America

An American friend has drawn my attention to the website of the Congregation for Humanistic Judaism of Fairfield County. I know of no similar organisation here, though we've had high profile Jews in the British Humanist Association, including its former president, the late Claire Rayner, and the actor Warren Mitchell.

"Pastor" Michael Stahl from Florida, who doesn't actually have a church and probably assumed the title himself, is clearly a very ignorant and prejudiced man. A year ago he wrote in his blog that he was going to start a grassroots organization to keep a database of atheists called "The Christian National Registry of Atheists." He wrote,

I mean, think about it. There are already National Registrys [sic] for convicted sex offenders, ex-convicts, terrorist cells, hate groups like the KKK, skinheads, radical Islamists, etc... This type of 'National Registry' would merely be for information purposes.

When Mr Stahl's great idea came to light a few days ago, it naturally annoyed a lot of people, mainly atheists like us, who'd never considered any similarity with sex offenders or terrorists. Mr Stahl seems to have neglected to make a list of all the Catholic sex offenders, but perhaps he thinks that the Pope's right, and we should just ignore them.

Anyhow, the Thinking Atheist thought that this was a good opportunity to point out what a great list this might be.

Yesterday, representatives of the Secular Coalition for America met White House officials to discuss issues of concern to American atheists, humanists and secularists. Before the meeting, they said,

... it will be the latest indication that the secular movement is gaining significant momentum, and that secular Americans, numbering in the tens of millions, are a constituency that must be included.

Predictably, fundamentalist Christian right-wingers have reacted as though President Obama was making a pact with the devil (who doesn't exist, though try telling them that).