American Atheist Magazine Second Quarter 2013

American Atheists
American Atheist
A JOURNAL OF ATHEIST NEWS AND THOUGHT
Our
50
th
Anniversary
Keeping Church and State Separate Since 1963
ATHEISTS.ORG
SECOND QUARTER 2013
50
Michael E. Asbury Bob Baxter Norm Beavers Steve Bieveer Michael A. Bloch Martin J. Boyd, MD Bill Bream Wendy Britton Andrew T. L. Bryant Allison L. Byrd Dr. John Carver Neal Cary Al Collins Lola Craig Liz Craig Greg Craig Don Deakins Sunil Deshmukh Matt Dillahunty Lee Dorsey David A. Dresser Mark Duyvesteyn Eric P. Emerson Brian D. Engler Holly Erickson-King Given Life Ministries Randall Gorman James Grisham Dr. Paul Hans John Healy Sally Stapledon Justin Hinckley Frank Holub Mark Hotsenpiller Keith D. Kalkwarf John Kehl Greg Lammers
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Thank you to these donors who have each contributed $50 in honor of our 50th Anniversary.
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AMERICAN ATHEIST
A Journal of Atheist News and Thought
2nd Quarter 2013

Vol. 51, No. 2 ISSN 0516-9623 (Print) ISSN 1935-8369 (Online)
Above: Madalyn Murray OHair was Phil Donahues very first guest Cover Design by Rick Wingrove
EDITOR-IN-CHIEF Pamela Whissel mageditor@atheists.org LAYOUT and GRAPHICS EDITOR Rick Wingrove rwingrove@atheists.org Copy editor and Proofreader Karen Reilly AMERICAN ATHEIST PRESS MANAGING EDITOR Frank R. Zindler editor@atheists.org
Published by American Atheists, Inc. Mailing Address: P.O. Box 158 Cranford NJ 07016 Phone: 908.276.7300 FAX: 908.276.7402 www.atheists.org
In This Issue
6 10 12 14 16 18 20 23 24 30 32 34 36 33
Arrogance of the Clergy | Michael B. Paulkovich Some Tricks of the Brain | Dale DeBakcsy Voices of Reason Rally | Hemant Mehta Quiet Company Speaks | Becky Garrison Book Review: In Freedom We Trust | Carl E. Kramer Going Global to Do Good Without God | Becky Garrison Ages of Atheism: Part Three | James Luce On Respect | JT Eberhard Remembering Madalyn Murray OHair | Frank Zindler American Atheists First Fifty Years | Ed Buckner Religion is an App| Ce Atkins Jesus was a Horse Thief | Rick Wingrove In Memoriam: Ann Zindler | Frank Zindler Madalyn OHair, Charles Darwin, and Me | Paul Loebe
2013 American Atheists Inc.

All rights reserved. Reproduction in whole or in part without written permission is prohibited. American Atheist is indexed in the Alternative Press Index. American Atheist magazine is given free of cost to members of American Atheists as an incident of their membership. Annual Individual Membership with subscription for one year of American Atheist print magazine: $35. Online version only: $20. Couple/Family Membership with optional print magazine: $35. Sign up at www. atheists.org/aam. Discounts available for multiple year subscriptions: 10% for two years, 20% for three or more years. Additional postage fees for foreign addresses: Canada and Mexico: add $10/year. All other countries: add $30/year. Discounts for libraries and institutions: 50% on all magazine subscriptions and book purchases. 2ND QUARTER 2013
www.atheists.org | AMERICAN ATHEIST | 3
Letter from the
President
We must make it safe for Atheists to come out of the closet, and then we must convince them to do so.
eve come a long way, American Atheists.
In 1963, Madalyn Murray OHair won a battle for all of us. Even though I wasnt even born yet, her win in the US Supreme Court allowed me to attend public school without the pressure and ostracism that comes with forced Bible readings. She was supposedly the most hated woman in America, but thats because so many people were wrong. They thought religious indoctrination was not only good, but necessarythats what their pastors had told them. Madalyn fought a hard fight. She was arrested, harassed, and forced to move to another state, all in the effort to free American children from forced religion. She was not perfect, but her actions and dedications can only be described as heroic. Her organization has flourished. What was once a fledgling organization has now become known worldwide as the leader in American Atheist activism. Thanks to our leadership (i.e., The Reason Rally), other movement organizations look to us for ideas and inspiration. More importantly, American society views American Atheists as the premier Atheist organization in the country. At one time American Atheists Press, run by Frank and (the late) Ann Zindler, was the only organization publishing Atheist materials. This allowed countless titles to be made available to the public that might otherwise never have seen the light of day. Additionally, American Atheist magazine, originally a stapled pamphlet, is now available in major bookstore chains in the US and Canada, placing the word Atheist on magazine stands for the first time. We have continued in the OHair tradition with our smart and winnable lawsuits. The Murray v. Curlett win has given way to our more recent activities, including the defeat of the secular crosses in Utah, the Dept. of Homeland Security case in Kentucky, the World Trade Center Miracle Cross case, and our newest quest for equality in the IRS tax code. All these lawsuits have something in commonthey are unpopular but necessary. Our current cases represent the front line of progress toward and protection of our legal equality, and it is something of which our members should be very proud.
The number of people calling themselves Atheists
has quintupled since 2005.
But to achieve true Atheist equality, we must bring our position to the American public. We must de-demonize the A-word. We must make it safe for Atheists to come out of the closet, and then we must convince them to do so. Our marketing campaigns have done just that. Our billboards, aerial banners, and other PR campaigns use blatant truth and honesty to drive home the message that Americas Atheists are plentiful and growing in number nationwide. Our message may be politically incorrect, but progress is often not politically correct until it succeeds. We are succeeding. According to Gallup, the number of people calling themselves Atheists has quintupled since 2005, and for the first time in modern American history, more than half of the country would vote for a qualified Atheist as president. Thats serious progress. Of course, we are not done yet. We will continue our fight until Atheism is accepted as normal. When bigotry against us is treated as harshly as racism or anti-Semitism, when Atheist votes are courted by elected officials and Atheists are elected to office themselves, when every citizen in every state is viewed equally in the eyes of the government regardless of religious inclination, we will have won. By we, I mean our staff, volunteers, and the board, but most importantly, the members and donors, without whom we would still be at square one. Nothing happens without your help. So thank you, dear members and donors, for allowing American Atheists to make this progress happen. We have a long way to go, but weve come a long way during these past five decades, and our future improves every day as a result of our activism. Happy Birthday, American Atheists! Sincerely, David Silverman President DSilverman@Atheists.org
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4 | AMERICAN ATHEIST | www.atheists.org
On August 20, American Atheists unveiled a logo to commemorate the 50th anniversary of its founding by Madalyn Murray OHair. The design was chosen through a competition judged by select staff members. Participants were challenged to address specific design elements, including use of the original American Atheists logo, while incorporating a forwardlooking stance as the organization moves ahead into the next fifty years and beyond. The winner, Carbon Red Designs, will receive $250 and an official introduction by President David Silverman during the convention.
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The Appalling Arrogance of the Clergy

and a
Modest Proposal
by Michael B. Paulkovich
DOGMA WATCH
Religion has had an enormous impact on the world. In this series Michael B. Paulkovich examines dogmas, myths, and relgious notions, past and present, that are of interest.
ocieties generally grant extraordinary respect to men of the clothpastors, priests, shamans, witch-doctors. It is accepted social protocol; call a priest Father, kneel to kiss the bishops ring, revere their undaunted faith and homiletics (no matter how absurd). This is a priority inversion, an ancient tradition and practice that has stagnated world societies for thousands of years. The typical priest or minister makes spectacular and patently false claims about his abilities, his knowledge, his powers. We need not delve into the near-psychedelic Mormon magic underwear concept to
(and a request for monetary contribution) to have been granted divine knowledge in these areas of mystery and ministry. He studied theology, so Father knows best? What does the word theology even mean? A quick trip to Dictionary.com provides an answer. The first entry, from The Random House Dictionary, defines theology as the field of study and analysis that treats of God and of Gods attributes and relations to the universe; study of divine things or religious truth; divinity. How, then, does theology differ from superstition or magic? The mere occurrence of the word god in its definition relegates the term
Due to Hitchens research and journalism, we know that Mother Teresa was, well, no Mother Teresa.
prove this point of religious absurdity. The plain vanilla Christian pastor claims to know more than any person can possibly know: where we all came from, who is the real god (among thousands claimed), all about gods son, why we are here, gods plan for us, andmost audacious and arrogantthe eternal, magical things that happen to us after we die. Some things might be good, he tells us, and others quite hideous. The religious leader actually claims, with a smile and a fatherly wink
to a rusty bucket of mystical and ignorant speculation. And note the inherent tautology of the term religious truth. Perhaps the most succinct religious truth proclaimed is that of the subtitle of the book god is not Great by Christopher Hitchens: religion poisons everything. Also, largely due to Hitchens research and journalism, we know that Mother Teresa was, well, no Mother Teresa. Pastors and priests claim to have incredible magical powers: to dunk
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a person in wetness to wash away prior proxy sins, the alchemic ability to convert natural H2O to holy water, and the capacity to change the course of future events by leading a group in prayer. I wonder who first proclaimed that two hands working can do more than a thousand hands clasped in prayer. Id like to think it was Mark Twain or Thomas Paine, but it was not. Apparently the author is unknown. Catholic priests claim the power to expel demons from a person via exorcism. This is performed, apparently, only with permission of the bishop and in accord with formulas of the Roman Ritual. Yet their bible prohibits magic: There shall not be found among you anyone who makes his son or his daughter pass through the fire, one who uses divination, one who practices witchcraft, or one who interprets omens, or a sorcerer, or one who casts a spell, or a medium, or a spiritist, or one who calls up the dead. For whoever does these things is detestable to the Lord; and because of these detestable things the Lord your God will drive them out before you. (Deut. 18:10-13, NASB) He made his sons pass through the fire in the valley of Ben-hinnom; and he practiced witchcraft, used divination, practiced sorcery and dealt with mediums and spiritists. He did much evil in the sight of the Lord, provoking Him to anger. (2 Chron. 33:6, NASB) I will cut off sorceries from your hand, and you will have fortune-tellers no more. (Micah 5:12, NASB) Now the deeds of the flesh are evident, which are: immorality, impurity, sensuality, idolatry, sorcery, enmities, strife, jealousy, outbursts of anger, disputes, dissensions, factions, envying, drunkenness, carousing, and things like these, of which I forewarn you, just as I have forewarned you, that those who practice such things will not inherit the kingdom of God. (Gal 5:19-21, NASB) Clearly Jesus exhibited all the characteristics of a wizard. But since Exodus 22:18 says Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live, he should have been put to death, then forgotten, even set ablaze like Christians have done to millions over the centuries. Priestly Infantilism Is it asking too much to request that the clergy simply grow up? Supernatural demons do not exist. There is neither a devil nor a heavenly father who grants prayer wishes. One of my pleas: Dear ministers and priests, please embrace 18th century Enlightenment, and (if you are so bold) perhaps even join us here in the 21st century. Christian clerics claim something magical about handing out tidbits of bread and grape juice shooters to the gullible sheep of their congregation. What is in their secret sauce? Catholics are even taught an apotropaic gesticulation that supposedly protects them: the signum cruses, or crossing oneself. Catholic priests claim that a string of beads can help their lemmings communicate with the deity, to petition their god with selfish desires. A corporation called
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Our Ladys Rosary Makers (OLRM.org) manufactures rosaries for the worlds spiritually needy, claiming an annual output of seven million. I have to get into a business like that; it sounds lucrative. Bottled holy water came to mind as my new get-rich-quick scheme, but apparently such a dodgy and dishonest idea has already been taken by Charlatans with even fewer scruples than I. Google itits disgusting. New idea: religious Ponzi scheme, perhaps? Oh, thats right. Its already been done. Priests claim that by uttering certain phrases a certain number of times (Our Father, Hail Mary, Glory Be) you may coerce the forgiveness of their god, and even bring about divine intervention. Did you have premarital sex? Well, ten Hail Marys (or is the magic number twenty-
The Confession app, at just $1.99 is the perfect aid for every penitent.
seven? Or fifty?) will absolve your sin and render god happy with you. You can even buy Catholic apps for your smart phone. Little iApps, LLC, is one such company providing these blessed bit of software. Their worldwide bestseller is the Confession appjust $1.99. This perfect aid for every penitent, even provides a laundry list of sins or personalized examination of conscience, as they call it. Just select and save the ones youve committed this week and youre all set for the confessional. Modern conveniences! I have to wonder if theres an app that will say your Hail Marys for you or allow you to text prayers directly to Jesus in heaven. Man, the money-making ideas just keep piling up! Clearly these beliefs and rites derive from nave superstitions passed down for millennia. When asked about their outlandish dogma, the believer typically uses the word faith as an end-run around epistemology and logic. Believers prefer faith over reason and readily embrace magical and mystical explanationsdespite their bible repeatedly forbidding all magic and imposing the death sentence on witches and wizards. We humans do, in fact, have spiritual desires that spring from our human nature, the fear of death, and a fount of ignorance. We have existential questions we cannot answer but always attempt to. Religions so often claim to have all the solutions, and then evolve (devolve?) into institutions of breathtaking arrogance. How many times have you heard I know my religion is the right one, and I follow my gods words. All other religions and gods are wrong? Child Abuse Religious leaders exhort lies of profound arrogance upon the youngest of their flock. Unquestionably, it is immoral to lie to children, especially on matters of factual, moral, and philosophical importance, yet I can exempt the Santa Claus ruse, as it is kind of a fun concept as a child and a harmless thing even when one discovers the truth. But
Jesus was a racist who praised genocideand promises eternal torture if you merely do not believe in him.
no Christian parent, it seems, ever confesses to their kids that the Jesus stories were all lies, like Santa. My mum only lied to me about one thing, Ricky Gervais recalled. She said there was a god. 2 The most despicable thing Christians do is to threaten children with eternal damnation if they do not believe the absurdities proffered by the misguided (and perennially brainwashed) clergy. For if you do not follow Jesus, he says you are cursed and his dear old dad will send you into everlasting fire: Then shall he say also unto them on the left hand, Depart from me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels... And these shall go away into everlasting punishment: but the righteous into life eternal (Matthew 25:41-46). He that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life: and he that believeth not the Son shall not see life; but the wrath of God abideth on him ( John 3:36). And it shall come to pass, that every soul, which will not hear that prophet, shall be destroyed from among the people. Yea, and all the prophets from Samuel and those that follow after, as many as have spoken, have likewise foretold of these days (Acts 3:22-23). Robert Ingersoll lamented long ago about such evil teachings, saying These are the words of eternal love.3 The Bible claims that this vengeful and jealous god relegates unbelievers to hell, even though he created those very same unbelievers. God still loves them, it seems, while he has them tortured for eternity. No clear-thinking, compassionate person can believe or teach such mythical, evil nonsense. Mark Twains insights come to mind here: I cannot see how eternal punishment hereafter could accomplish any good end, and therefore I am not able to believe in it. And, ... but to roast him forever for the mere satisfaction of seeing him roast would not be reasonableeven the atrocious God imagined by the Jews would tire of the spectacle eventually.4 In a fair, logical, freethinking world, what should be the punishment for teaching falsifiable myths as if they were true history? What should be the punishment for teaching children that all humankind descended from two people a few thousand years agoand that we are thus descended from Adam and Eves children, all three having been boys? In a just world, what should be the punishment for teaching that the god forged by ancient Hebrews despised peoples of certain genetic makeup, and that this god himself assisted in their massacre? Yahweh destroyed seven nations in Canaan and gave their land to Israel as an inheritance (Acts 13:19). Gee, I wonder why there is trouble between Palestine and Israel today. And Jesus did not merely mention the mythical genocides; the New Testament actually applauds them. Christians are taught that Jesus was not just a good man, but the innocent, saintly, omniscient, perfect son of god. Yet Jesus was a racist who praised genocideand promises eternal torture if you merely do not believe in him: I will therefore put you in remembrance, though ye once knew this, how that the Lord, having saved the people out of the land of Egypt, afterward destroyed them that believed not. And the angels which kept not their first estate, but left their own habitation, he hath reserved in everlasting chains under darkness unto the judgment of the great day. Even as Sodom and Gomorrah, and the cities about them in like manner, giving themselves over to fornication, and going after strange flesh, are set forth for an example, suffering the vengeance of eternal fire. Likewise also these filthy dreamers defile the flesh, despise dominion, and speak evil of dignities ( Jude 1:5-8). Woe unto thee, Chorazin! Woe unto thee, Bethsaida! For if the mighty works, which were done in you, had been done in Tyre and Sidon, they would have repented long ago in sackcloth and ashes. But I say unto you, it shall be more tolerable for Tyre and Sidon at the day of judgment, than for you. And thou, Capernaum, which art exalted unto heaven, shalt be brought down to hell: for if the mighty works, which have been done in thee, had been done in Sodom, it would have remained until this day. But I say unto you, That it shall be more tolerable for the land of Sodom in the day of judgment, than for thee (Mat. 11:21-24). Clergy, Humble Thyself The source of most religions lies in meek humans pondering deep questions, still figuring out the universe. We are (perhaps) the superior animal on this insignificant blue orb, yet we are just a chromosome or two away from the chimpanzee. Even Neanderthals had a brain larger than Homo sapiens. For thousands of years we ponderedeven figured out, although always incorrectlywhere we came from, why we are here, what happens after we die. Nobody can truly pull off this hat trick. Yet religious leaders claim to have all the answers with no evidence whatsoever. Then again, they studied theology, so... When religious groups believe that they are on the right side, able to answer imponderable enigmas, they lose perspective on reality. They repeatedly reinforce their falsely concocted sense of the world with weekly or even daily homilies. Their superstitions become their adamantine, insuperable reality. This creates monsters like Paul Jennings Hill, a Presbyterian minister
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who murdered abortion provider Dr. John Britton and his clinic escort James Barrett in 1994. Hill was found guilty and sentenced to death. Prior to Hills 2003 execution he proclaimed that he expected a great reward in Heaven ... I am looking forward to glory.5 And you know there are zealots who truly think Hill is in heaven now. Religion was the motivation of Dena Schlosser, unable to distinguish reality from the Christian mythology of her upbringing. In 2004 she saw a news story about a boy who was mauled by a lion, so Schlosser took that as a sign of the apocalypse. She amputated her 11-month-old daughters arms with a knife (WWJD?). The infant died, and Schlosser offered the dead child to god. She thus responded to that sign from above with human sacrifice.6 High on gerin oil for far too long, Leilani and Dale Neumann watched piously and with faith in the Almighty as their daughter of eleven years sunk into a diabetic coma. Her parents did what they considered most reasonable: pray. The couple chose to eschew the scientific proof and simple logic that the power of prayer is mere superstition, as proven scientifically in many experiments.7 Their daughter Kara Madeline died, and the Neumanns were charged with second-degree reckless homicide. The parents showed no emotion and had no sadness in losing their daughter or when they were found guilty. Instead, they said they had peace in God.8 I generally agree with John Lennons lyrics whatever gets you through the night, its all right, but certainly not when others are harmed by that same whatever. These are not isolated incidents. I enumerate over fifty recent victims of similar religious venom in my book, No Meek Messiah, along with tens of millions of other victims throughout history. A Modest Proposal My dream, though I know it will never come true, is a worldwide moratorium on Abrahamic teachings. Give us a dozen years during which children are not inculcated with the absurd myths. Then, when they reach age twelve, go ahead and tell them, We believe human origins are explained by this book, the Old Testament, and that God sent his son to Earth 2,000 years ago on a suicide mission to save us all from the sin that Adam and Eve perpetrated 6,000 years ago, when the universe was created, by eating a forbidden fruit because they were tricked by a talking snake. The children will either lose it in an uncontrolled laugh-attack or look at their mom and dad the way a dog looks at a ceiling fan in either case, they will most likely drop most of their respect for the deluded parents. Then again we must consider a peculiar phenomenon that I like to call the Saul Syndrome, where an adult raised without religion suddenly accepts claims that are supernatural and illogical and which could just as well be updated to Francis Collins Syndrome. In a CNN interview, Collins, the organizer of the Human Genome Project, admitted that before blindly accepting Christianity in adulthood, he already had glimmers of something, some longing outside of myself, some sense that maybe there was a god out there that I might be able to reach out to.9 So we see his inherent predilection for the supernatural as a yearning, a frailty, or his own word: longing. If my dream of a brief moratorium on Judeo-Christian mythology could be realized, I believe the world would be born anew, largely full of logical individuals, and free of antique delusions and malignant superstitions. We might even attain the state of enlightenment the Greeks had realized 2,500 years ago. Now to research how to create a cell phone app
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Endnotes 1. Catholic Encyclopedia, Revised and Updated. Nashville: Thomas Nelson Publishers, 1986, p. 207. 2. YouTube.com/watch?v=sBBtYcK9Jb8 3. Ingersoll, Robert G., The Works of Robert G. Ingersoll. C. P. Farrell, 1900. 4. Albert Bigelow Paine, Mark Twain: A Biography Volume III Part 1: 1900-1907, New York: Harper & Brothers, 1912, p. 1583. 5. Paul Vallely, A Certain Martyr? Third Way, Oct. 2003, Vol. 26, No. 8, p. 5 6. Doctor: Woman Says God Wanted Her to Cut Babys Arms, USA Today, Feb. 20, 2006. 7. NBCNews.com/id/12082681 8. Janet L. Factor, The Ties that Bind, Free Inquiry, Oct./Nov. 2009, Vol. 29, No. 6, p. 22-23. 9. YouTube.com/watch?v=Ml0FqyFYfrU Editors note: Except where indicated as NASB (The New American Standard Bible), all scripture passages are from the King James Version. Michael Paulkovich is a systems engineer and freelance writer who also contributes to Free Inquiry and The American Rationalist. Raised Christian and subjected to weekly Sunday School and even yearly vacation Bible school, he rejected religions around age ten. He is the author of No Meek Messiah. To learn more, go to NoMeekMessiah.com.
Some Tricks of the Brain
Neurochemistry, World of Warcraft, and the End of Religion

