Reviewed in Winter 2018 issue of Pantheist Vision:

Book Review by Harold Wood

Chet Raymo, a Ph.D physicist and popular science writer, was raised as a Catholic, and remained devout up through college. But soon, his science courses, even in a Jesuit college, led him to question traditional beliefs. As his understanding of science grew, so his attitude toward the meaning of God changed as well. Like many Catholics, Teilhard de Chardin was his avenue into adopting a spirituality based more on evolution, replacing the Bible or the teachings of the Church. Today, Raymo is a respected member of the Religious Naturalist Association Board of Advisors. He states his beliefs as follows:

So this is my Credo. I am an atheist, if by God one means a transcendent Person who acts willfully within the creation. I am an agnostic in that I believe our knowledge of "what is" is partial and tentative-a tiny flickering flame in the overwhelming shadows of our ignorance. I am a pantheist in that I believe empirical knowledge of the sensate world is the surest revelation of whatever is worth being called divine. I am a Catholic by accident of birth.

Much of the book deals with Raymo’s insistence that to affirm “absolute belief” in anything is simply wrong; that with a scientific point of view we must always realize how ignorant we are of the facts of the world. We find answers to many questions using science, but those in turn inevitably raise new questions. The scientific enterprise is not intended to find the “ultimate” answers to the Big Questions about the meaning of life and the universe, but to find answers to the little questions. Raymo also completely rejects “cultural accretions that religious traditions” apply to “Mystery” - “the anthropomorphisms, misplaced pieties, triumphalism, intolerance toward “infidels,” supposed miracles, and supernatural natural imaginings,” which he calls “Memes without substance.” Thus, Raymo forthrightly eschews anything supernatural, or any form of “deity” whatsoever. Inspired equally by Walt Whitman (see page 7 of this issue) and the latest brain science, he asserts that there is nothing in the human body or brain that could be the locus of a “soul.” Yet, he still counts himself as among the “religious.”

He explains that the reason he is a “religious” naturalist and not a purely secular naturalist is because he doesn’t want to lose the experience of “the mind-stretching, jaw-dropping, in-your-face wonder of the universe itself, the Heraclitean mystery that hides in every rainbow, every snowflake, every living cell.”

It is this latter sense of mystery that make Raymo embrace the term “agnostic” - not just in a traditional religious sense, but in a scientific sense. His insistence that we must accept that we never will know everything makes him reluctant to embrace Pantheism wholeheartedly. Like most Pantheists, he does believe the “sensate world” is indeed worthy of being called divine, but, again like most Pantheists, he fears falling into the trap of “certainty” about anything. Without more explanation than that slender reed, he says the term “Pantheist” isn’t quite right for him. But why he thinks that a sense of “awe” and “wonder” and willingness to affirm that “we just don’t know” everything no matter how deep our scientific expertise explores the world is inconsistent with Pantheism, I cannot fathom.

In fact, as Raymo says, “With the discovery of the universe of the galaxies, the geologic eons, the wonders of evolution, and the dance of the DNA, our eyes are opened to a majesty and a mystery of far greater dimension than the Olympian deities of our ancestors - or of the slightly more abstracted personal God worshipped by most believers today.” To my mind, the logical result of these scientific discoveries makes the truth of Pantheism virtually self-evident. Our Creator is the Universe, and evolution and DNA is how it creates. The majesty and mystery in the natural world far exceeds those of “Olympian deities,” — what can be more divine than that?

When God Is Gone Everything Is Holy by Chet Raymo is an intriguing book that offers the religious and secular alike diverse views about religious living. He explained how nature in a Heraclitean way hides itself. As a scientist he ventured to peel back the many layers of nature to find its meanings. Such an endeavor has led to some surprises and discoveries. How come a staunch Roman Catholic with a graduate education in physics from the University of Notre Dame became a critic of the Catholic faith? This was because of his training in the empirical research methodology as a scientist who investigated life’s natural phenomena.
The writer as a result came to disbelieve in the teachings of Roman Catholicism although he liked its liturgical celebrations. He nevertheless saw sin, free will, miracles, and the soul as religious beliefs that lacked authenticity in the lab. Raymo described Catholic beliefs as being paternalistic, and Eurocentric. He sided with some notable historical figures like Gerard Manley Hopkins, Charles Darwin, and Teilhard de Chardin in support of his arguments. The author also referred to Richard Dawkins, and Sam Harris with whom he had issues with, but had kind words for Thomas Merton’s ideas about nature. Raymo concluded that he would best be described as an agnostic or a religious naturalist, for there was much he didn’t understand about God and the mysteries of life. ( )

A concise and enlightening look into "religious naturalism." Raymo is poetic, crystal clear in what he has gained from his own religious upbringing (Catholic) and where he departs from it, and an eloquent and sincere voice for the scientific worldview (rather than harsh and sarcastic, as Richard Dawkins can be). Raymo says a lot in a slim volume. This is one that will stay with you. ( )

A concise and enlightening look into "religious naturalism." Raymo is poetic, crystal clear in what he has gained from his own religious upbringing (Catholic) and where he departs from it, and an eloquent and sincere voice for the scientific worldview (rather than harsh and sarcastic, as Richard Dawkins can be). Raymo says a lot in a slim volume. This is one that will stay with you. ( )

A concise and enlightening look into "religious naturalism." Raymo is poetic, crystal clear in what he has gained from his own religious upbringing (Catholic) and where he departs from it, and an eloquent and sincere voice for the scientific worldview (rather than harsh and sarcastic, as Richard Dawkins can be). Raymo says a lot in a slim volume. This is one that will stay with you. ( )