is no such source. That everything is physical, that there is no “spiritual”. “Spiritual” is just electrons firing in neurons, and so Hannibal Lecter is just as moral as Mother Theresa.

For a tediously long and in-depth explanation of word etymology and the the importance of the difference between an atheist and an anti-theist see my reply to Laura above.

Briefly, on that topic anti-theists are hiding behind a label they do not deserve (to wit: “atheist”) in the same way that Leftists are hiding behind the label “Liberal”. I think I covered that to death so if you want to know why I use “anti-theist” instead of “atheist” you can read all that if you like.

I agree with you completely.

There is a school of “scientific” thought that maintains people inherit their moralities by means of a “virtue gene”. It’s an attempt to prove that God the Standard, Judge and Prosecutor of immorality isn’t necessary. It’s ridiculous because …

The people forwarding that theory are the same people who support the immoralities we know to be detrimental to the human condition. They might not be murderers and thieves but they do support transgenderism, the validation of homosexuality, equality of outcome, Leftist social deconstruction and the rest of the social ills now plaguing America. The “study” included children from broken homes, already problematic in the view of what is and is not foundational morality.

If you study which animals are edible and most of your animals are pigs, cows and chickens then the baseline conclusion is that all animals are edible. They’re not. In fact not all parts of some edible animals are edible either. Try eating a bear liver and see what happens to you.

If the “virtue gene” were true then it would be absent in all examples of people who exhibit antisocial behaviors. Studying prison populations would betray this lack. It does not. There are environmental aspects involved but the prison populations of the United States are some of the most genetically catalogued groups in the entire world. Because in almost all cases now a genetic sample is taken from prisoners, it just happens to be the best, broadest data source available for study.

There is no test for the “virtue gene”, it is deduced through sophistry without any proof, or at least without any more proof than that the globe will become uninhabitable in the next 12 years due to climate change. I’ve read quite a bit on this and you’re welcome to look into it if you like but … It’s the tail wagging the dog and nothing more. There’s a huge difference between “scientifically phrased bias confirmation” and actual science. Sadly and to our detriment the former is dangerously encroaching on the latter.

I’m using the “virtue gene” as an example because when you see someone forwarding that hypothesis you can be certain that person is feeding a confirmation bias and isn’t really all that knowledgeable about the scientific method. It does not follow the “hypothesis > theory > tests > proof > predictability” that the scientific method requires. If it did then prison populations would be the proof and predictability end result and the proponents of the hypothesis would crow about that. They don’t. Though it does a dandy job of scientifically phrasing a bias confirmation.

You really hit the nail on the head with the “FSM” concept of the anti-theists That’s a logical fallacy called the “ad hominem attack”. That there is obviously no old man with a flowing beard living in clouds and determining the course of events in the universe is easy to debunk. That’s why they created him, he’s a straw man easy to light on fire.

The image in the Sistine Chapel of God as an old man in the clouds is a placeholder for “that which is beyond this”. It’s the same sort of thing as “the cloud” in cloud computing where in network diagrams the internet was depicted as a cloud. The internet is not a cloud, has nothing to do with clouds and the diagramming of a cloud to represent the internet simply means “out there beyond my perimeter”.

So someone claiming they refuse to believe in the FSM is on the same order as someone who would say “I don’t believe in the internet. My devices do not connect to some cloud somewhere in the sky.” Well, duh.

Funny then how those same type people always claim to have studied theology extensively too. .They don’t seem to realize their ignorance of the subject is glaringly obvious because “they’ve studied” and come to a conclusion that suits them.

So again, when you see that kind of thing you’re not dealing with a rational, scientific mind. You’re dealing with a fanatic that is trying to proselytize you to his own religion, the Church of No God.

Funny thing too. The guy I mentioned in my original post is someone I like. His ideas on politics are well thought out and eminently valid. I just wish he would apply the same effort to this topic as he does politics. He is conspicuous by his absence in this comment section on this video.