by Dale DeBakcsy
very day, over an intense period of a year and a half, I used to log on to the role-playing game World of Warcraft and dither away one to four hours picking virtual purple lotus flowers and joining up with old college chums to rid that virtual world of virtual evil. And it was great. I didnt think too closely about it at the time, but on a chemical level, it was really doing everything necessary to trick my mind and body into believing that all of my primary biological imperatives were being fulfilled.
Day-to-day religion does pretty much the same thing but with thousands of years of metaphysical and historical baggage. An inspection of how Warcraft and similar games work on a natural level might be in order to answer the oft-posed question, What can replace religion to keep people happy and fulfilled? But before we go there, lets look at the mind that is absorbing all of this adventure. The Homo sapien brain has been in the business of keeping us alive in spite of ourselves for the better part of 200,000 years. Its done this by making us feel good about behaviors and items that increase our chances of passing on our DNA and wretched about things that dont. When we see a bit of food chock full of historically rare sugars and proteins, our brain pushes us toward it by pumping us full of dopamine. Suddenly, we feel very desirous of that food bit, and we exert ourselves to get it. Conversely, if our relationship of two years falls apart, our brain very sensibly decides that we are probably barking up the wrong reproductive tree and lathers us in cortisol. This makes us feel terrible at the mere sight or thought of the lost loved one, shoving us along to the next mating partner, who we hope will be rather less picky about our numerous personal, financial, and physical failings. There are three things above all that our genes, through the mediation of our brains, want us to do: pursue those resources that have done well for us in the past, gather together in groups, and climb to a position of authority in those groups. In other words, to keep our genes going, we need to eat, find protection in communal living, and be so dazzlingly impressive that we have the pick of mating partners.
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Whenever we go along with this game plan, our brains reward us with shots of dopamine, oxytocin, and serotonin, and we feel quite good for a while. This is the real trinity humans have given themselves over to, and its one that World of Warcraft exploits to the fullest to keep us forking over $15 a month for the pleasure of mining imaginary ore. In the game, there is always something that you are made to want experience points, gold, honor points, faction points, armor, rare crafting components, skill levelsall entirely illusory, but so close to those reward systems that got us candy and new bicycles in elementary school that our brain takes them for the same thing and rewards us with dopamine shots for pursuing them. Surviving in a modern social system is so complex, and the needs so numerous, that our poor caveman brains are quite worn out by keeping track of what we actually need. Our brains instead have to make do with apportioning dopamine whenever we approach something that looks kinda-sorta like something that once helped us out. By keeping us in constant anticipation of reward, the game keeps the chemicals flowing and us playing. The social aspect of Warcraft is perhaps even more compelling. With millions of players the globe over, the game is teeming with others who need your help to achieve their own in-game objectives. Thus do guilds form, which have at their root the human interdependence that the brain decided long ago was a good strategy for survival. Trusting others to heal us when we are hurt, jump in front of us when we are being attacked, and craft the items we cant make ourselvesas well as being trusted by others to do the same for themare all very close to the bonds that allowed us to survive in days of yore. We are liberally rewarded with oxytocin for our efforts, in spite of the fact that none of these people online can protect us from anything resembling a genuine threat. If a tiger walks into my study, it is going to eat me in spite of all those frost spells my Warcraft guild might summon. And, oh, the opportunities for status-seeking. There are entire websites devoted to ranking your armor, your achievements, your talent allocations on a global scale, and these are a source of intense pride for many. Having the #4 hunter orc on the Zangarmarsh server makes you walk a little taller; people cower in your path, and you are assiduously courted for guilds. From the brains perspective, you have dominated your peers, which will surely make you a more attractive reproductive partner, and so you are rewarded with serotonin. In reality, that online status costs you face time with actual potential mates, destroys your physique through hours of sitting while drinking Mountain Dew and eating bags of Halloween candy, and dulls your social senses to the bare minimum required to communicate with your guild during a raid. But at that moment, when you are The Guy who can save the day, and you get the call to do what only your character can do, your brain thinks that you have hit reproductive gold, and you feel on top of the world. Warcraft brilliantly manipulates the brains motivational system by offering it virtual survival that it interprets on a chemical level as the real thing. This is nothing new. Religion has been at it for thousands of years. It is a grand trick that we played on our own brains to get the drugs we like. In place of grueling demonstrations of dominance, laborious dedication to tangible goals, and the difficult requirements for forging relationships, religion offers easy paths to neurochemical Happy Towneasy because they are entirely made up. Why struggle to make yourself the head monkey? Its easier to just kick back and believe the guy who says that, no matter how messed up you are, you are Jesuss best friend and your seat at the celestial table is
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waiting for you. Serotonin? Check. Why work on the real social issues that make forming a community difficult, or the real personality conflicts that make relationships challenging? You can submit to an imposed community based around repetition of a few stock phrases once a week to generate a feeling that approximates togetherness. Oxytocin? Check. And why be tossed about on the back of your bodys real physical needs and worldly goals? You can spend a lifetime in delicious, constant anticipation of heavenly reward without even getting out of bed. Dopamine? Check! This is the brilliance of religion and the road out of it as well. What thrived long past its time as a low-energy alternative to the chemical rewards of survival can also be ended as such. We tend to look to religion to meet deep spiritual needs that cannot possibly be answered by anything lacking the dominating edifice of metaphysical thought. And so we despair at what society might be like if religion is removed. But thats just because we have believed the stories religion tells us about itself to obscure the fact that, in terms of its day-to-day pull, it has gotten by almost entirely on neural sleights of hand. Remove the chemical trickery and whats left of religions intellectual content are fumbling, foggily worded, self-contradictory answers to ill-put questions of metaphysics. And thats just not enough to keep religion alive. So, am I suggesting that we replace religion with video games? Not remotely. I started by saying that I played Warcraft intensely for a year and a half. I played once a week for about three years after that, more to drink beer while chatting online with far-flung friends than to do the game justice. Then followed one final year of paying fifteen bucks a month for the opportunity to play the game, if I should happen to want to, which I didnt. I found other things that fed me neurochemical happiness more effectively, though I was aided in that task by what I had learned about my head through years of having it batted about by the mad geniuses who design Warcraft. Put simply, Atheists need to combine their town halls with Azeroth. By doing so, we can blend the oxytocin-inducing connections to real people with the constant dopamine-based and serotonin-based reward mechanics perfected in the online world. Frederick the Great noted long ago what men will do for a bit of ribbon and a title. In our data-rich society, it shouldnt be too difficult to find a thousand ways to reward people for the things they do as a matter of course and then turn the mere act of living into a grand secular adventure all its own where the world itself is your guild. The sanitation district says you just recycled your ten thousandth aluminum canheres a badge for your jacket and the title of CanMan Supreme for your Facebook page. Youve worked 400 days straight without calling in sick. Congratulations, Iron Horse! Keep on doing what you do. If every act works towards some bit of distinction, and if those distinctions exist in a real, physical place where Everybody Knows Your Name, humans will have the chance at lives happier than they ever dreamed possible. And then that quaint chap people used to call religion will be just a thing we did for a while until we figured out what we wanted after all. Dale DeBakcsy is the author of the weekly Atheist webcomic The Vocate, co-author of Frederick the Great: A Most Lamentable Comedy, contributor to The Freethinker, and former editor of the online Rivets Literary Magazine. By way of feeding his children he is a physics and mathematics teacher.
Voices of Reason Rally

Because our past coverage of the March 24, 2012, Reason Rally on the National Mall in Washington, DC, has been a mere glimpse of that day, we will continue to feature the words that were spoken by some of todays greatest voices of reason.
Photo by John Welte
Hemant Mehta
t has taken many people many years to put together this event, and I hope everyone has a great time. But if you go home without something to take back with you, it will have been for nothing. You all know the statistics. Were the least trusted and least electable minority group in America. But we can change that. I want to suggest a few things we can do to make a profound difference in how Atheists are perceived and treated in America. If we can make these things happen, we will change the course of American Atheism. Run for public office. Do you want your childs school district run by creationists? Do you want your health care in the hands of legislators whose faith tells them women should not have total control over their own bodies? Do you want a Congressperson who believes we live in a Christian nation or a Senator who creates the US Office of Alternative Medicine? Then get on the ballot. You dont all need to run for president. You dont all need to run for Congress. But run for city council. Run for the local school board. If youre a college student or a high school student, run for class president. If your city elects a dog catcher, run for that! We need more rational thinkers in public officepeople who know how to tell truth from fiction, ask good questions, and think critically. Pete Stark needs some
company. If we dont run for office, the Religious Right will. Support your local freethought communities. There is strength in numbers. We have the numbers but youd never know it if you go to most local gatherings. With numbers, we can raise awareness that were out there. We can put up billboards that let people know Atheists can be good without god. We can volunteer for local charities that need more support. We can lobby all those politicians who care more about the Bible than the Constitution. We cant do it alone. What if you dont have a local group? What if you dont like your local group? Then start your own. We cant grow a movement if we dont know youre out there. Let people know youre an Atheist. I know thats easier said than done. I removed any reference to Atheism from my resume when I applied for my first jobI didnt mention the scholarships I had won for my activism or the campus Atheist group I helped create. I didnt think I would get the job if I mentioned those accomplishments I was so proud of. But not every conversation has to begin with, Hi, Im Hemant, and Im an Atheist. And not every declaration of disbelief has to be a big deal. When youre on the flight home and the person next to you asks
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why you were in DC, tell her you were at a rally with thousands of other Atheists. And smile as you say it. If youre on a date, and religion comes up, tell the person youre with you dont believe in a god. And watch for the reaction. Thats good dating advice right there. You dont have to yell or scream or TYPE IN ALL CAPS. You just have to be honest with people. Treat them with respect, but if their ideas are bad, dont be quiet about it. If you do that, you may even convince other people to come clean about their own religious doubts.
I lost my faith when I was 14. Wait. Scratch that. I discovered reality when I was 14.
Help young Atheists. Atheist, I asked people if they would chip in to give her a scholarship to I lost my faith when I was 14. Wait. Scratch that. I discovered reality college. Another group created shirts that said Evil Little Thing and when I was 14. But I didnt know what to do with that information. I was donated the money to the cause. The American Humanist Association always taught that Atheists were bad people. I didnt know any Atheists. And even now, Photo by John Welte when there are books and blogs and videos and podcasts about Atheism, a lot of young Atheists feel alone. How can you help? Where are the college students? Start a group for Atheists on your campus. The Secular Student Alliance and the Center For Inquiry will be glad to help you. If you are already part of a group like that, then help people you know at other schools start their groups. And then I want you to talk to your friends who are still in high school and help them start a group for Atheists there. When theyre that young, its so important that they realize its okay to be an Atheist. Im a high school math teacher. And I would never tell my students that some numbers are imaginaryjust like God. But it turns out a lot of the students know Im an Atheist. Not because I bring it up, but because Im so public about it outside of work. In the five years Ive been teaching, students have come up to me before class Roy Speckhardt, Executive Director of the American Humanist Association, because Im the only adult Atheist they presents Jessica Ahlquist with a scholarship for $62,000. know. And they tell me that their pastor said something in church over the weekend that they didnt agree with. Or offered to hold on to all the money in a fund for Jessica. Now, Id like they tell me they dont want to go through with their confirmation, but to invite the American Humanist Associations executive director, Roy their parents are making them. Or theyll say theyre not sure how to tell Speckhardt, to the stageas well as Jessica Ahlquist. their parents they dont believe what the Bible says. Jessica, with the help of thousands of donors, its our honor to And my response to them is always the same: You didnt do your present you with this check for $62,618. Thank you for your bravery, homework, did you? your courage, and for inspiring so many of us to remain vigilant in the Still, if youre someone who works with children, with teenagers, fight for church/state separation. you can help them feel less alone by helping them start a group where [Addressing the crowd again] Please take these action steps. Support they can discuss these thoughts openly and without fear. the Atheists who do, whenever you can. We are all spokespersons for Its never easy for them. In fact, there is one high-schooler here who Atheism whether we like it or not, and we should take that responsibility stood up to her administration and her city. She sued her school district seriously. because of an illegal prayer banner they had up in their auditorium. They said nasty things about her when she filed the lawsuit and they Editors note: Two days later, Jessica was named Atheist of the Year said even worse things after she won. A state representative called her an at the American Atheists national convention in Bethesda, Maryland. evil little thing. Local florists wouldnt even deliver flowers to her. But she stood her ground, always kept calm, and showed the world what an Hemant Mehta is a high school math teacher and blogger at intelligent young woman with the facts and the law on her side can do. FriendlyAtheist.com. The Young Atheists Survival Guide is his Jessica Ahlquist is a hero to a lot of us. On my website, Friendly latest book.
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Left to Right: Matt Parmenter-bass / Tommy Blank - guitar / Cody Ackors - trombone, keyboard / Taylor Muse vocals - guitar / Jeff Weathers - drums
Quiet Company Speaks

