Nothing "religious" about that observation; quite the opposite, in fact. In particular: it's not so much whether the tool "works" or not, but the side effects

Nothing "religious" about that observation; quite the opposite, in fact. In particular: it's not so much whether the tool "works" or not, but the side effects (how well it plays with other tools; and hence, the extent to which it can be integrated into larger, maintainable projects) that need to taken into consideration, also. Which is why better engineers detect more than a whiff of bad "design smell" when they hear someone say "just use Excel" (most of the time).