I wonder why that is? Oh well …

Here’s the thing about non-believers. As far as I’m concerned they’re welcome to their beliefs. They’re just not welcome to lie (even though they don’t know they’re lying) and they’re not welcome to attack believers from a false position of intellectual superiority. I don’t care if they believe or not, that’s on them not me. They can’t say they weren’t told when the day comes to account. That is the end of any responsibility any believer has towards an adamant non-believer.

I want them to vote conservative whether they believe in God or not. There is no case in which I would apply a need for a religious faith compatible with mine else I would not welcome their vote in the struggle against the sociopolitical evil we’re now facing. I genuinely do not understand why they feel a need to attack my faith and I will respond in kind if they do.

If people want to emulate artificially and without God the principles that God has given us; monkey-see/monkey-do is good enough for me. They can do that without telling me (and you, and Laura, and Scott Ott, and Bill Whittle, etc.) that we’re not as smart as them because our religious beliefs are not compatible with theirs.

However, if they claim that they are moral and virtuous people in the complete absence of Judeo-Christian values and would be such wonderful human beings anyway … That’s nothing more than hubris and virtue signalling. “I’m so smart I don’t need your God and I can figure out my own morals for myself” is what got us people like Adolph Hitler and Mousy Dung.

They might not commit the same atrocities as the Nazis but every single member of the Death’s Head SS thought they were doing the right and moral thing by perpetrating industrial scale genocide. Without Judeo-Christian principles they were as right as anyone else. Just ask them, historically and metaphorically speaking of course. They didn’t see themselves as monsters and there was no impetus outside their own understanding to tell them they were.

Harvard’s actually lagging behind most western university’s. The Australian National University has excluded true Christian chaplains for years. Only heretics need apply.

As an Ivy League alumni who understands what it takes to be admitted and graduate, I detest all those who have worked to undermine the accomplishment of myself and my classmates.

Do leftists believe in anything except brute force and power? The way I see it, putting victims on a pedestal to worship, and atheists ensconced as chaplains, education as indoctrination, lies and doublespeak as truth, medical treatment causing death, attempting to subdue nature at a cost guaranteed to end humanity, euthanasia an obligation, childlessness a calling and all the other insanity they promote is nothing less than a nihilistic elitist horror scape intended to rid the planet of all but themselves and just enough serfs to serve them.

Or, perhaps they simply aim to demoralize and humiliate those of us who enjoy life, or are trying to, because their soul-less empty lives are meaningless without the infliction of torture? I suppose these hopeless, miserable people deserve pity, but I have none to give. And I am not demoralized or humiliated. I am quietly determined to thwart them in any way I possibly can, even if the only way I can do that is to continue being happy and productive in my own life.

An atheist Pastor makes as much sense as an abstinent hooker. The only people who would seek them out are people who are not really interested in their services

Lol. Good stuff. An alternative…coke dealers and bare-chested women go together like carrots and peas.

Kudos to Zo for having brought up the ridiculous idiocy of the Left for perhaps the week – at least my week. I’ve seen and read a lot of really headscratching things from the Left over the years, but I have to admit this one I didn’t foresee at all. Stealing virtue is a hallmark of the Left and I guess it was just a matter of time before faith became a target. But Steve’s analogy was spot-on — hiring a plumber who doesn’t believe in water. Or perhaps along those same lines as hiring an electrician who doesn’t believe in arc flash.
Kudos also to Zo for having brought up the historical founding of Harvard University and illustrating just how far that institute of “higher learning” has sunk.
Your signoff, Zo? Fuggedaboudit. 🙂 It’s nice to see a good-natured flub and nobody I know of thinks worse of you for it.

The electrician who doesn’t believe in electricity may at some point get the shock of his life. The atheist chaplain may experience the same thing at some point.

The Buddhists, Hindu, moslems and animists out voted the few Christian chaplains left. The atheist is seen as neutral.

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