An Interview with Taylor Muse
by Becky Garrison
ince their 2005 inception in Austin, Texas, indie rock band Quiet Company has traveled all over the country logging over 400 shows from 2007 to the present day. Their songs have been played on multiple episodes of Keeping Up With the Kardashians and MTVs The Real World New Orleans. The band also appeared on an episode of ABCs My Generation where they played themselves. Two of their songs have been featured in the series. Becky Garrison met Taylor Muse, 31, last November in Cambridge, Massachusetts, when they performed at the 2012 Harvard Humanist of the Year award show which honored the online dating website OK Cupid. Garrison continued the interview recently by telephone to explore some of the themes Muse raised during his brief talk prior to the bands appearances at the 2013 South by Southwest Music Festival. The band has performed previously at SXSW, though this looks to be the year Quiet Company will emerge as one of the breakout acts of the festival.
We have a capacity to imagine a world thats so much better than the world in which we now exist. Religion provides outlets, like prayer, for dealing with the pain and suffering we experience because we are vulnerable, finite, and alone. We need to cultivate humanist, secular reposes to this situation. When Quiet Company creates music, thats a direct response to the pain of life. Its a way of saying I look my eventual death in the mouth and I laugh and I sing and I hold hands and I connect. Greg Epstein, Humanist Chaplain at Harvard University
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What role did religion play in your childhood? I grew up in East Tyler, Texasthe most bible-belty part of the Bible belt. Religion is in our schools and our social lives there. My brother is still a youth minister, and my grandfather was a song leader. You moved from there in 2002, followed with a stint in Nashville, and then settled in Austin in 2003. How did your faith shift when you moved from East Tyler? It was the first time I was away from my family and my childhood faith. Since I had just gone through a rough breakup, I viewed it as a chance to reinvent myself and become the worldly person I wanted to be. I started reading a lot of stuff I had never read before, like Kurt Vonnegut and Tom Robbins. I had always viewed humanism and Atheism in an exclusively negative context, so for me to hear Vonnegut discuss the potential of humanism was a shock to my system. He quickly became my favorite author, and I read everything of his that I could. Why did you issue your debut album with the Christian rock label Northern Records and then promote it at the Cornerstone Festival put on by Jesus People USA? At that time, I was a big fan of Northern Records. This label is run by guys who had been in bands that I had grown up listening to and liked. We were never a Christian band, and by the time we played Cornerstone, we were only tenuously connected to this world. But we wanted to play in front of a lot of people and just took whatever shows and opportunities that were available to us. I was still a Christian, so I wrote from that perspective, but I didnt think my stuff was preachy. We never saw ourselves as the poster boys for anyone. Why do you call We Are All Where We Belong a break-up record? This relationship with this deity or this idea becomes a romantic story of your battle against all odds for this person who died for your sins. He has this unchanging love for you that spans all time and space. Every facet of your identity gets wrapped up in this relationship. When you walk away from religion, youre walking away from that part of yourself that you know the best. Am I still the same person or am I different? How did your family react when you walked away from the faith? My family is concerned for me because they still believe, so they feel I am putting my eternal soul in danger. They felt that if I reject my faith, then it meant me rejecting them as well. I do not expect them to agree or talk to me about this. But I still love them. Nothing has changed. Im still their son and brother, and thats all that really matters. How have your Christian fans reacted to your de-conversion? We Are All Where We Belong is the best example of why its best to do honest art. If they are honest, they know theyve had these doubts that are well represented in this record. They will be glad that a record like this exists at all. We joke how once we get done with this, well fake a reconversion back to Christianity. We need to be authentic. In this album, you move from abstract religious metaphors to calling Jesus out by name. None of our records were ever written from the perspective of someone who was in the honeymoon phase of the Christian faith. Once I left the faith, it didnt feel lame to call out Jesus and call him a fake or a phony. So you werent a Jesus jumper? I never was a cheerleader for the faith who thought it was cool to write gushing praise songs about Jesus.
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This relationship with this deity or this idea becomes a romantic story of your battle against all odds for this person who died for your sins.
Taylor Muse Was the birth of your daughter three years ago a part of the catalyst to break away from your faith? If I were only responsible for myself, I would allow people to assume whatever they thought about me. But now that my daughter, Harper, has come into the room, I am responsible for another person. So I had to ask myself, Do I ever want to lie to that person? That was clearly not the case. Hence, I felt I had to be honest with everyone and tell them I was not part of the club. Then I started writing We Are All Where We Belong. And your wifes response to this news? Leia was raised in a Jewish home but they werent terribly observant. She converted to Christianity early on because she thought it was important to me even though I said I didnt care. When I told her I was having a crisis of faith, she replied, Great! I never really believed it anyway. Where do you find your faith these days? Faith is a weird word because it has all these connotations with spirituality. No one gave me this gift of existence, but I have enjoyed every day of it and hope to enjoy several thousand more days. In particular, I enjoy being with my family and seeing what kind of person my daughter will become and what kinds of things we will create together. Life is all about the adventure you create with the people you love. You put some definite Christian songs on your new Christmas album. Oh Holy Night and Angels We Have Heard on High are just good songs. Yes, its ironic but who cares? If we did songs about Santa, it would have been the same because we dont believe in him either. Whats been the reaction to your trajectory from playing at Cornerstone to South by SXSW and then a humanist gathering at Harvard University? We still keep in touch with a lot of people we met at Cornerstone. While we dont need them to agree with us and vice versa, were really happy to have them support the band. The same is true with any fans
(Continued - p. 17) www.atheists.org | AMERICAN ATHEIST | 15
Book Review:
In Freedom We Trust by Carl E. Kramer

ince this review is written at the invitation of American Atheist, I feel it is appropriate to disclose certain things the editor knew about me when she extended the invitation and which inevitably shape my evaluation of this book. First, I am a professional historian with a doctorate in American history, including a subspecialty in religious history. Second, I am a liberal Protestant with roots in the Reformed tradition. I am a member of the United Church of Christ (UCC) and have a foot in the Presbyterian Church (USA), my wifes heritage. In the late 1980s I was a UCC student-in-care at the Louisville Presbyterian Theological Seminary, where I took courses in Old and New Testament and the history of the United Church of Christ. Readers familiar with the Reformed heritage and its influence in American history should not be surprised that I agree with most of the Buckners analysis. At the same time, I do take issue with some aspects of their argument. But that is tempered by the fact that the authors (a father-son team), while scholars in their own fields, are neither historians nor Biblical scholars and need not be held rigidly to the canons of those disciplines. That said, it is deliciously ironic that they deftly skewer claims of some who should know betterincluding Newt Gingrich, a former American history professorthat the Founding Fathers envisioned this country as a Christian nation in some formal sense. The Buckners intent for In Freedom We Trust is to show why a defense of secularism is necessary. In building that defense, they argue soundly that secularism requires everyone to admit that ultimate religious truth, if it exists at all, is not within the grasp of human beings (18). That is an argument to which most thoughtful people of faith, and certainly this reviewer, can say amen. As for the Founding Fathers, the authors add, they did not intendand we do not here advocate for an anti-theistic government or even an atheistic government except in a narrow sense that government should not be based on or dependent on religious ideas, or anyones conclusion of what any god is like or wants us to do. Secular means not religiousit does not necessarily mean antireligious (18). Again, amen. In nineteen concise, easily readable chapters, the Buckners make mincemeat of a broad range of arguments by Texas Governor Rick Perry, 2008 Republican Vice Presidential candidate Sarah Palin, pseudo-historian David Barton, Representative Michele Bachmann, Pat Robertson, and other right-wingers that the U. S. was formed as a Christian nation and that the American government must follow Judeo-Christian principles. Invoking Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, George Washington, Thomas Paine, and other founders, the authors underscore the fundamental truth that freedom of religion is important and worth protecting and that it is impossible unless it is voluntary. Simply put, separation of church and state is essential to liberty because any government that has the power to approve or endorse a particular
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Edward M. Buckner and Michael E. Buckner. In Freedom We Trust: An Atheist Guide to Religious Liberty. New York: Prometheus Books, 2012. Paperback. $18.00. ISBN: 978-1-61614-644-3.
Quiet Company from p. 15

faith also has the power to restrict it and any other faiths and to punish those with no faith. While the central argument of In Freedom We Trust is fundamentally sound and well documented, I was distracted by parenthetical insertions that telegraph whats to come or that reference previous points, which unnecessarily disrupt the narrative. When it comes to controversial Biblical citations, the authors tend to prooftext as well as avoid passages from Isaiah, Micah, the Gospels, and the Pauline epistles that bespeak liberal values of peace, love, and justice. The terms theocracy and its variants are employed loosely to suggest that a faith-based government is inherently theocratic, as in the theocratic underpinnings of some American colonies. While this understanding is not uncommon, a theocracy is, in fact, a state governed by the clergy. But early Puritan New England communities prohibited clergy from holding public office. This policy reflected the fact that the mission of NonSeparating Congregationalists was to build an alternative model to the Church of England. Ministers had a central theological role in leading the process, and to endow them with civil power as well amounted to letting the fox guard the hen house. Its also noteworthy that in colonial Virginia, where the franchise was limited by law to Anglicans, officeholders in many counties allowed dissenters such as Presbyterians and Baptists to vote and actively sought their support. I find the authors tendency to fight their battle on the opponents field problematic. Much like the skilled athlete, trial lawyer, or debater whose performance can be diminished in the face of a weak opponent, the Buckners accept their adversaries sloppy use of nation and state interchangeably. But the words are not synonyms. A nation is a territory demarcated by specified boundaries and occupied by people who share broadly common ethnicity, language, religion, traditions, and political values. The state is the complex of laws and institutions through which the nations is governed, and the government is the people who conduct the functions of the state. In this light, the right-wing assertion that the United States is a Christian nation is objectively correct, since most Americans are at least nominally Christian and a Christian culture has prevailed since the founding. But the central issue is not whether the US is a Christian nation but whether it is or should be a Christian state. It is the latter argument that conservatives actually make, and regardless of semantics, the Buckners are on sound historical footing in their insistence that the American state must be secular. The framers of the Constitution and the First Amendment recognized that religious freedom is possible only when all faiths have the opportunity to operate freely and openly, when those with no faith have full rights of citizenship, and when no government body or official is empowered to determine who may or may not participate in the political process based upon their faith or lack thereof. I noted earlier that I am a Reformed Protestant. A major tenet of Reformed theology is that God calls us all to vocation, widely defined. Based upon scriptural authority of both the Old and New Testaments, perhaps it is not too ironic to suggest that God has called Atheists like Edward and Michael Buckner to remind people of faith that our freedom to express our beliefs, including the right to bring prophetic judgment upon those who govern, is most secure with a secular state, especially in a nation as diverse as the United States. Carl E. Kramer is vice president of the historical consulting firm Kramer Associates, Inc., in Jeffersonville, Indiana. He is the retired director of the Institute for Local and Oral History and adjunct assistant professor of history at Indiana University Southeast, where he taught for 34 years.
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We strive to build a community around our band that brings in both freethinkers and Christians. Anything that I can do to promote humanist ideas is icing on the cake. If weve challenged any Christians to think about their faith or helped Atheists to feel less alone, thats great.
weve got from the Atheist and freethinker side. We dont want to be thought of as the Atheist or Christian band. Instead, we strive to build a community around our band that brings in both freethinkers and Christians. Anything that I can do to promote humanist ideas is icing on the cake. If weve challenged any Christians to think about their faith or helped Atheists to feel less alone, thats great. I love the work Greg Epstein is doing with the Humanist Community at Harvard by providing community without the theology and dogma.
Quiet Company We Are All Where We Belong What are you working on these days? I am doing an album of songs that I wrote for my daughter. I look forward to that day when shes old enough to really appreciate a record her dad made thats all about her. Not many kids have that. Also, we are in the studio re-recording our first album, which was released on a small label. In the revision, we are adding back the words we were told to take out in order to get a Christian distribution. A month or so ago, we all quit our day jobs and we hope to get to a sustainable level. For up-to-date info, tour dates, and streaming audio and video from Quiet Company, go to QuietCompanyMusic.com.
Becky Garrison is a storyteller and religious satirist. Her seven books include Red and Blue God, Black and Blue Church (Publishers Weekly starred review) and Roger Williams Little Book of Virtues.
Going Global to Do Good Without God

