ABSTRACT
As head of a multi-faith and belief Chaplaincy in a large international university, the author encounter multiple forms of atheism weekly. These include forms of state atheism that students and staff from current or former communist countries describe to him. Some of the students raised in atheist regimes practised their faith underground in their young teens, and remember being forbidden to say prayers before taking exams, and their lives and those of their family members being at risk from authorities. Others arrive at university ignorant of religion and find the opportunity to learn about diverse faiths intriguing, disturbing, and enticing. Still more closely related to new atheism is the stance of the Secular Society which, in 2019, lobbied Scottish universities to have prayers removed from Anatomy Services. Anatomy Services are memorial services in honour of those who have given their bodies to science, and they are held with the Medical Schools whose students have worked with the cadavers.
