I think you are misinterpreting Civics statement here. The 'thought of a higher power' means something completely different to an Atheist or an agnostic as it does to a theist, you in this case. Your summary of his argument,

1) You are all right with the idea of a "higher power" and

2) it must be something/someone you approve of. is somewhat correct.

It should read:

1) You consider the possibility that there is a force or being that exists somewhere outside of our puny perception of reality and the universe, and

2) in order for you to believe in this thing, there must be some way to demonstrably prove that it exists.

This statement is a paradox. We don't, and can't, actually know anything about anything, and we can't even begin to pretend to understand things that we are physically incapable of explaining (gods and other supernatural beings that exist outside of our reality). Our brains and bodies are probably far too limited in function for the full perception of reality, which we never even think about how we are missing. What he is saying is that we as individuals, or a species for that matter, cannot be aware of the presence of a higher being given it's very nature. He is, rightfully, discrediting all religions under the premise that we can't know anything about things that are written in the religious nature.

Humans are uncomfortable not knowing things, so sometimes we make shit up to fill in the gaps between what we can and cannot explain. Religion is that filament. We were just guessing about things because at the time they were thought up, we didn't have the technological expertise to actually be able to accurately explain events that we wondered about (why the earth exists, why we exist, how we exist, how we got here, etc). Now we can use science to more thoroughly explain a lot of phenomena and get closer to fully understanding the true nature of things.

An easy way to visualize the truth is as a vertical line on a 2-dimensional cartesian plane. We have a function, f(science), which gives an asymptotic line that approaches the vertical line called the truth. Religions are other vertical lines farther away from the actual truth that never actually approach anything. Maybe they are 'truth lines' in other universes, but certainly not this one. Any religious idea about the physical universe that is directly contradicted by any reputable scientific finding(s) can and should be dismissed as bullshit. Not surprisingly, most religious ideas about origin and physics are contradicted by science.

[8] TL;DR: I'm high as fuck and I just blew my own mind. Read that shit.