Skip to main content

Stanford Appoints Atheist Chaplain


There's an atheist chaplain at Stanford. This is good news. John Figdor has a degree from Harvard Divinity School and he does what chaplains do. He counsels those in need and visits the sick. And what's more, he's welcomed as part of the Office of Religious Life. His appointment not only broadens the conversation about "belief" and "unbelief" but also exposes the confusion at the heart of that conversation. We are often talking at cross-purposes. As Figdor points out, "Atheist, agnostic and humanist students suffer the same problems as religious students - deaths or illnesses in the family, questions about the meaning of life, etc. - and would like a sympathetic nontheist to talk to."

Evidently he's part of a growing number of "faith-free" chaplains at universities. All the benefits of religion without the god bit. And here's where the conversation, with all its risk of confusion, gets interesting. For me, faith is all about freedom. For others, faith is a form of closed-mindedness. The early Christians were called atheists and the tradition in which I was trained taught me that one of the reasons to believe in God is that it saves you from having to believe in anything else! Everyone, as Paul Tillich taught us decades ago, owes an allegiance to some "Ultimate Concern" and freedom relies on that concern to be incapable of being manipulated.

Read complete article at -- http://www.huffingtonpost.com/alan-jones/an-atheist-chapaincy-a-good-way-to-begin-the-new-year_b_2366663.html?ncid=edlinkusaolp00000008

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Why did they lay their coats at Saul's feet?

The witnesses, laying their coats at the feet of Saul, were the men that would cast the first stones at Stephen in Acts 7. Why did they all lay their coats at Saul’s feet? The Talmud contains a very interesting account of the act of stoning that may provide the answer. “When the trial was over, they take him [the condemned person] out to be stoned. The place of stoning was at a distance from the court, as it is said, ‘Take out the one who has cursed.’ [i] A man stands at the entrance of the court; in his hand is a signaling flag [Hebrew   sudarin = sudar , ‘scarf, sweater’]. A horseman was stationed far away but within sight of him. If one [of the judges] says, ‘I have something [more] to say in his favor,’ he [the signaler] waves the   sudarin , and the horseman runs and stops them [from stoning him]. Even if [the condemned person] himself says, ‘I have something to say in my favor,’ they bring him back, even four of five times, only provided that there is some substance to...
Post a Comment
Read more

Are Saul and Paul the Same Person?

There has always been some confusion over whether Saul and Paul is the same person. The confusion begins in the Book of Acts. ● “Then Barnabas departed for Tarsus to seek Saul . . . he brought him to Antioch . . . for a whole year they taught a great many people. And the disciples were first called ‘ Christians ’ in Antioch .” ( Acts 11:25-26 ) ● “ Then Agrippa said to Paul , `You almost persuade me to become a Christian .’” ( Acts 26:28) ● “ Then Saul , who also  is called   Paul . . . ” ( Acts 13:9a ) Based on the three verses above, we would assume they are references to the same person – but is he the Paul we read about in the Epistles? The name “ Saul ” doesn’t appear in the Epistles. In order to answer that question we must examine the stories of the “ conversion experiences ” of Saul in Acts and Paul in Galatians . Pay close attention to the time periods and places mentioned in both accounts. Saul’s experience is found in Acts 9 and...
Post a Comment
Read more

Rabbi Stephen S. Wise’s Sermon at Synagogue on Jewish Jesus Causes a Storm

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stephen_Samuel_Wise#/media/File:Stephen_Samuel_Wise.jpg Rabbi Stephen S. Wise gave this sermon in late December 1925 and it set off a storm of protests in Jewish communities.  Before you read the article, it is important for you to be aware of some of the accomplishments of Rabbi Wise. ● a founder of the New York Federation of Zionist Societies in 1897 ● first vice-president of the   Oregon State Conference of Charities and Correction in 1902 ● appointed Commissioner of Child Labor for the State of Oregon in 1903 ● co-founded the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) ● founding of American Jewish Congress (AJCongress) in 1918 ● founded the   Jewish Institute of Religion, an educational center in New York City  in 1922 ● founding president of the World Jewish Congress in 1936 (created to fight Nazism) ● co-chair of the American Zionist Emergency Council in WWII ● hel...
Post a Comment
Read more