by Becky Garrison
hen I first interviewed Greg Epstein, Humanist Chaplain for Harvard University, in 2007, we spoke about his Good Without God campaign for a book I was penning at an edgy Christian book imprint. While we connected over our shared interest in highlighting the collective good found among both liberal people of faith and nonbelievers, I remained skeptical if this conversation could develop into a bona fide movement. After all, the media-driven, sound-bite culture favors partisan debate over informed dialogue. This system does not lend itself to the creation of platforms that connect people of differing belief systems. Within a year, the commercial Christian industrial machine began to implode under the weight of its own hubris. The so-called cutting edge imprint where I was scheduled to be featured got consumed into the belly of Thomas Nelson, the worlds largest Christian publisher. In what could be seen as a symbolic protest, the satirical magazine The Wittenburg Door, where I had served as a Senior Contributing Editor since 1994, closed up shop during this time frame. Even though I had signed a book deal with Zondervan with the promise that I would be marketed in the secular sphere, they seem to have lost interest in any works that dare to question their status quo.
Greg Epstein fostering this conversation. These freethinking dialogues struck me as far more spiritual than the material being marketed by Christian publishers to a growing Christian Atheist market that promoted a new kind of Christianity guaranteed to usher forth an insurrection where supposedly love wins. When I reconnected with Epstein last fall, I learned that since he took the reigns in 2005, the Humanist Chaplaincy at Harvard (HCH) has grown from four active students and an annual budget of $28,000 to a point now where they have outgrown their space. Epstein, who came out as a none while growing up in multicultural Queens, is now trending on twitter, commenting on the rising number of nones that come through his door: Theres a lot happening in what I would call
He wants to push the humanists so they are perceived as the leader in doing the most good when responding to societys problems.
Then, after I lost my position on the Sojourners masthead for protesting their rejection of an LGBT welcome ad, all signs indicated that even progressive and emergent forms of evangelical Christianity had now moved to the right. Women and LGBT folks need not apply. Meanwhile, I noticed a shifting in select freethinking and humanist circles toward embracing the spiritual side of non-belief. Alain de Bottons book Religion for Atheists (Pantheon, 2012) joined earlier works like Epsteins Good Without God (William Morrow, 2009) and Andr Comte-Sponvilles The Book of Atheist Spirituality (Penguin, 2008) in
the humanist community. A lot of people both here at Harvard and all over the world want and are even increasingly willing to use some of their own time, energy and community to build a community that is a positive alternative to a religious community for non-religious people. Following the publication of Good Without God, Epstein set out to create a local community at Harvard as outlined in the closing section of his book. This burgeoning group focused on the core areas of education, community, secular ceremonies to mark lifes transitions, and interfaith dialogues.
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As the movement grows in strength, it is no longer acceptable for faith groups to ignore us in forming coalitions.
The Rev. Dr. Cameron Partridge, who served as the interim Episcopal Chaplain at Harvard in 2010-11 before being appointed Boston Universitys Episcopal Chaplain, reflects on the collaborative nature of Epsteins work. I remember him being supportive of me as an openly trans chaplain, and of trans people in general. Also, I recall an environmental stewardship project on which the Episcopal chaplaincy collaborated with an undergrad from the humanist chaplaincy that year. My overall impression of the humanist chaplaincy at Harvard was that they were lively and particularly LGBTIQ affirming. By partnering with faith-based groups that welcome LGBTIQs, Epstein encourages friendly competition among collaborators. Ideally, he wants to push the humanists so they are perceived as the leader in doing the most good when responding to societys problems. Through their Values in Action (VIA) initiative launched in 2010, the HCH spearheads community service projects where anyone in the Harvard community can participate. At least once a month the HCH sponsors a VIA event. These programs have mobilized thousands of people of different religious and philosophical traditions to come together and work on projects like packaging over 70,000 nutritious meals for hungry children, making scarves for homeless veterans, and assisting LGBT youth in crisis. Chris Stedman, Assistant Humanist Chaplain, VIA Coordinator, and author of Faitheist: How an Atheist Found Common Ground with the Religious (Beacon Press, 2012), elaborates on the value inherent in these gatherings: By building coalitions and working with people of faith toward common goals, we can challenge the idea that Atheists and other nonreligious people dont care about helping others and making the world a better place, we can destigmatize Atheism, and we can build relationships with religious communities in order to foster a more constructive dialogue. By combining the resources of different communities, weve been able to accomplish much more than we could on our own, and weve been able to partner with groups that havent had many, or any, positive interactions with Atheists before. According to Epstein, collaborating with religious organizations experienced in community-building gives the HCH the opportunity to learn from the success of others. In forging these relationships, Epstein maintains that humanists should be included in any faithbased responses. As the movement grows in strength, it is no longer acceptable for faith groups to ignore us in forming coalitions. We should be given equal opportunities for leadership in collaboration issues. For the past six years, the HCH has reached beyond the Harvard community to collaborate with the American Humanist Association (AHA) in presenting an Outstanding Lifetime Achievement Award in Cultural Humanism to an individual who has advanced humanism worldwide. Recipients include Salman Rushdie; punk rock star/
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biologist Greg Graffin; writer/director Joss Whedon; Mythbusters hosts Adam Savage and Jamie Hyneman; actor/ humorist Stephen Fry; author Mary Roach, and comedian Eddie Izzard. While focusing on building up their local community, the Harvard Humanist Chaplaincy began hearing from others seeking advice on how they could to do likewise. Last November, the HCHs Harvard Community Project (HCP) forged a new partnership with the AHA to build and promote communities for the nonreligious. This venture marks the first coordinated national effort to create multigenerational communities with the potential to reach millions of Americans who remain unconnected to any religious body but desire the connections afforded to those belonging to a faith-based community. Over the next three years, Epstein and his staff plan to research and document the successful efforts of communitybuilding by humanists, Atheists, and nonbelievers worldwide. In compiling these accounts, they hope to cite the best practices that can help inform 21stcentury humanist communities. Take, for instance, the United Kingdom, where nearly ten percent of Parliament joined the Humanist Caucus. Members attribute this growth a program that has trained hundreds of people to officiate at rituals like weddings and funerals. Epstein hopes their analysis of humanist communities can help them ascertain those components of program that can work in other contexts. He expects that after three years they will have compiled the resources needed to train professional leaders and assist people on the local level to organize humanist collectives. As humanist communities begin to find their voices, how will they evolve over time? In my reporting, I have documented the rise of a similar collective spirit that arose in the early 2000s among progressive evangelical and emergent groups in the US. But by 2007, this movement devolved into yet another commercialized author/speaker showcase. One can find countless examples of quests to do good that over time morph into hierarchical institutions led by those with power and publishing deals. Initially, the signs appear quite promising for humanist communities. When I reported on Kelly Carlins tribute to her late father the comedian George Carlin for this magazine (3rd/4th Quarter 2012) I observed, The more I connect with spiritual Atheists and agnostics, as well as the occasional religious community or individual, I realize that while we all think for ourselves, we often speak a similar language that connects us in our shared humanity. Im picking up similar sensibilities in Epsteins work. Becky Garrison is a storyteller and religious satirist. Her seven books include Red and Blue God, Black and Blue Church (Publishers Weekly starred review) and Roger Williams Little Book of Virtues.
Ages of Atheism:
Why Its Difficult To Be An Atheist From Day One To Death
Part Three: The Days of Whines and Bosses Defending and Defining Yourself as an Adult Atheist
In Parts One and Two, I examined issues of Atheism relating to children and adolescents in those days of wine and roses devoid of adult responsibilities. Now lets examine the issues and obstacles adult Atheists frequently encounter both at home and in the outside world in our days of whines and bosses.
Like Gaul, Atheism is Divided into Three Parts The only common characteristic shared by all Atheists is their knowledge that there is not, and never has been, any god. Just as Christians are divided into Protestant, Catholic, Evangelical, etc., each Atheist approaches life and is approached in life differently. There is no uniform list of problems faced by every Atheist. But for our purposes here, Im dividing Atheists into three distinct subcategories. They are those who: have been out of the closet since their youth and have never interacted with the world as a person of religious faith,1 are still in the closet regardless of what age they first saw the light of reason, or become overtly Atheistic in adulthood, much to the surprise or even chagrin of the people in their lives.
by James Luce
The courtroom dialogue in the film Inherit the Wind was taken almost verbatim from Clarence Darrows crossexamination in the Scopes Monkey Trial.
Perhaps the only problem common to each of these subgroups is that most people who believe in a divine being also believe that Atheists in general are misguided, immoral, unreliable, and just plain reprehensible.
This is not surprising in that throughout history there have been people in one religious group who have felt the same way about people of other religions. Northern Ireland, the Middle East, and Kashmir are full of such examples, but so is the rest of the world. In Europe and the US, people of religious faith tend to be more circumspect about expressing their opinions about a person whose god goes by a different name, tending to avoid rather than persecute people of differing religious persuasions. However, their attitudes towards Atheists are frequently less tolerant. Ridiculing, lambasting, boycotting, and shunning are more the norm in the case of the godly when confronted by the godless. After all, how can someone who has no holy writ, no moral guidelines chiseled in ancient stone, possibly be trustworthy or even safe to be around? A recent personal example makes my point that even open-minded, intelligent, well-educated people of religious faith consciously or unconsciously view Atheists as slightly sinister or insensitiveand are surprised when they find out we arent. An old friend of mine recently emailed to his mostly Christian associates a poem Id written at his request, directed to the younger generation. I received a message from one of the recipients saying he thought my poem was hopeful,
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soothing, and beautiful and had been surprised to learn of my Atheism. Atheists are frequently prejudged in this manner, but we are often unaware of this prejudiceuntil we are fired from a job or excluded from an organization for our non-belief and our insistence on adhering to fact. Still in the Closet I regard Atheists in this subcategory as the most tormented. Living a lie creates powerful and disturbing cognitive dissonance,2 feelings of guilt for being a hypocrite, and a sense of betrayal as loved ones are excluded from this secret mental life.
the Anti-Discrimination Support Network, have documented the consequences of coming out: divorce, child custody disputes, loss of friends, exclusion or expulsion from social groups, termination of employment, and emotional and physical harassment of the Atheist as well as family members.3 Atheists in the closet must determine whether or not the continuing mental pain is less supportable than the yet-unknownbut likely unpleasantresults of opening the door. If your spouse or a friend rejects you because you rejected god, then perhaps the relationship was not worth saving. As painful as it is to lose such people, how tolerable is it for you to be around people who are
The most productive tactic is to concede their right to believe in god.

Having the good fortune to be born to Christian parents (Deistic father, Presbyterian mother) who believed that their children had the right to choose between god and no god, Ive never personally suffered any of the torments of being in the closet, but I know from my reading and discussions with friends trying to emerge that the list of daily torments is long and painful: Sending your children to Sunday school where they will indoctrinated into a dangerous worldview and idiotic cosmology; Having to explain to your children how it is that god created the universe in six days even though their science book says it took a quantum event plus fourteen billion years; Being unable to oppose your tax money going to creation science teachers, nativity scenes, and Ten Commandments displays in government establishments; Standing in church, head bowed, reciting prayers to a god you know does not exist and keeping a straight and pious face while doing so. Donating cash you know will go to spreading false propaganda, building more ziggurats to some god, or even paying the salaries of lifelong child molesters; Listening to interminable, ignorant, and inaccurate recitations by friends and neighbors about the goodness and wisdom of Judaism, Christianity, Islam, or the Tao when they obviously have never read the Old Testament, New Testament, the Koran, or the Tao-Te-Ching; Hearing a minister, priest, rabbi, or other religious leader blither on about some species of glorious afterlife and the goodness of god in taking a loved away from you forever; Being unable to speak frankly with your spouse or partner, and Living with yourself in light of all of the above Fortunately, closeted Atheists hold the sole solution in their hands because they can at any time declare their affirmative non-belief in the existence of god or gods. Unfortunately, this solution is often seemingly unavailable because the principal cause of the torment is the fear of going public, especially the perceived negative impact such a revelation would have on personal and business relationships. Even more unfortunately, these fears are rational. Issues of Coming Out Various reports, such as those of Margaret Downey, founder of intolerant of your beliefs? If you have children, they will at last have a chance to get to know the real you. If you lose your job, you may want to consider filing a lawsuit. The attorney doesnt even need to be an Atheist. (But I can tell you from my personal experience as a trial lawyer that there is nothing quite as much fun as having a sworn witness under cross examination who throws her Bible at you and accuses you of being the Antichrist. Fortunately, she missed.) Moving is not an option for everyone, but if it is, there are dozens of states in the US and dozens of other countries in the world where Atheism is not considered a mortal sin.4,5 Furthermore, the sources of these consequences are external, and as such can be (with admittedly quite a bit of effort in some cases) tolerable and possibly even avoidable, unlike the incessant mental turmoil caused by living a dual and deceitful life. Our brains are with us 24 hours a day wherever we are, unlike the bigoted, ignorant hypocrites, gossips, and evangelicals with whom we are occasionally confronted. Tolerance Overt Atheists share a common thorn with doctors and lawyers: being approached by relative strangers at social gatherings and asked a lot of questions. Doctors and lawyers are approached for medical or legal advice. Atheists are approached by people seeking to dialogue (i.e., convert us to their god) or bait us into showing how unreasonable and hostile Atheists are (i.e., to confirm their prejudices). How to cope with such either relatively bland or antagonistic confrontations is of concern to all Atheists because each of us is, willingly or not, a soldier in the war against bigotry and annihilation. The last official auto de fe (act of faith) when the Spanish Inquisition murdered a person for questioning gods grace occurred only 186 years ago.6 The Old Testament and the Koran both include express admonitions to slaughter all nonbelievers.7 We will not gain acceptance by attempting to covert Americans who believe in god to Atheism. Our best strategic and tactical course is to push freedom of, and from, belief as guaranteed by the US Constitution. These social situations of dialogue or confrontation fall under the rubric of tolerance, a word that has unfortunately become almost synonymous with political correctness, multi-cultural diversity worship, and moral relativism. Tolerance is about accepting the right of somebody to do things we dont like and to believe things we think are misguided. But these rights end at the tips of each of our noses. So long as a persons actions or beliefs dont damage me, my family and friends,
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or people unable to defend themselves, fine. If they do, tolerance does not prevent taking action. Tolerance is active, not passive. When confronted by a person earnestly trying to save your soul or trying not so subtly to get your goat, there are two rules that if followed will result in yet another victory for reason and tolerance. First, dont argue the numbers, and, second, always play in their ballpark. Most intrusively-bent people of religious faith come armed with high- caliber studies, surveys, pseudoscience, and illogical logic to keep you busy and on the defensive for hours. They can prove that Atheists are sicker, sadder, more prone to suicide, more likely to abuse a spouse and children, likely to die a premature death, and are less charitable/friendly than people who believe in god.8 You can counter with a host of refutations.9 You can point out the flaws in their surveys
been created yet when god told Adam not to do so. You can point out that there is nothing in Genesis that suggests anybody, including god, ever forbade Eve to eat of the tree. Another effective tactic is to imitate the cross-examination approach of Clarence Darrow in the Scopes Monkey Trial. (For a reference, watch Inherit the Wind. The courtroom dialogue was taken almost verbatim from the actual trial transcript.) Eventually, the person will either drift away quietly or will start ranting. Either way, you win. Tolerance is active. One Omitted Issue This article intentionally does not discuss an extremely complex problem faced by many Atheists from time to time, but especially as we grow older: lingering doubts and backsliding. The final installment of this series, Until Death Do Us Depart, will explore how and why religious faith tends to try to creep in under the sheets as we face the inevitable pitfalls and disappointments in life. Yet, contrary to that popular saying, there are indeed plenty of Atheists in foxholes, and for good reason. Endnotes 1. The word faith is often used as though it means only spiritual belief, rather than simply as a noun meaning complete trust in someone or something. The distinction is important. 2. Stanford social psychologist Leon Festinger developed the now accepted theory of cognitive dissonance. We all have a compelling need to have our beliefs be consistent and also that our behaviors are in conformity with our beliefs. Except with the truly pathological, telling a lie increases the heart-rate, elevates blood pressure, and releases unhealthy quantities of adrenaline and other hormones. Acting inconsistently with belief has an even greater impact, in that these same physiological stresses remain operative so long as we continue to create dissonance. 3. SecularHumanism.org/library/fi/Downey_24_4.htm 4.Patheos.com/Blogs/FriendlyAtheist/2009/01/30/top-10MostLeast-Religious-States-in-the-Country 5. SecularHumanism.org/index.php?section=library&page=PZuc kerman_26_5 6. School teacher and Deist Cayetano Ripoll was garroted in Valencia on July 26, 1826, for teaching that god has had no active role in the universe since the creation. For comparative historical reference, the last time a witch was murdered anywhere in Europe was in 1811. 7. For example, Koranic Sutra 4.89 in reference to unbelievers: Seize them and kill them wherever you find them. 8.Conservapedia.com/Atheism#Mayo_Clinic.2C_university_ studies.2C_and_other_research 9. SecularHumanism.org/library/fi/Downey_24_4.htm 10. In The Bible of the World, edited by Robert O. Ballou, you will find the major portions of all the worlds religions. Chapter Four of my book, Chasing Davis: An Atheists Guide to Morality Using Logic and Science, can also provide you with dozens of missiles and arrows. James Luce is the author of Chasing Davis: An Atheists Guide to Morality Using Logic and Science. After four years as a criminal investigator in the US Air Force, he spent 25 years as a trial lawyer. Now retired, he lives in Spain. Read more by him at LucelySpeaking.com.
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You can point out that there is nothing in Genesis that suggests anybody, including god, ever forbade Eve to eat of the tree.
and their logic. You can point to the obvious leaps of faith made in their reports. This will only reinforce their belief that god is real and that you are a nasty person. They have no difficulty attacking your beliefs, but their god tells them to punish those who blaspheme or deny. In short, arguing the numbers is futile. The most productive tactic is to concede their right to believe in god. Concede the fact that they consider you to be in mortal error and under a delusion or in the thrall of the devil. Then point out that the Constitution gives you that right. Most Americans do not want to be seen as unpatriotic and they will normally concede your point. Score one for the Atheists. However, if they persist and you cant escape from the situation, then it is tactically necessary and permissible to go on the offensive, but always by asking them questions about their holy writ, whatever it may be (i.e., by playing in their ballpark). This approach saves a great deal of heartache because you dont get into creation science or Saint Thomas Aquinas twelve logical proofs of god or indeed any theology at all. Just tell them about how you have read the (Bible, Koran, the Tao) and you have some questions.10 The Books of Genesis and Job provide ample ammunition, as does any page in the last two-thirds of the Koran opened at random (Mohammad got more radical as his revelations progressed). For example, you can ask why Eve was blamed for eating of the tree of knowledge when she had not even
On Respect
Respect means treating others like they can do better and then holding them to that standard rather than telling them that theyre doing great when theyre not.
by JT Eberhard
ecently, I was asked by a teacher of a Christian high school to make a video for his students discussing how an Atheist views technology. I thought this was pretty rad of the teacher and I agreed to do so. I later posted the video to my blog, after which I received an email from another non-believer who wanted to congratulate me for putting a good face on Atheism: Thank you for being so nice and respectful. When we disrespect the
from insult. Respect means treating others like they can do betterand then holding them to that standard rather than telling them that theyre doing great when theyre not. So many Atheists of the accommodationist sort want to create a culture of mutual condescension and then call it respect. Theyre convinced that the unwillingness of firebrands like me to suffer irrationality with deference is what is harming the Atheist movement. It seems clear to me that the opposite is true.
Being nice does not always mean respecting others and their opinions.
beliefs of others, we push away potential allies and friends. I hate to disappoint this person and those who share his opinion, but that is not at all what I did. Being nice does not always mean respecting others and their opinions. Some peoples opinions are deleterious to humanity and manage to twist the kind natures of others into hate (look no further than all the well-intentioned opponents of gay rights to confirm this). The truth of the matter is that in order to be nice to the human race, we must sometimes meet other individuals with intense disrespectand that is precisely what I did in that video. I told the students that their god was cruel, and I provided them with evidence. Were I not focusing on the subject of technology, I would tell them that their beliefs about people rising from the dead were both foolish and wrong. I would tell them that they have a moral obligation to be reasonable and that they, and their parents, are failing it. Never would I tell them that I respect that failure or that I respect their beliefs or that their failure was even acceptable, let alone worthy of respect. The person who emailed me needs to understand that respecting others means assuming that they want to be told when someone else thinks theyre wrong. It means expecting them to be able to tolerate some mild criticism and believing in their ability to distinguish criticism
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For those who wonder why we cant all just get along, the answer is simple: irrationality in the heads of individuals affects the entire society. We should not smile about that. We should not antagonize others for the sake of antagonism. But when someone believes that a Canaanite Jew rose from the dead and that the Canaanite and his father have moral instructions for that person, the Atheist can do one of two things: we can lie to the Christian and tell them that we respect that belief or we can help them to improve by telling them the truth. Anybody who thinks the first even resembles respect might be an Atheist, but they have aligned themselves with unreason. For all the horrors of religion around the world, it makes no sense to abandon the well-being of the world to protect the feelings (and the delusions) of an individual. I will never do that, and I will never do it because I care deeply about that individual and the world in which we both live.
JTs blog, What Would JT Do?, is at Patheos.com/Blogs/WWJTD. He previously worked for the Secular Student Alliance, where he was their first high school organizer. He is the co-founder of the Skepticon conference and served as the events lead organizer for its first three years.
REMEMBERING MADALYN
April 13, 1919 September 1995
by Frank R. Zindler
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N MURRAY OHAIR
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s we approach the ninety-fourth anniversary of the birth of Madalyn Murray OHair, I am moved to try to total up the historical, intellectual, legal, and human significance of the woman who, for more than a decade, was virtually a mother to both my wife, Ann, and me. It is a daunting task. I confess I am still too close to be able to attempt a truly objective assessment of Madalyn the person, Madalyn the friend.
Her fight was fundamentally a fight for liberty, the liberty of the mind.
Madalyn the Intellectual During the last fifty years, I have known a lot of brilliant women. Ive who takes pleasure in exercising the intellect. Like Aristotle, she took worked with them as a science professor and in the field of scientific all knowledge as her province. Coming as late in history as she did, publishing. I even had the good fortune to marry one. And then, of however, she had a lot more provinces to master than did Aristotle course, there was Madalynarguably the smartest woman Ive ever and all of Aristotles provinces had become much bigger. Nevertheless, known. Her intelligence was analytical, dissective, and often applied like Madalyn was a lifelong student who went after every subject as though an x-ray probe. Most problems, both in daily life and in law, are complex it were a rare or exotic butterfly to add to her collection. She read all the classics. She read all the Great composites composed of a skeleton of Books. She read all the philosophers and facts and hard data surrounded by a theologians. She read all the histories. foggy envelope of misperceptions and She studied the sciences. She assembled emotional color. In its prime, Madalyns the greatest library on Atheism that ever mind could pierce such fog covers with existed in the US. lightning speed to reveal the hard core of Music also was a province Madalyn the problem facing her. When she did this sought to subdue. Completely conversant on the debate platform or in the midst of a on all the great classical composers, she radio or television show, she was dazzling. studied their lives as well as their music, Although she retained this ability to concluding that many of the greatest had the end of her tragically abbreviated been Atheistsor at least not Christians. life, during her later life her cognitive Beethoven, I think, was her favorite. functions were sometimes impaired by She clearly could relate to the story told of the brittle form of diabetes that bedeviled his death. Beethoven, it is said, was lying the final years of her career. With blood comatose upon his deathbed, unable to sugar too high or too lowI never could speak or respond to speech. A terrible decide on which side the problem lay lightning storm developed. A sudden problems presented too suddenly could barrage of thunder shook the death elicit fiery emotional outbursts. On a chamber, causing him to sit up suddenly, number of occasions, she would punch shake his fist at the sky with a look of wild out letters on her typewriter that utterly defiance upon his face, and then fall back devastated their recipients. At least some dead. Beethovens remark, I have seized of these letters I am certain she later Fate by the throat and grappled with him, regretted. But she could never publicly go probably was ever in her consciousness. back on a decision once made. Frank Zindler, Ann Zindler, Robin Eileen MurrayShe could play the piano, too. The first For someone who, for so many years, OHair, Jon Garth Murray, Madalyn Murray OHair time I ever visited her at home, I noticed had been able to wield the scalpel of reason a modest spinet piano in what my grandmother would have called a with the self-assurance and finesse of a neurosurgeon, it must have been sitting room. I asked if I might try out the instrument and she told me to difficult or impossible to admit even to herself that anything could affect go ahead; there were music books in the piano bench if I needed them. her ability to reason objectively. Fortunately, such lapses were rare. Opening the bench, I seized upon Schirmers edition of the Chopin Madalyn Mays, then Madalyn Murray, then Madalyn OHair or tudes . Turning to my favorite, the so-called Revolutionary tude, I Murray OHair, was the quintessential intellectualthat is, a person
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was startled to see that the pages were dog-eared, another personal preference in a society that wanted thoroughly worn, and had been carefully annotated to remain both civilized and free. Religion was the in pencil for fingerings. Whos been playing the enemy of freedom, the corrupter of natural human Revolutionary tude? I asked. Me, she replied, ethics, and the greatest threat to survival of Homo before the Baltimore cops broke my wrists when sapiens. Religion and religious modes of thought they attacked us in our home. I was too stunned had to go. Clearly, that could not be achieved by by this information to attempt the piece myself, force. Only education, assisted by completely free settling instead upon the Moonlight Sonata. How speech, could attempt it. Madalyn the educator, the appropriate, I thought later, for Madalyn to have free-speaker, accepted the challenge with relish. devoted so much effort on a revolutionary etude. Free speech: that was what was needed to Symbolism was as important in Madalyns life as educate the public about religions and the illogic was breakfast. of superstition. Madalyn knew that words can have Although Madalyn was well-read in all the magical significance in religionfor example, philosophers and her Atheism was firmly grounded preachers end prayers with In Jesus Name We in solid philosophical principles, she was not a Pray in order to use the heap-big-medicine of a philosopher herselfat least not a technical or name of power to make the prayers magically come Robin Eileen Murray-OHair theoretical philosopher such as Bertrand Russell true. She knew that the commandment Thou shalt or A. J. Ayer. She discovered no new disproofs of not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain gods that I am aware of, and wrote very little on was simply a prohibition against using a magical epistemology and the other topics that professional word for unauthorized purposes. She knew that philosophers like to gnaw upon. One of her treasured this was the foundation upon which the concept of possessions was an admiring letter written to her by blasphemy was based as were the anti-blasphemy Bertrand Russell. laws which seek to nullify the First Amendments She was an applied philosopher who attempted guarantee of freedom of speech. to put into practice the eclectic philosophy of Madalyn argued that in the world of physics materialism or realism that she had put together in and physiology there were no magical words, and the course of her voracious reading. She wanted to blasphemy was a subjectless crime. Words are make the world reasonable, and tried until the end to words, nothing more. People who reacted to certain do so. Everything in the world sorted out so clearly words as though they were magical had to be in her mind. Why couldnt the rest of the world see educated. Specifically, they had to be desensitized things the way they really were? Once people could to the religious words of power. My gawwd! she be made to see how evil religion ishow they are would exclaim, relishing the reactions of Christers being conned and duped by preachers, priests, and as they recoiled from the mockery of an Atheist gurussurely they must rise up, overthrow their demonstrating so casually the utter triviality of Jon Garth Murray deceivers, and join her cause. their most potent word. To do that, she had to get the attention of the world, which was Madalyn knew also that the taboo four-letter words proscribed in not easy given the vast amounts of money being spent to keep people ordinary American speech are anthropologically no different than the inattentive to voices of reason. Madalyn often had to be flamboyant and religious words of power that must not be taken in vain. She would even somewhat outr. Since professional philosophers never got on point out that Yahweh (the secret name of the deity which must
One of her treasured possessions was an admiring letter written to her by Bertrand Russell.
television and radio, she knew she would have to be theatrical and more than a bit outrageous. To get the attention of the world, she often had to apply the principle behind the joke about the Quaker farmer who had to hit his mule over the head with a two-by-four to get his attention. She was Phil Donahues very first talk show guest, and as such launched his career in television at the same time she launched her own. Madalyn never even tried to hide the fact that she had no respect for anybodys religion. According to her aphorism, religion had caused more harm than any other single idea in the history of humankind. It would be immoral, in fact, to pretend that evil so great might become just never be pronounced, on pain of death) is a four-letter word in Hebrew (YHWH). She realized that speech taboos were nothing less than the intrusion of religious (i.e., illogical) modes of thought into daily life. Four-letter words were, when you got down to it, religious. People had to be desensitized to them also. She delighted in challenging people to explain the objective difference between the words fuck and copulate, and she would point out that ficken, the German cognate, was fairly acceptable for use in ordinary German discourse. Why should it be wrong to use the word in English but not in German? Superstition, nothing more. She did expend great effort to desensitize the nation to the A-word.
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She used the words Atheist and Atheismcapitalized, no less over and over in every possible venue. Before Madalyn, most Atheists were afraid to use the word other than in whispers. Things are much different now, thanks to her, although I cant say the desensitization of society as a whole is yet complete. Nevertheless, Madalyn made it much safer and much more natural to call oneself an Atheist. The Legal Legacy Madalyn is most remembered for her watershed lawsuit Murray v. Curlett (1963) in which the US Supreme Court ruled that forced prayer and bible reading in public schools was unconstitutional. Murray v. Curlett, moreover, had contested school prayer on behalf of Atheists, and the plaintiffs had identified themselves as Atheists supplying an eloquent explanation of Atheist philosophy (see sidebar). Unfortunately, this very fact of which Atheists are justly proud resulted in the court spitefully relegating Madalyns case to a subsidiary role in its published decision, which combined Murray with a similar case
In ruling against the case, US District Court Judge Jack Roberts agreed with a federal appeals courts ruling that the use of the motto on coins has nothing to do with the establishment of religion. Its use is of a patriotic or ceremonial character and bears no true resemblance to a governmental sponsorship of a religious exercise. The Supreme Court refused to review the case on appeal. Attempts to remove religious slogans from money, the national motto, and the pledge of allegiance to the flag continue today. (All three intrusions of religious language into the secular sphere occurred in the mid-1950s, as the finale of the McCarthy crusade against Atheist communism.) OHair v. Blumenthal changed my life completely, forcing me to abandon a twenty-year career at a community college branch of the State University of New York. How did this happen? In 1977 I had joined with Madalyn, the composer Leonard Bernstein, and a multitude of other co-plaintiffs in her suit to get In God We Trust off our money. I made the rounds of radio and television talk-shows in the New York State Capital District. That infuriated the right-wing politicians who
Life magazine dubbed her the most hated woman in America.

