Comparing Secular Services

The Sunday Assemblies have gotten more people than ever talking about what people want or need from their atheist and humanist organizations. They didn’t start these discussions, of course, but expanding them is good. I have been, however, struck by how many of the articles and blog posts focus on what one person does or doesn’t want from a meeting with other nonbelievers.

Here in the Twin Cities, we were approached by Sunday Assembly, and there’s been some curiosity. The moderate amount of interest wasn’t enough to draw the founders all the way out here on their tour this summer (though it is ongoing).

Back in November, for the Atheists Talk television program, I sat down with representatives from three Twin Cities groups to talk about the general concept of atheist and humanist congregations and what these groups had to offer their members. I’ll note that we have many more than three groups for nonbelievers here, but I only had three chairs to work with. I spoke with August Berkshire of Minnesota Atheists and Scott Lohman, president of Humanists of Minnesota, representatives of the largest local atheist and humanist groups. I also spoke with Rev. David Bredeen, pastor at Minneapolis’s First Unitarian Society, which is unusual for a UU group in that it was founded specifically as an atheist congregation.

Things only got a little competitive.

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Comparing Secular Services
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