Excerpt #14 from my book, Religion, An Obstacle to Human Progress
Harvard Senior Paper Rejected
My Senior Paper required for graduation from Harvard Divinity School, less than three weeks from graduation, was rejected.
It was devastating news.
Let me describe what happened.
Near the end of my third year in divinity school (one at Yale, two at Harvard), it came time to present my Senior Paper, a requirement for Harvard graduation.
Two full semesters under the guidance of a professor are dedicated to the project.
Each student, in a classroom of about twelve, was asked by our professor to describe aloud the subject of our paper.
When it came my turn, I said I would write about the need for a new world belief system.
You can imagine the looks I got from the professor and fellow students.
“I believe that religion, generally speaking, has been a curse to mankind…that its modest and greatly overestimated services on the ethical side have been more overcome by the damage it has done to clear and honest thinking…I believe that evidence for immortality is no better than evidence of witches, and deserves no more respect.” – H. L. Mencken (1880-1956)
I was working on a manuscript for a book titled One, A Third Millennium Belief System during that final year at Harvard.
My Senior Paper was to be several chapters taken from my manuscript.
I was one of the first to complete my Senior Paper.
After submitting it to the professor, I turned my attention to writing additional papers and to studying for difficult final exams in four other courses.
I made great progress with my additional writing and exam preparations until I got a call from my Senior-Paper professor.
In a meeting that followed with him and another professor, he said my paper was unacceptable.
I would not graduate.
He said, “If you would like, you can come back next year and try again.”
They argued that I could not write this paper without contrasting my thoughts with some learned theologian.
Fair enough, though, I wondered why he didn’t communicate this way earlier.
Both professors at that meeting knew what I was writing about.
It felt like a set up.
At this meeting, he and the other professor suggested the name of a theologian with whom I could contrast my thoughts.
They also read from a list the names of about fifteen books I would have to read.
They told me to come back next year and try again.After working non-stop for three years, I was not about to be put off that easily.
I said, “Let me see the list of the books I would have to read.”
I told them I was going to attempt to read the books and write a new Senior Paper immediately and graduate with my class.
They didn’t take me seriously but agreed to let me try.
I had written lots of papers between my years at Yale and Harvard and when I was in graduate school at the University of Colorado to get my Masters in Architecture.
If they wanted another “normal” paper, I could write one.
I quickly read and skimmed all the books on their list, rewrote my Senior paper along the lines they suggested, and turned it in.
It took about ten days.
I waited to see if it would be accepted.
I received a phone call from my Senior-Paper professor.
They accepted my paper albeit not with great enthusiasm.
I breathed an enormous sigh of relief.
I passed my remaining exams and graduated with my class.
“. . . even a superstitious man has certain inalienable rights. He has a right to harbor and indulge his imbecilities as long as he pleases, provided only he does not try to inflict them upon other men by force. He has a right to argue for them as eloquently as he can, in season and out of season. He has a right to teach them to his children. But certainly he has no right to be protected against the free criticism of those who do not hold them. He has no right to demand that they be treated as sacred. He has no right to preach them without challenge.” – H. L. Mencken