brought by Edward Schempp, a Unitarian. That made it hard for legal scholars even to obtain her case. Although the full title of the decision is School District of Abington Township, Pennsylvania, et al., Appellants, v. Edward Lewis Schempp et al., William J. Murray III, etc., et al., Petitioners, v. John N. Curlett, President, et al., Individually, and Constituting the Board of School Commissioners of Baltimore City, the case is always indexed and referred to as Abington Township v. Schempp. Period. Despite the fact that Murray had docket No. 119 and Schempp was No. 142 (Murray clearly having priority), and despite the fact that Murray was broader in its petition, the Court could not dignify Atheists by granting them the title of a decision. Madalyn never forgave the slight. Despite the judicial smothering of her case, Madalyn was quick to claim the victoryand the world ignored Schemppeven though that was now the official name on the caseand focused all its wrath on Madalyn. Life magazine dubbed her the most hated woman in America. (Madalyns gripping, personal account of the violent aftermath of the SCOTUS decision can be found in her autobiographical An Atheist Epic, available from American Atheist Press.) Virtually every First Amendment religious case before the Supreme Court since 1963 has either been enabled by Murray v. Curlett or has been necessitated by attempts of religionists to nullify it. All the attempts to sneak creationism into the public schools, all the prayers at football games, all the attempts to get vouchers for parochial schools all these efforts and more have, without exception, had Madalyns case down deep below the surface as the irritant motivating them. Of course, this motivation is not always hidden. In fact, literally millions (probably billions, if one counts all the sermons preached since 1963) of words have been written and spoken by religionists about the case that kicked God out of the public schools and about the Atheist who challenged the hegemony of the clergy in American secular society. Although Murray v. Curletta case she wonwas Madalyns most important case for our country, OHair v. Blumenthal (1977) a case she lostwas of greatest importance to me personally. This case sought to remove the motto In God We Trust from US currency and coins. controlled the purse strings of the college and led to their withholding funds for science education until I was forced to resign.* Office Space Living and working long hours together in what psychologically were tight quarters was not easy or without instability. The three highly-charged personalities of Madalyn, her son Jon Garth Murray, and granddaughter Robin Eileen Murray-OHair were like mutually repellent protons in an unstable nucleusthreatening to fly apart at any moment but held together by the invisible binding forces of common purpose and consanguinity. New staff would often be alarmedeven frightenedby the shouting matches that often erupted among the three principals, but such emotional outbursts were always short-lived. One time, when my wife, Ann, and I were visiting it looked as though they were about to kill each other. Several hours later, they treated us to late-night hamburgers and regaled us with the days hate mail. We all were jolly as we parted to get some sleep before the next fourteen-hour day of work. Madalyns Voice is Silenced For many years, persistent rumors had circulated that Madalyn had embezzled millions of dollars from her organizations and had squirreled them away in some offshore repository. (No matter that those organizations were always so close to bankruptcy that she often had to use her military and Social Security pensions to help pay the staff!) She was, after all, an Atheist, and how could an Atheist be trusted? Somehow, rumors of the millions found their way to David Roland Waters, a man who had committed his first murder while yet a teenager and had served time for other violent crimes as well. Out of prison once again, he found his way to the American Atheist Center in Austin and sought employment. Presenting a completely bogus resume, he started work as general factotum and quickly demonstrated that he could do anything needed to keep the office running. When the Murray OHair family had to leave the office for a week or so to join me and other members of the board to defend ourselves and our corporations in a
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trial to be held in a federal court in San Diego, he was charged with holding down the fort. As soon as the family was gone, Waters hacked into the computers and stole tens of thousands of dollars of the operating funds. He cracked the safe as well, stealing over a hundred thousand dollars in bonds. When the Murray OHairs returned to the office unexpectedly early, they found that the staff had been dismissed and Waters was nowhere to be seen. Madalyn quickly found incontrovertible evidence that Waters had robbed her corporation, but when she took the evidence to the Austin police, they would not take any action. It wasnt until weeks laterafter Atheists all over the country, myself included, had faxed letters and petitions of protest to the chief of police, the sheriff, the county prosecutor, and a judgethat David Waters was brought in for questioning. After pleading guilty to the thefts, he was released and was ordered to repay the stolen money as he was able. While rummaging through the computers, Waters had found a million-dollar account in a bank in New Zealand. Having been hired about a year after American Atheists had completed its well-publicized fund drives to amass a million-dollar trust fundit had been hoped that the earnings from the fund would pay for the day-to-day operations of the organizationWaters must have concluded that he had found one of the fabled offshore accounts he had been seeking. The New
Texas ranch. Only then could it be proved that they were not traitors to their own cause or robbers of their own corporations. No one was ever charged with murder in the case, but David Roland Waters and Gary Karr were sent to prison on lesser charges. A Chilling Memory At one point, Ellen Johnson was able to contact Jon and Robin by means of Madalyns cell phone. They assured Ellen that everything was okaythey were just away on business. I also tried several times to call Madalyn on her cell phone, but she never answered. Several days after I gave up, I started to receive death threats on my home phone in Columbus, Ohio. Although I had received dozens of death threats over the years only a few were deemed to require the attention of police. These calls, however, were different. They all were from a man who could disguise his voice in multiple ways and then, after engaging me in conversation, would revert to what I suppose was his real voice and snarl, The same thing that happened to Madalyn and Robin is going to happen to you and your wife. The calls came daily for more than a week. Immediately after the first call, I notified the police and a trap was placed on my phone. Never could a call be traced accurately; they seemed to bounce all over the country and trace to innocent, real people. One call came as a police
Madalyn made it much safer, and much more natural, to call oneself
an Atheist.
Zealand account, however, was not hackable, and Waters had to delay its acquisition to a later date. That date appears to have been Sunday, August 27, 1995, a day Waters knew the Murray OHairs would be working at the Atheist Center alone. Accompanied by fellow ex-con Gary Karr and petty crook Danny Fry (and indirectly assisted by girlfriends and another ex-con, Gerald Lee Chico Osborne), Waters kidnapped the trio, held them hostage for a month, and extorted over $600,000 from them. Jon was forced to withdraw money from the New Zealand trust fund and wire it to a coin dealer in San Antonio, Texas, converted it into gold coins. When the kidnappers obtained the coins, they killed the First Family of Atheismapparently by strangulation, dismembered their bodies, stuffed them into small plastic barrels, tried to cremate them, and then buried them on the Camp Wood ranch near San Antonio. The Murray OHairs were forced to leave a handwritten note on the front door saying that they had been called away on important business. Soon rumors began to circulate about their disappearance. In order to keep American Atheists operating, the board of directors elected Ellen Johnson acting director. Ann and I were asked to rejoin the board from which we had retired a year earlier. When Ellen discovered the $600,000 missing from the New Zealand trust fund and reported the theft, widespread claims circulated that the family had absconded with the money and were hiding in New Zealand, Australia, South Africa, or even Bulgaria or Romania. But no police agency would investigate their disappearance, even when Madalyns estranged son William, a bornagain Christian, tried to get them to do so. It would be January 2001 before the dismembered remains of Madalyn Murray OHair, Jon Garth Murray, and Robin Eileen MurrayOHair would be exhumed from their shallow graves on the desolate
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officer was at my home. He picked up the phone and argued with the caller. The caller would not believe it was actually an officer of the law! Days later, the threats ceased, and it was only five years later, after the bodies were found, that I had a chilling thought. Had Waters gotten my home phone number from Madalyns phone? Had I been talking to Waters? Improbable, but certainly not impossible. The Summing Up I wish to conclude this assessment of Madalyn OHair by saying without apology that I think Madalyn Murray OHair was the most important legal figure of the 20th century in terms of both the practical impact she had and the theoretical implications of her cases. Her fight was not just about school prayer and Bible-reading in schools. It was not just about the separation of state and church. Her fight was fundamentally a fight for liberty, and it was a fight for the most fundamental of liberties: the liberty of the mind. All her life, Madalyn sought truth, both in the microcosm and in the macrocosm. The pursuit of truth, however, depends upon freedom freedom of inquiry. Minds that are shackled by superstition and forced to reason in chains cannot seek truth. Minds that are free but barred by religious or other authorities from carrying out investigations cannot seek the truth either. Madalyn fought against all forces impeding pursuers of truth. She did not win that war, but she bravely gave her every erg of effort to the fight. For that I honor her. For that I remember her. Frank R. Zindler is a member of the Board of Directors and managing editor of this magazine. *See Eliminate That Atheist! in the 4th Quarter 2012 issue.
From an Old Guy not from the Old Guard
American Atheists First Fifty Years

by Ed Buckner
A Look Back at
left high school for Rice University in 1963, so I have some sense of how long American Atheists has been at it, but I never met Madalyn Murray OHair. I joined American Atheists sometime in the 1970s, but I was never a part of even local leadership until I was hired to be the president in 2008. But Im an ardent fan, a longtime activist, and old enough to have seen first-hand what American Atheists has accomplished and to have well-grounded reasons for optimism about the future. In the 1960s, when Madalyn Murray OHair (MMOH, as many of us affectionately refer to her) first strode onto the national stage raising hell in court, in debates, and on TV, she was not well loved among my parents and siblings, let alone the rest of the nation. She took pride in being called the most hated woman in America and she seemed to relish her reputation as a fearless troublemaker and an avowed, aggressive Atheist. At the time, I was gradually coming to own
Bible, which hed asked her to sign.) She once made the comment (for a Texas newspaper, I think), Thank God Im an Atheist. For years afterwards, I heard people like my siblings claim that as proof that even the Atheists really are believersdeep down where they dont even know it. What it actually proved was that Atheists have a sense of humor, that we can employ irony to good effect. She made it plain in every public appearance that she was proud to be a militant or avowed Atheist, unapologetic about not accepting what religions were selling. She never asked permission for, or hinted that she needed the establishments approval of, her views. She bristled at any hint of condescension, boldly asserting her rightand the right of all Atheiststo believe and practice according to their own lights, not those of authority or religion. She was hated, Ive become convinced, more for daring to disagree openly and plainly than for any prickly rudeness or for her occasionally grandiose ideas on her personal lifestyle.
She was hated more for daring to disagree openly and plainly than for any prickly rudeness or grandiose ideas on her personal lifestyle.
my senses as an Atheist but as I watched her from afar, I was unsure of her techniques and tactics. Was she, as some Christian relatives and friends claimed, just being rude for its own sake, intentionally rubbing believers the wrong way for sport? Why was she so angry, so vigorous in her defense of Atheism? Couldnt diplomacy and cordiality have worked better? I watched her tell a TV preacher on a talk show, Keep the faith, Bob, but keep it to yourself. (I think she also wrote that in his Whatever our current needs for civility, graciousness, and cooperation (and we can argue about such matters), the only real choices in 1963 were to accept our roles as social and moral inferiors or to stand up and defend ourselves. MMOH had something in common with Baptist preachers in the Revolutionary Era like Isaac Backus or John Leland, who rejected official toleration of their beliefs and practices in favor of complete liberty of conscience. They argued then,
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The 1960s and 1970s were a time when the vast majority of Americans sincerely believed they were speaking the truth (even though they werent, even back then) when they said theyd never known an Atheist.
as we argue now, that governmentand the broader society, for that matterhas no power to declare whether were right about anyones ideas about any gods. In due course, Atheists, including me, came to see MMOH as a breath of fresh air, a courageous and clear-headed defender, and a leader, no matter her faults. The organization she led quickly gained credibility with us as one that would stand up for us and for the idea that we richly deserve to be defended and stood up for. My son, Michael, was born to my wife, Diane, and me in 1970. When he was quite young, one of my pious sisters sent him a book of sappy Bible stories. She knew of our Atheism and insisted she was not trying to be rude or cause trouble; she just wanted Michael to have some exposure to the truth, to have a chance at a decent and moral life. She feared that he might, without her brave help, meander through life in the American South without learning about the good news of Christianity. And, of course, Christianity was oh-so-invisible to us. (Her efforts apparently failed. Despite our steadfast avoidance of indoctrination, Michael is, like Diane and mebut without any suggestion from usa proud life member of American Atheists.) I was angry with my sister then but knew that sending her a protest letter would not change her mind or her approach. I wrote instead to American Atheists, asking them to send some materials on Atheism to my sister so that her children might have some exposure to better ideas. I strongly doubt that my sister ever shared that material with her children, but she never again sent Christian reading matter to Michael, so she apparently got the message. Another example of the impact of American Atheists also comes from my personal history. In 1968, my father was the rector at St. Christophers Episcopal Church in League City, Texas. That was also the year that Apollo 8 became the first manned spacecraft to orbit the moon. Its commander, Frank Borman, was a lay reader at St. Christophers. Frank and my father cooked up a plan for Frank to take part in the churchs Christmas Eve service as he was orbiting the moon. The timing turned out not to be right for Franks live participation, but he did record a prayer from orbit that was used in the service. As a result, there was worldwide hoopla over these religious bits as well as the mission itself and my father got his fifteen minutes of fame. After all this, MMOH sued the Feds on the grounds that the astronauts are government agents sent to the moon at huge taxpayer expense and should therefore be restricted from using that mission for their missionary work. The courts denied jurisdiction and refused to intervene, but NASA apparently got the message since future blatant attempts at astronaut proselytizing were at least muted. (See the Wikipedia article on Apollo 8 for more details.) MMOH did not gain in respect or affection from my parents and siblings but Atheism gained nevertheless. The widespread national disdain for American Atheists and MMOH, echoed in the recurring canards like there being no Atheists in foxholes or that we have freedom of religion in America, not freedom from religion, was vocally shared by many I knew. The 1960s and 1970s were a time when the vast majority of Americans sincerely believed they were speaking the truth (even though they werent, even back then) when they said theyd never known an Atheist. The stigma of Atheists being hopelessly immoral, outrageously in rebellion against a loving God, and in league with Satan (possibly as foolish dupes rather than his evil minions) was pervasive. The stigma has not ended, the fear of and hatred of us has not abated, and the ignorance and misunderstanding is still widespread. But there has been overwhelming progress over the last fifty years for Atheists, despite the massive work still to be done. American Atheists and Madalyn Murray OHair were not the only factors in bringing about the positive changes, but they were indisputably the key leaders for the good of Atheists, an indispensable part of change for the good. Ive known and had the privilege of working with some of the many people who led and worked for American Atheists in its earliest days: Frank Zindler, the late Ann Zindler, Neal Cary, Noel Scott, the
I watched her tell a TV preacher,
but keep it to yourself.

late Conrad Goeringer, Chris Allen, Dick Hogan, Arlene-Marie, Rich Andrews, Dave Kong, Ellen Johnson, and many others. (My communication and cooperation with Ellen Johnson came before I was anything beyond a member.) Im strongly optimistic about the long-range future of Atheism, and American Atheists is the most important basis for that optimism. Today we have an incredibly bright, diverse, energetic board, with a nice blend of old guard and dynamic newer leaders. We have important legal efforts underway. We have this fine magazine to serve as the flagship for our published efforts to educate ourselves and others. We have a still small but skilled and dedicated staff to keep us on track. We support local groups and collaborate with national groups with stunningly successful results like the Reason Rally. It was supported by many groups and individualsbut spearheaded by American Atheists and President David Silverman. And its his leadership thats assuredly the single most important reason for my confidence in the future of American Atheists. Ed Buckner was the president of American Atheists from 2008 to 2010 and is a current member of the Board of Directors. His new book, In Freedom We Trust: An Atheist Guide to Religious Liberty (Prometheus Books), was coauthored with his son, Michael.
Keep the faith, Bob,
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Religion
by Ce Atkins
is an App
G
reetings, heretics. Verily, religion is an app.
structure that optimizes relationship information. The philosophic orientation here is that all the codes mentioned above are structured information aggregates that simultaneously function as apps. They are information processors trying to optimize relationships within and among their respective networks. From this perspective, moral, religious, and legal codes are aggregated information structures that functionalbeit impreciselyas culture apps/information processors which attempt to optimize human relationships. Etiquette, sportsmanship, and diplomacy are examples of subcodes or apps. DNA and emotions are biological apps; software is a technological app. In the context of our Earth being 4.5 billion years old, these are all complexity apps, generated for more effective navigation (optimization) of increasingly complex relationships. To put this idea in an evolutionary context, lets start with a few quotes from a powerful information processor, Dr. Jonas Salk: The most fundamental phenomenon of the universe is relationship. Evolution has proceeded along the course of optimizing relationships. Nature Tech: Code One of natures technologies for optimizing relationships is code. Codegenetic, language, moral, religious, legal, software, etc.is the technology that living beings use to optimize (organize, weight, prioritize) component relationships within a network. Codes are aggregated, condensed, and generally standardized information structures. DNA is an aggregated, condensed, and generally standardized information structure. DNA is code that functions as an application,
Science, as a reality-processing app, has been gnawing on gods coverage map for centuries.
an app that attempts to optimize a bodys myriad network relationships (digestive, immune, etc.) to sustain its life. DNA also seeks to optimize an organisms relationships with geo, eco, bio and social networks. A set of moral principles is a code. Its an aggregated, condensed, often standardized information structure used as an app to optimize human relationships in social networks. A moral code is an aggregate
So how is religion an app? Heres an example. Its 1842. Youre in a 53-unit wagon train heading west. Youre about to cross the Platte River in Nebraska, but theres no bridge. The wagons slowly roll through the river. You and your family are on the 47th wagon. The first 46 cross without significant problems. However, their crossing has altered the contours of the river bottom, loosening a rock structure. Your wagon hits the structure, snaps a
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When you have an omniscient, omnipresent, omnipotent super app called god, you can cover a lot of ground.
wheel from the axle, and pitches the wagon into the frigid waters of the Platte. Your mother was holding your seven-month-old baby daughter. Tragically, they both perish in the swift currents of the river. This devastating event causes your emotion apps to be fully engaged; you suffer severe crying fits and profound sadness. Still, like a soldier whose best friend is killed next to him in battle, the demands of survival (other codes) override the emotion apps and the next day the wagon train presses on. The pastor traveling with your group processes the horrible loss by using a religion app to soothe the emotion apps. He eloquently speaks of the similarity between grandmother and granddaughter, the grandmothers kindness, and how god has called them home to heaven because of their purity, or whatever story he invokes per his app. You are an Atheist with a degree in engineering. You understand statistics, that crossing rivers can be dangerous, and that there is some probability a wagon will not successfully forge the river. While you agree with the pastors assessment of the grandmothers strong character, you do not invoke the god/heaven/religion app to process their deaths. You do use the emotion app of sadness, but you also use the science app of statistical probability. Religion is a primitive information processorpart explanation app, part comfort app. Religious codes are aggregate information structures trying to help people optimize relationships with death, god, other people, ancestors, etc. Historically, religions app coverage has been huge. When you have an omniscient, omnipresent, omnipotent super app called god, you can cover a lot of ground from broken wagon wheels, to the color of your eyes, to super storms, to the collapse of whole nations. Science, as a reality-processing app, has been gnawing on gods coverage map for centuries. Culture Codes In earlier cultural iterations we lived in tribes. When the best hunter (lets call him Joe) brought home a big buck, we used moral codes to process the distribute-meat-to the-tribal-members relationship. Sure, Joe killed the buck, but its Omar who makes the excellent arrows that allow for greater accuracy with his new feather app that processes/optimizes the arrows-moving-through-air relationship. And dont forget Judys bow stings. They allow for greater power. Joe had a lot of information processing help. (Were a eusocial species; we specialize.) So who should get the best cuts of meat and who should get the merely edible ones? Moral codes tried to optimize meat-tribe (network) relationships for the survival and well-being of everyone. Moses Ten Commandments were religious codes trying to optimize relationships in human-to-god and human-to-human networks. His ten-point app says if you want a good relationship with god, forget those other gods (the g-man gets jealous). If you want good tribal relationships, dont steal and dont covet Harrys wife (Harry gets jealous). For males, jealously is, in part, a nasty, biological/emotional app, coded to secure and monitor a vital and scarce resource: fertile eggs. For females, jealousy is, in part, a radar app for securing and monitoring a males commitment to help raise
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the offspring. When we lived in tribes of 40 hunter/gatherers roaming thousands of acres, we needed primitive moral and religious apps. When we evolved to 100-acre villages of 4,000 people, we needed to develop a new cultural technology to try to optimize all the new relationships generated by the more complex social structure. And so we invented a new coding technology, a culture relationship app we call law, or legal codes. Forty nomadic hunter/gatherers could pretty much bury their dead anywhere. Four thousand people living in one place cant. Next to the well? No. Next to the brothel? No. Legal codes are culture apps that seek to articulate optimal relationships between decaying bodies and things like drinkable water or people having sex. We processed these relationships, coded them, and survived. Complexity and Religious Codes Religious codes are a cultural technology/app, developed in an attempt to optimize human relationships. Ongoing increases in complexity generated by evolution (e.g., where new aggregate structures come online such as physics, biology, chemistry) have rendered the religion app an obsolete and increasingly dangerous impediment to our ability to accurately, quickly, and powerfully process the realities of climate change, population increases, etc. John Tooby, the founder of evolutionary psychology, said, The mind is designed to balance these two functions: coordinating with reality, and coordinating with others. The larger the payoffs to social coordination, and the less commonly beliefs are tested against reality, then the more social demands will determine beliefthat is, network fixation of belief will predominate. Physics and chip design will have a high degree of coordination with reality, while the social sciences and climatology will have less (Edge.org). As Atheists, we get it. Religion is antiquated code/software, an archaic app that doesnt coordinate well with reality.
Religion is a primitive information processor: part explanation app, part comfort app.
Ce Atkins is the creator and editor of PostGenetic.com, which proposes the development of crowd, computer, and/or individual-sourced, postgenetic codes integrated with technology to help us navigate the exponential increases in cultural complexity. He also writes regularly for the Science Interview Series in this magazine.
Jesus was a Horse Thief

by Rick Wingrove
Artists Rendition of the Holy Perpetrator ~ Julius Schnorr von Carolsfeld
hile scanning the bible one day, I ran across an odd little story. It was a strange, seemingly innocuous account that seemed out of place, and one that I had never heard mentioned before. The more I thought about it, the stranger it seemed. Now I have come to think that this bizarre little story may hold the key to the entire christian fable. Jesus (assuming for the purpose of this argument that a traveling evangelist by that name once existed) lived in a time of great gullibility and religious fervor. Superstition was deeply ingrained into the everyday lives of the millions - literacy and critical skepticism were not - certainly not in regards to vengeful and unpredictable gods whose ire could be unleashed upon the unwary for no apparent reason. The average citizen was fearful and entirely powerless against authoritarian rulers. Questioning authority seldom evoked an enlightened or compassionate reaction. The people of that region have a history of extreme susceptibility to any and every new superstition that came along. It was a golden age for traveling holy men.
So anyway, this particular itinerant preacher had a gang of 12 guys who followed him around. That raises the question - what did these guys do all day? Were these 12 mouths he had to feed just mindless adoring sycophants, following him around, hanging on every word, (though
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never writing any of it down), and receiving food like manna from heaven, or did they exist in a real world, having to earn their keep and deal with daily pressures, necessities, and irritations? Like traveling preachers of today, his staff might have had a variety of duties like those of advance men and roadies who get there ahead of the gig, carry the bags, find accommodations, gather firewood, cook, put up posters, manage public relations, grease palms, call in favors, arrange permits, find venues, and a thousand other ad hoc chores. Or, were some of their duties more like those of Medicine Show crowd plants who were miraculously cured anew in every town. The tricks of the trade, like bringing dead people back to life, might have played to the country peasants who might mistake a deep coma for death. And faith healing? Petty magic and flim flam - tools of the trade for hucksters and charlatans. It might have impressed the ignorant and superstitious, who, after being taken in, were unlikely to confess their gullibility until the show was long gone. At any rate, one could easily believe that at least parts of their days were filled with sometimes mundane duties involved in the support of a traveling faith healing show - things like finding and preparing food for his posse, collecting and handling money, managing transportation, security duties such as screening access to the son of the creator of the universe, etc. Apparently, sometimes those duties included special ops. While searching for a bible passage one day, my eyes fell upon a most curious account in Luke 19, verses 29 - 36.
simply hand over their loot without a struggle. So they went to town, located this guy's horse, and started to make off with it when the guy spots them and comes running out to find out what the hell they think they are doing. So, they 'splain to the guy how it's gonna be. I guess you could say they made him an offer he couldn't refuse. Long story short, the guy caves and they depart with what, for many people in that part of the world in those days, would have been a large and indispensable part of their net worth. Whatever they told him seems to have been quite persuasive. Lastly, they made a riding blanket out of their clothing - so far so good, although it is a little surprising that the alleged son of god would require either a horse or padding for his own butt - but then it just got weird. His followers started laying thier clothis on the ground for the horse to walk on. Why they were doing this is not evident, but it sounds like something that a petulant young medieval prince might have had his minions do out of boredom. Makes me wonder how many miles they kept that up. Boiled down, this has conspiracy, coercion, and grand theft written all over it. I'm not sure how the folks around Bethpage and Bethany dealt with this kind of thing, but the Romans were known to be very tough on crime and were fond of using criminals, including petty thieves, for rough entertainment. Where I come from, stealing a horse would have gotten a person hanged a lot faster than religious scammery. Conclusion And I think thats exactly what happened. It turns out that local constabularies of the day viewed thievery very harshly. Imprisonment, torture, and cruel executions were common even for petty offenses. It seems to me that there is a likelihood that this traveling preacher simply ran afoul of the law, got caught and got hung, so to speak. Now the large number of people who actually believe the jesus fable will tell you that he was tortured and crucified like a common criminal for his beliefs. The adamantly religious are rarely objective, and sometimes diverge from the facts in the public assessment of their figureheads. Looks to me like his followers and the biblical revisionists who came later may have glossed over any misdeeds committed by this pack of unemployed religionistas, and painted his incarceration as if he were an innocent, unjustly imprisoned, and badly treated religious/political prisoner, Luke 19 notwithstanding. It reminds me of the old Bob Newhart Show in which Bob was complaining about a ticket for parking illegally in an alley. His airheaded neighbor, Howard, told Bob about a guy he knew who had parked illegally in that same alley and was now in prison. Bob asked incredulously, "He's in prison for illegal parking?" Howard replied, "Yeah! Well... that and he killed a guy." So, yes, Jesus was executed for his religious views. That, and he stole a horse. Rick Wingrove is the Virginia State Director for American Atheists and the graphics and layout editor for this magazine.
*Although there were certainly horses available in those days, it is possible that this meant an ass or a donkey. But in days of yore, stealing a loaf of bread could get you hung, let alone a small, rideable, horse-like, animal.
And it came to pass, when he was come nigh to Bethphage and Bethany, at the mount called the mount of Olives, he sent two of his disciples, saying , go ye into the village over against you; in the which at your entering ye shall find a colt tied, whereon yet never man sat: loose him, and bring him hither. And if any man ask you, Why do ye loose him? thus shall ye say unto him, Because the Lord hath need of him. And they that were sent went their way, and found even as he had said unto them. And as they were loosing the colt, the owners thereof said unto them, Why loose ye the colt? And they said, The Lord hath need of him. And they brought him to Jesus: and they cast their garments upon the colt, and they set Jesus thereon. And as he went, they spread their clothes in the way.
What are we to glean from this sparse account? Looking at this with an eye on known human behavior modes, here is what it looks like to me: Jesus and his crew stopped outside a small town to scope it out and make some plans. Apparently these plans involved the removal of a horse (colt*) from the town without prior approval or notification of the owner. Today, this is known as 'theft' and, until relatively recently, was a hanging offense. Jesus told two of his men to go into the town where they would find a horse. He told them to get the horse and bring it to him without being seen, but if they were seen, to inform the guy that they were taking his horse to their boss, a guy who apparently had enough of a rep (and 12 mindless "followers", work hardened and ready to do whatever the "son of god" might require of them) that people would
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REMEMBERING ANN IN MEMORIAM ANN E. ZINDLER

February 25, 1935January 4, 2013
by Frank R. Zindler
Ann and Frank Zindler
ts been a long goodbye, but now its final. The only woman I have ever loved has died, two months shy of her seventyeighth birthday. Eighteen years after her first breast cancer in 1990, she developed another cancer. Then she suffered liver failure, and a heroic four-and-a-half-year battle against the metastatic disease came to an end. She knew she wouldnt make it to her birthday. Consequently, upon starting hospice-at-home, she requested that I order from Krogers an un-birthday cake with lemon filling and white frosting with red roses, get some French vanilla ice cream from Graeters, buy some cheap pink champagne, and have the family join us to have an un-birthday party. We all were there: our daughter Catherine, her consort Big Mike, and our three grandchildren Michael, Steven, and Laura. Exactly one week later, at about the same time of day that the party had been celebrated, her heart shut down and she breathed her last belabored breath. Ann died at home, but she had spent so much time in hospitals and rehab centers during the year 2012 that any one of them might have begun to feel like home away from home. From January to January, one medical crisis after another developed and I devoured an up-to-date pathophysiology text so I could alert her doctors to subtle developments and allow prompt interventions. At least three times during the year, Ann eluded the Reaper. Alas, during all the down time when she was fighting acute illnesses unrelated to the cancer, she could not receive chemotherapy and the tumor cells multiplied steadily until there was nothing more to be done. My wife, lover, and best friendmy better selfis now gone and I need to sort out the facts about her that I hope will be remembered the facts that may help to show why her life was important not only to me and our family but to the entire Community of Reason as well. Ann was born on February 25, 1935 in Ann Arbor, Michigan, to Charles Gordon Hunt and Ruth Elizabeth Prather Hunt. Her father was nonreligious during most of his life until he had a heart attack and caught a bad case of religion from his wife. (The disease proved incurable, and he lived only a few years longer.) Anns mother, however, was a life-long member of the Church of Christ (not to be confused with the Christian Church, which scandalously allows the use of musical instruments in its services) and was an evangelical to the max. Throughout Anns childhood and early adult life, Ruth tried to make Ann get religion. Ann remembered how, at about the age of five, her mother made her put her nickel in the collection plate during the collection. She always enjoyed
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recounting how much she resented having to give Jesus her money in Michigan. We wanted to have a Life magazine wedding, that is, a when she could buy so much candy with it. Jesus doesnt need money wedding so unusual that it would make the pages of Life. I had become to buy candy, she thought, so why should I give him my nickel? acquainted with the anthropologist Margaret Meade and we planned to Ann attended Roosevelt High School, a school operated by Eastern have her perform the ceremonyin front of the Brontosaurus skeleton Michigan University. It was, of course, quite secularnot exactly what in the Field Museum in Chicago. I also knew Marlin Perkins at the time Anns mother preferred. Ann was encouraged to attend a revival-like and we thought it would be nice for him to supply a couple chimpanzees meeting of the church at which she claimed she was hypnotized into from the Lincoln Park Zoo to serve as ring bearers. Unfortunately, getting dunked. The baptypnosis didnt last, however, and it wore off in a Margaret Meade was not licensed in Illinois to perform marriages, and few daysleaving Ann more skeptical than ever. More drastic measures even if she could, it didnt seem likely that the museum would allow being needed, Ann was sent off to get religion at Harding College, a bible- chimpanzees inside its Mesozoic sanctuary. college-like school in Searcy, Arkansas. Not surprisingly, Harding College We decided then to be married in the Unitarian Church in Ann was where Ann learned to sin. It seems that many other Christian Arbora hotbed of heresy filled with atheistic professors from the parents had sent their wayward offspring to Harding to be reformed, University of Michigan. Alas, Anns mother had heard about Unitarians and so Ann found many other like-minded free spirits with whom to and that quickly became as impossible as chimpanzees beside a associate. There being around forty rules (commandments) governing Brontosaurus. We had to get hitched in the home of Anns parents in life in the dormitory, she and another neer-do-well systematically set out Ypsilanti. I composed and recorded a wedding march that was played to break them all. Coming to the prohibition against soliciting, they as Ann descended the open staircase to the living room where about were unsure how to understand the rule but decided that reselling candy sixteen guests were assembled. Her mothers hillbilly preacher and bars up and down the dormitory hall would I were waiting for her in front of a large bay suffice to violate the rule. Ann was not asked window that faced the assembled guests. to return the following year. The snakes and Earlier, Ann had told the preacher that she turtles in the bathtub may have been partly to wanted the bare minimum of ceremonyno blame. sermon, no obeying, etc. Just the minimum Returning from Arkansas to Ypsilanti, that would be legal. Right. The preacher had Michigan, where she had been reared, she his back to the window, facing the audience. enrolled at Eastern Michigan University to Ann and I were facing the window and the study biology and art. To earn tuition money, preacher, with our backs to the guests. No she worked part-time at the University of sooner had the preacher started the ceremony, Michigan in neighboring Ann Arbor as a the spirit fell upon him and he launched into desk clerk and telephone operator in a mens a sermon. As he was just about to enter the dormitorythe dorm in which I had just theosphere, Annwhose nose was about two come to live. I have only vague memories of feet away from hismade a face. It was an conversations with her from that period, and omigawd-wont-you-spare-us-this-nonsense didnt really get to know her until the summer type of face. after my graduation. Although it was a cool day in mid-October, I had decided to stay in Ann Arbor sweat spurted from the preachers forehead. Ann Zindler that summer to take the intensive Greek He faltered in his fantasy, stammered, and course. One day, as I was walking with the proclaimed, I now pronounce you man and cinematographer-to-be Michael (Alessandro) Degaetano to the wife. Ann and I then decided we really should exchange rings in order Michigan Union to get a drink and a bite to eat, I saw a woman walking to make things legal. And so began an amazing marriage that lasted about fifteen feet ahead of us. I think thats Ann Hunt, I said to more than forty-eight years. Michael, a bit louder than I realized. Furiously, she whirled around and Ann was what I call a natural Atheistsomeone who simply confronted us. Are you talking about me? she snapped. Yes, I said. cannot believe in things without evidence. I, by contrast, had been very Arent you Ann Hunt? Who are you? she fumed. Im Frank Zindler. religious as a childso religious that after graduating from eighth grade Immediately her annoyance disappeared. It turned out that we had I had been offered an eight-year scholarship to attend a Lutheran high had many friends in common and she knew my name. We went together school and seminary in Milwaukee. Although Ann did not call herself then to the Union and three months later we were engaged to be married. an Atheist at the time we met, after reading the copy of Homer Smiths We realized much later that I actually had been to a New Years Man and His Gods that I gave her that summer she realized that Atheist party at her apartment but had passed out after one drink, got very was the perfect word to describe her Weltanschauung. And so began a sick, and spent the night on the bathroom floor of an apartment across philosophical, activist, and loving partnership that never faltered until it the hall. That was the first of the silent migraines that have plagued me was dissolved by death. sporadically throughout my life. In any case, Ann had become known In the 1970s, when I was a professor at SUNY-Johnstown, we lived for the salons over which she presided. She was a magnet for some in Upstate New York, in the Mohawk Valley. About the year 1976, of the most brilliant young artists, mathematicians, and scientists at Madalyn Murray OHair came to New York City to organize a chapter the university. It was joked that one should receive graduate credits for of her Society of Separationists, the forerunner of American Atheists, attending her gatherings. Inc. (She was not allowed at the time to charter a corporation with It wasnt possible to actually get married until more than a year later, the word Atheist in the name.) As did I, the nuclear physicist Renato when I was teaching biology and earth science at Holland High School Bobone and his wife Mary of Schenectady attended her meeting. We
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decided to start a chapter with Mary as Director in Schenectady, only a half-hour drive from Amsterdam where we were living at the time. Cable-access television was just beginning at the time, and Ann and the Bobones and I decided we should produce a weekly Atheist-education program. Ann took the training needed to use the cameras and recorders, and proceeded to design and build a television studio in our garage. Absolutely hating to speak in public herself, Ann did everything possible to allow me and the Bobones to occupy the spotlight. About a year later we moved to Columbus, Ohio, where we founded the Central Ohio Chapter of American Atheists with Ann as Assistant Director. A very activist chapter needing many picket signs, Ann did all the graphics, made the signs, and marched with all of us as we picketed mosques, churches, government buildings, and other threats to the wall of separation between state and church. Hating public speaking, she busied herself in creating the necessary infrastructures needed for others to glory in the spotlight of public attention. I got all the credit for the work that Ann had done. Fat ladies didnt get much respect in those days. Shortly after founding the Columbus chapter, we resumed cableaccess TV, producing a weekly half-hour program called American Atheist TV Forum. Sometimes the show involved interviews, but often it was highly didactican Atheist primer if you willfor which many elaborate graphics were required. Guess who produced them! A monthly chapter newsletter was needed, and Ann made use of newly available computer layout and typesetting technology to produce the publication. The newsletter turned quickly into a small magazine. In the mid-1980s, Madalyn Murray OHair conferred life memberships upon us and asked us to join the Board of Directors. Madalyn really loved Ann, and treated her like a daughter. The affection was mutual. We often were invited to Madalyns home in Austin, Texas, and several times the Unholy FamilyMadalyn, Jon, and Robin visited our home in Columbus. Until the murder of the Murray-OHair family in 1995, we functioned as though we were a family of five. After the murders in 1995, Anns role in American Atheists really shifted into high gear. Publication of American Atheist had lapsed almost a year prior to the disappearance of the family, and Ann and I decided the journal had to be resurrected. Ann had to reconstruct all the logos and formatting of the magazine from scratch. Artwork, including covers, had to be created in such a way that it could be printed on the antiquated printing press at American GHQ in Austin. (No printing company in Austin would print Atheist material, and so Madalyn had had to do all her own printing in-house.) In like manner, the monthly national newsletter had to be recreated from scratch. And then there were books. Anns artistic talent proved indispensable in producing covers and other graphics for the books that she created with the same complicated computer software used to produce Time and Newsweek. My darling wife became a computer geek. With foresight, she passed on many of her skills to our daughter Catherine, who now is in charge of production of books for American Atheist Press. Throughout the forty-eight-plus years of our marriage, Ann was plagued by frequent illnesses. Reactive hypoglycemia and then diabetes induced the obesity that made the misery and embarrassment of her life. There was a reason for her shunning of cameras. The obesity led to osteoarthritis and a sequence of surgical interventions. Hospitalizations were not entirely without fun for her, however. Avoiding Catholic hospitals at all cost, she always went to Riverside Methodist Hospital in Columbus, where there was the always-present annoyance of Christian chaplains who thought it their duty to discomfit the sick. Ann thoroughly enjoyed returning the favor.
In 1990, a small cancer was discovered in Anns left breast. Fortunately, a lumpectomy was possible and only radiotherapy was required. Alas, eighteen years later, in August of 2008, a second tumor was discovered in the same breast. By the time of its discovery it had apparently metastasized, but it was several years before the location and extent the metastases was realized. Things became critical in February of 2012 and it was necessary to make arrangements for hospice-athome. Ann was prepared to die. Her birthday was on February 25, and she thought she would die soon after. We threw a birthday party for her in the nursing home. Roses, birthday cake, Graeters ice cream, the whole familyand a poem. I had felt that Ann had actually recovered more than was realized and I thought a bit of psychological boosting might help. The muse of doggerel came to my aid. With Ann sitting up in bed and surrounded by our family, I read the following lines:
My dearling, my lover, my copilot Ann Stay with me, love me, as long as you can. The road that weve traveled has still far to go; Continue our journey, whichever winds blow. Lend me your compass when clouds start to grow. Stay true to our mission, reject not my hand; Stray not from our path, sink not in the sand. Cease not, in this journey, beside me to stand; Faint not on the pathway weve trod through this land. Continue to love me, hold tight to my hand. Lets finish the projects our young hearts had planned.
It worked! About a week later, when Ann was supposed to come home to hospice, she simply came home. We had a beautiful summer, visiting state and metro parks, camping out at picnic tables working on crafts and writing, watching birds and reveling in the world of nature that was so crucially important to both of us. Throughout her adult life, Ann had been an amateur ornithologist and freshwater biologist. Swamps were her passion. She loved to swim and snorkel, paint and draw, sew, cook, create miniatures of all sorts, and breed tropical fish and birds. During the years we lived in New York, she became a stained glasswright and became rather famous from Boston to DC for her acidetched stained glass creations. Glasswrights from all over would call her for instruction on how she etched the delicate designs into glassonly to be dismayed to learn that because of the deadliness of hydrofluoric acid she did most of the etching in the fume hoods in my chemistry laboratory at the college where I was teaching. During the last few years of her life she took up the art of making delicately designed glass beads. Sadly, she did not live long enough to attain the fame she had earned for her stained glass artistry.
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TO ANN ON HER 77TH BIRTHDAY
I have already opined that Ann was a natural Atheist. Never, in the forty-eight years of our life together did I ever detect even a hint that she took into consideration the notion that there might be a life after death or any paranormal or supranormal reality. To the end, Ann was a philosophical materialist who realized the truth of the beer commercial that said You only go around once. Go for the gusto! At the same time, she daily exemplified the definition of Materialism that she printed at the back of every issue of American Atheist: Materialism declares that the cosmos is devoid of immanent conscious purpose; that it is governed by its own inherent, immutable, and impersonal laws; that there is no supernatural interference in human life; that humankind, finding the resources within themselves, can and must create their own destiny. It teaches that we must prize our life on earth and strive always to improve it. It holds that human beings are capable of creating a social system based on reason and justice. Materialisms faith is in humankind and their ability to transform the world culture by their own efforts. This is a commitment that is, in its very essence, life-asserting. It considers the struggle for progress as a moral obligation that is impossible without noble ideas that inspire us to bold, creative works. Ann now has been transformed from a material being into a torrent of cascading memories, but the world of reason is the better for her having lived. It is not entirely likely that American Atheists would have survived the death of its founder had it not been for the practical publishing skills that Ann brought to the team of Atheist stalwarts who rescued the organization after the disappearance of the Murray-OHair family. Most of her contributions have been so fine-grained that they are invisible to the eyes of the present membership. Nevertheless, Anns legacy reverberates throughout the Community of Reason. Her presence can be felt everywhere, even if only a few can identify the source of the feeling.
Columbus Dispatch obituary, January 9, 2013

Ann Elizabeth Zindler, ne Hunt, 77, of Columbus, succumbed to metastatic breast cancer at her Columbus home after a heroic battle of more than four years duration. The daughter of the late Charles Gordon Hunt of Michigan and Ruth Elizabeth Prather Hunt of Florida, she was born on February 25, 1935 in Ann Arbor, MI. She is survived by her brother Lynn Gordon Hunt of Melbourne, FL; her husband of 48 years Frank R. Zindler; daughter Catherine E. Zindler; and grandchildren Michael A. Zindler, Steven C. Zindler, and Laura E. Zindler, all of Columbus. She was a graduate of Roosevelt High School in Ypsilanti, MI, and studied art and biology at Eastern Michigan University. Before marriage in 1964 she managed a womens dormitory at the University of Michigan. Upon moving to Johnstown, NY in 1967 she became a stained glasswright and was well known on the East Coast for her acid-etched stained glass creations. Her hobbies included drawing, painting, miniaturing, sewing, cooking, snorkeling, breeding tropical fish and birds, and crafts of all kinds, most recently the creation of glass beads of fine artistry. Coming to Columbus in 1983 she served as joint director of the Central Ohio Chapter of American Atheists, the organization founded in 1963 by Madalyn Murray OHair. After the murder of the Murray-OHair family in 1995, Ann became the principal artist and art and layout editor for American Atheist Press, designing and producing books, magazines, newsletters, and Atheism-associated ephemera such as clever solstice cards. Beyond her family, Ann devoted her life to the advancement of reason and the dispelling of superstition. Even in childhood she could not force herself to believe in religion and was by nature a skeptic. For many years she served on the national Board of Directors of American Atheists, Inc. and labored with her husband to guard the wall of separation between state and church. She was a member of Planned Parenthood and NARAL, Zero Population Growth and, being an avid ornithologist, the Audubon Society. A private memorial of reminiscence will be held in Columbus later in January and a memorial celebration of life will be held at the 50th-anniversary convention of American Atheists to be held in Austin, TX, March 28 31, 2013. In lieu of flowers, contributions may be sent to the American Atheists legal-defense fund at www. atheists.org.
Phoenix Acid-etched stained glass window by Ann Zindler
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NEW LIFE MEMBERS
n the past few months, seven members of American Atheists increased their commitment by becoming Lifetime Supporters or by upgrading their Lifetime Supporter memberships! Thanks to our new and upgraded Lifetime Supporters for their significant commitment to our organization and for their continued support. Since our last issue of the magazine, the following members have decided to increase their commitment to American Atheists and further promote our shared goals and values:
LIFE
David Andrews Leroy Barnett Richard Haynes Lucinda Loveless Manish Pathak Frederick J. Pollack Kurtis Rader Matthew Rapp Terry Tappan
SILVER
Kenneth Crosby David Saidian
Seeking Regional Directors

want more than potluck dinners and discussions in a pub? Do you want to make a real difference?
Are you more concerned with societys secular issues than holy book debates? Are you a motivated, passionate Atheist? Do you Activists and activism are what create change. And that is where we want you. American Atheists is looking for volunteer regional directors. Our directors monitor legislation and issues in their areas and take Y
action when needed. They are also the personal contact for the friends and affiliate groups of American Atheists. And they represent American Atheists in local media and assist in national projects in their part of the country. our efforts will boost the Atheist, freethought, and secular presence in your community. You will meet and work with other well-known activists and celebrities in the movement. You will stand out at our annual convention and meet others from your area and beyond.
Interested individuals should be self-motivated, confident, well-spoken, have a professional appearance, and belong to American
Atheists for at least one year. Some experience with activism and organizing is preferred.
If this sounds like you or someone you know, contact Ken Loukinen, Director of State/Regional Operations, at KLoukinen@Atheists.org.
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From the author of the Dogma Watch series in this magazine
Religion, especially Christianity, has enjoyed unwarranted respect for far too long. Jesus did say a few nice things, but he was no humble or wise prophet. How do we know?
Its in the Bible.

Available in hardcover, paperback, and e-book
NoMeekMessiah.com
Proclaiming Liberty of Conscience

"No man shall be required to worship or maintain a worship against his will." Roger Williams, 1644
What lessons gleaned from the life and ministry of this pioneer of religious liberty can help us to be good citizens in a global pluralized world?
Available through Amazon and iBooks.
www.beckygarrison.com
2ND QUARTER 2013
American Atheists Affiliates

ALASKA
Alaskan Atheists
For detailed information visit Atheists.org/Affiliates or contact Stuart Bechman at SBechman@Atheists.org. ILLINOIS
The Chicago Freethought Project IL/WI Stateline Atheists Society IWU Atheist, Agnostics, and Non-Religious The Secular Segment
NEW YORK
Hudson Valley Humanists New York City Atheists Westchester Atheists
ALABAMA
Alabama Atheists & Agnostics (UA) Auburn Atheists & Agnostics Birmingham Atheists Meetup Marshall County Atheists & Agnostics Montgomery Area Freethought Association North Alabama Freethought Association UAH Non-Theists
KANSAS
Kansas City Atheist Coalition University of Kansas Society of OpenMinded Atheists and Agnostics
OHIO
Free Inquiry Group Freethought Dayton Humanist Community of Central Ohio Mid-Ohio Atheists
ARKANSAS
Arkansas Society of Freethinkers Ark-La-Tex Freethinkers, Atheists, Agnostics & Humanists
KENTUCKY
Humanist Forum of Central Kentucky Lexington Atheists Louisville Atheists and Freethinkers
OKLAHOMA
Oklahoma Atheists Atheist Community of Tulsa
ARIZONA
Tucson Atheists
LOUISIANA
New Orleans Secular Humanist Association
PENNSYLVANIA
NorthEast Pennsylvania Freethought Society PA Non-Believers*
CALIFORNIA (North)
Atheist Advocates of San Francisco Atheists and Other Freethinkers Contra Costa Atheists & Freethinkers East Bay Atheists San Francisco Atheists Santa Cruz Atheists
MASSACHUSETTS
Atheists of Greater Lowell Boston Atheists
SOUTH CAROLINA
Piedmont Humanists Secular Humanists of the Lowcountry
MARYLAND
Freethinkers Union at McDaniel College Skeptics Freethinkers Agnostics and Atheists (aka Maryland Freethinkers)
TENNESSEE
Memphis Freethought Alliance Nashville Secular Life Rationalists of East Tennessee
CALIFORNIA (South)
Atheist Coalition of San Diego Backyard Skeptics Humanist Society of Santa Barbara New Atheists of East County Orange County Atheists
MICHIGAN
Atheists @ Oakland University Michigan Atheists Mid-Michigan Atheists & Humanists
TEXAS
Atheist Community of Austin Denton Atheists Freethinkers Association of Central Texas Freethought Oasis of Amarillo Golden Triangle Freethinkers Houston Atheists Kingwood Humble Atascocita Atheists Lubbock Atheists
MINNESOTA
Atheists for Human Rights Campus Atheists Skeptics & Humanists Minnesota Atheists*
COLORADO
Boulder Atheists Western Colorado Atheists & Freethinkers
MISSOURI
Black Freethinkers of Kansas City Columbia Atheists Joplin Freethinkers Rationalist Society of St. Louis Secular Student Alliance @ UCMO Springfield Freethinkers St. Joseph Skeptics
CONNECTICUT
Atheist Humanist Society of CT and RI
UTAH
Atheists of Utah Salt Lake Valley Atheists
DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA
Washington Area Secular Humanists
VIRGINIA
Beltway Atheists NOVA Atheists
FLORIDA
Florida Atheists & Secular Humanists (FLASH)* Gator Freethought (UF) Rebirth of Reason Secular Student Association at Univ. of Central Florida St. Petersburg Atheists Freethought Group Tallahassee Atheists Treasure Coast Atheists
MISSISSIPPI
Great Southern Humanist Society Humanist Ethical Atheist Rational Thought Society
WASHINGTON
Seattle Atheists Tri-City Freethinkers
WISCONSIN
Southern Wisconsin FreeThinkers
NORTH CAROLINA
A-News
WEST VIRGINIA
Morgantown Atheists
NORTH DAKOTA
Red River Freethinkers
GEORGIA
Atlanta Freethought Society Black Nonbelievers of Atlanta Fayette Freethought Society Kennesaw State U. Student Coalition for Inquiry Macon Atheists & Secular Humanists
US NATIONAL
Atheist Nexus Black Atheists of America Military Association of Atheists & Freethinkers
NEBRASKA
Lincoln Atheists Omaha Atheists
NEW JERSEY
New Jersey Humanist Network Secular Student Alliance @ Montclair State Univ
INTERNATIONAL / OVERSEAS CONSOCIATES

Southeast Asia Freethought Association, 379th AEW Philippine Atheists and Agnostics Society
IOWA
Atheists United for a Rational America Iowa Atheists & Freethinkers
NEVADA
Reno Freethinkers
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State Directors
For detailed information visit Atheists.org/State-Directors or contact Ken Loukinen at KLoukinen@Atheists.org
DIRECTOR OF STATE OPERATIONS Ken Loukinen (S. Florida Reg. Dir.) 7972 Pines Blvd., #246743 Pembroke Pines, FL 33024 954-907-7893 kloukinen@atheists.org MILITARY DIRECTOR Justin Griffith jgriffith@atheists.org MARINES LIAISON Paul Loebe PLoebe@atheists.org ARIZONA Don Lacey P.O. Box 1161 Vail, AZ 85641 520-370-8420 dlacey@atheists.org CALIFORNIA Larry Hicok P.O. Box 277 Pinole, CA 94564 510-222-7580 lhicok@atheists.org CONNECTICUT Dennis Paul Himes 860-454-8301 dphimes@atheists.org GEORGIA Scott Savage SSavage@atheists.org IOWA Randy Henderson P.O. Box 375 Ankeny, IA 50023 rhenderson@atheists.org MASSACHUSETTS Zach Bos zbos@atheists.org MINNESOTA Randall Tigue rtigue@atheists.org MISSOURI Greg Lammers P.O. Box 1352 Columbia, MO 65205 573-289-7633 glammers@atheists.org
NEBRASKA William Newman WNewman@atheists.org NEW YORK Michael Dorian MDorian@atheists.org NORTH CAROLINA Wayne Aiken P.O. Box 30904 Raleigh, NC 27622 919-954-5956 waiken@atheists.org OHIO John Welte jwelte@atheists.org OKLAHOMA Ron Pittser rpittser@atheists.org PENNSYLVANIA Ernest Perce eperce@atheists.org RHODE ISLAND Brian Stack bstack@atheists.org TEXAS AronRa Nelson AronRa@atheists.org VIRGINIA Rick Wingrove 703-433-2464 rwingrove@atheists.org WASHINGTON Wendy Britton 12819 SE 38th St., Ste. 485 Bellevue, WA 98006 425-269-9108 wbritton@atheists.org WEST VIRGINIA Charles Pique P.O. Box 7444 Charleston, WV 25356 304-776-5377 cpique@atheists.org
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Aims and Purposes

merican Atheists, Inc. is a nonprofit, nonpolitical, educational organization dedicated to the complete and absolute separation of state and church, accepting the explanation of Thomas Jefferson that the First Amendment to the Constitution of the United States was meant to create a wall of separation between state and church.
American Atheists is organized:

To stimulate and promote freedom of thought and inquiry concerning religious beliefs, creeds, dogmas, tenets, rituals, and practices; To collect and disseminate information, data, and literature on all religions and promote a more thorough understanding of them, their origins, and their histories; To advocate, labor for, and promote in all lawful ways the complete and absolute separation of state and church; To act as a watchdog to challenge any attempted breach of the wall of separation between state and church; To advocate, labor for, and promote in all lawful ways the establishment and maintenance of a thoroughly secular system of education available to all; To encourage the development and public acceptance of a humane ethical system stressing the mutual sympathy, understanding, and interdependence of all people and the corresponding responsibility of each individual in relation to society; To develop and propagate a social philosophy in which humankind is central and must itself be the source of strength, progress, and ideals for the well-being and happiness of humanity; To promote the study of the arts and sciences and of all problems affecting the maintenance, perpetuation, and enrichment of human (and other) life; and To engage in such social, educational, legal, and cultural activity as will be useful and beneficial to the members of American Atheists and to society as a whole.
Definitions
theism involves the mental attitude that unreservedly accepts the supremacy of reason and aims at establishing a lifestyle and ethical outlook verifiable by experience and the scientific method, independent of all arbitrary assumptions of authority and creeds. aterialism declares that the cosmos is devoid of immanent conscious purpose; that it is governed by its own inherent, immutable, and impersonal laws; that there is no supernatural interference in human life; that humankind, finding the resources within themselves, can and must create their own destiny. It teaches that we must prize our life on earth and strive always to improve it. It holds that human beings are capable of creating a social system based on reason and justice. Materialisms faith is in humankind and their ability to transform the world culture by their own efforts. This is a commitment that is, in its very essence, life-asserting. It considers the struggle for progress as a moral obligation that is impossible without noble ideas that inspire us to bold, creative works.
A A
theism is the comprehensive world view of persons who are free from theism and have freed themselves of supernatural beliefs altogether. It is predicated on ancient Greek Materialism.
M
M
aterialism holds that our potential for good and more fulfilling cultural development is, for all practical purposes, unlimited.
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2ND QUARTER 2013 www.atheists.org | AMERICAN ATHEIST | 45
From American Atheists Marine Liaison
Madalyn Murray OHair, Charles Darwin, and Me

by Paul Loebe
t was only a little over a year ago that I was a silent, apathetic Atheist unaware of the existence of a freethinking community. I was well aware of the scientific and historical inaccuracies of more than a few religious texts that some view as holy, but I did not know that almost all the research I had conducted had already been done for me. I simply thought the only Atheists who ever existed were Madalyn Murray OHair, Charles Darwin, and me. Clearly, I wasnt looking very hard to find other Atheists because, honestly, who gets together and talks about belief in nothing? That was the view I held at the time, and I have since learned is a common misconception most believers hold towards us. It isnt what we dont believe that brings us together. Rather, the by-product of our non-belief happens to be striking similarities in what we do believe and how we live. I knew that Madalyn Murray OHair had fought back against statesponsored prayer in schools which resulted in a Supreme Court case that took it away. Of course, because of the indoctrination of my youth, I believed that to be a bad thing. I also knew that she had started an organization called American Atheists and I wondered why people
afraid to tell anyone else because he wasnt sure how his family would react. It was something hed been wrestling with for years: a personal relationship with god versus a personal relationship with reality. Once he made that decision, however, he began introducing me to a group of fellow veterans via social networking that all happened to be Atheists. I was blown away by the fact that these people existed. I began to have some of the most insightful, intellectual, and mentally-challenging conversations of my life. It brought me out of an intellectual stasis where Id resided for years and made me feel alive for the first time in a long time. Once that was awakened within me, I had to find out if there were more people out in the world like this to befriend. The only place I knew to look was American Atheists. As a child, I thought of them as a horror story and an abomination. I figured it would be a good place to start. Boy, was I right! I began following what exactly American Atheists is and what they stand for. It didnt take me long to jump on board. Had it not been for Madalyns influence on the Christian communityas much as theyd like to deny itI would probably have
Had it not been for Madalyns influence on the Christian communityas much as theyd like to deny itI would probably have never looked into American Atheists at all.
would want to be a part of that because the word Atheist was a dirty thing back then. I was still blissfully unaware that there were other people in the world besides the small group of Fundamentalist Christians who surrounded me. My misconceptions about Charles Darwin were startling! I thought he was an avid Atheist who created this myth called evolution in order to further the Satanic agenda. Well, thats what I was taught anyway. Once I discovered the truththat he was a firm agnostic who delayed for two decades the publishing of his findings because he didnt want to offend his devoutly religious wifeI was quite upset Id been lied to. As I mentioned earlier, I was comfortable remaining blissfully unaware of the freethinking community at large until one day my best friend and cousin, Britt, confided in me that he had lost his faith. He was never looked into American Atheists at all. I might have stumbled upon them by accident, but the fact that theyve been making an impact large enough to effect the close-minded community of believers I grew up with speaks volumes to me. Im proud to be an American Atheist and Im proud to be a part of the organization as well. Im thankful that Madalyn made a stand against school-sponsored prayers so long ago because I doubt I would have even been aware that there was a community of people out there who didnt need god to be good. Paul Loebe is currently deployed. The contents of his columns do not in any way speak on behalf of any part of the US government in any official context. He is speaking only from personal experience and opinion.
2ND QUARTER 2013

American Atheist Magazine Second Quarter 2013

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American Atheists

Keeping Church and State Separate Since 1963

SECOND QUARTER 2013

Su b scr i p t i ons A m er i can At he i st Magaz ine PO Box 1 5 8 Cran ford, N J 0 7 0 1 6

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2nd Quarter 2013

2013 American Atheists Inc.

www.atheists.org | AMERICAN ATHEIST | 3

Letter from the

eve come a long way, American Atheists.

The number of people calling themselves Atheists

has quintupled since 2005.

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The Appalling Arrogance of the Clergy

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Some Tricks of the Brain

Neurochemistry, World of Warcraft, and the End of Religion

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Voices of Reason Rally

Photo by John Welte

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Quiet Company Speaks

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In Freedom We Trust by Carl E. Kramer

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Quiet Company from p. 15

Going Global to Do Good Without God

Why Its Difficult To Be An Atheist From Day One To Death

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The most productive tactic is to concede their right to believe in god.

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Life magazine dubbed her the most hated woman in America.

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From an Old Guy not from the Old Guard

American Atheists First Fifty Years

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I watched her tell a TV preacher,

but keep it to yourself.

Keep the faith, Bob,

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