Atheist News by Edwin Kagin

KENTUCKY ATHEISTS NEWS & NOTES Date: July 29, 2008

Kentucky Atheists, P.O. Box 666, Union, KY 41091; Email: ekagin@atheists.org

Phone: (859) 384-7000; Fax: (859) 384-7324; Web: http://www.atheists.org/ky/

Editor's personal web site: www.edwinkagin.com

Editor’s personal blog: http://edwinkagin.blogspot.com

Edited by:

Edwin Kagin, Kentucky State Director, American Atheists, Inc.

(AMERICAN ATHEISTS is a nationwide movement that defends civil rights for nonbelievers; works for the total separation of church and state; and addresses issues of First Amendment public policy.)

IT IS OKAY TO BE AN ATHEIST

To Unidentified Recipients:

For a waiting world, we now present “They’re Back in Their Burkas Again,” by Edwin &

Helen Kagin:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LmVxswvuJZI

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The brief filed in the Court of Appeals of Kentucky on behalf of David Ryan, the Kentucky Atheist father who objects to his son being sent, under court order, can be found here:

http://www.edwinkagin.com/Appellant_Brief_of_David_Ryan.pdf

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Y’all come to the Atheist Coming Out Part on August 2^nd, y’all hear.

Come and get de-baptized.

Edwin.

===============================================================

ATHEISTS TO HOST FIRST "COMING OUT" PARTY EVENT, DE-BAPTISM BASH

AMERICAN ATHEISTS, INC.

http://www.atheists.org

http://www.americanatheist.org

For more information, please contact:

FRANK ZINDLER, President (614) 299-1036

EDWIN KAGIN, National Legal Director (859) 384-7000

Atheists, Freethinkers, Humanists and other nonbelievers will be attending the nation's first "coming out" party next Saturday, August 2,

2008 in Westerville, Ohio. The event will feature talks, social events, and even a "De-Baptism" ceremony for those who were enrolled in religious groups and now wish to disaffiliate from their houses of worship.

"This will be a day of celebration and education for anyone who doesn't believe in a God and is still 'in the closet," said Ashley Paramore, organizer of the event. "We're sending the message that it is OK to not believe in a Jehovah or Allah or some other deity, and live a secular lifestyle as an alternative to organized religion."

Frank Zindler, President of American Atheists and Edwin Kagin, the group's National Legal Director will be signing De-Baptism certificates. Zindler said that the organization has been handing out the certificates for years, "This is the first time, though, that we're having a party to welcome all the new people we expect to turn out."

Zindler added that the De-Baptism ceremony would be a fun way for people who feel under pressure to conform to religious orthodoxy to make a statement about their newfound intellectual independence.

The Atheist Coming Out Party will be held on Saturday, August 2, 2008 beginning at 12:00 noon at the Everel Barn, 60 N. Cleveland Avenue in Westerville, Ohio.

For media interviews, please contact:

FRANK ZINDLER, President of American Atheists (614-299-1036) EDWIN KAGIN, National Legal Director (859-384-7000) ASHLEY PARAMORE (ashley@secularstudents.org)

AMERICAN ATHEISTS is a nationwide movement that defends civil rights for Atheists; works for the total separation of church and state; and addresses issues of First Amendment public policy.

American Atheists, Inc.

P. O. Box 158

Cranford, NJ 07016

Tel: (908) 276-7300

Fax: (908) 276-7402

===============================================================

From Reader Jan, who wrote his Excellency, the Governor of Kentucky. Here is his thoughtful reply:

On offishul stationery too.

He say:

========

Dear Ms. (Redacted):

Thank you for taking the time to contact me regarding your opinion about the option of having an “In God We Trust” license plate. “In God We Trust” is essentially our national motto, no one should have to pay extra to have the national motto reflected on their license plate. This new license plate would be provided at no additional cost and would be an alternative to the standard-issue “Unbridled Spirit” plate, which will continue to be available at no extra charge.

Your views are important to me, and I am grateful for your willingness to be involved in Kentucky’s future. Please feel free to contact me whenever an issue is important to you.

Sincerely,

Steven L. Beshear

========

Yup! Over an official signature - so he can’t say he was misquoted in the press.

And this moron used to be ATTORNEY GENERAL of Kaintuck?!?!

===============================================================

It is interesting that all of the thoughtful letters from our governor to those who oppose the threatened theocracy seem quite a bit the same. Edwin

===============================================================

From reader Frank:

Hello Folks!

You may recall that on August 16, 2008 I sent the

following in email to KY Governor Steve Beshear:

Can a volunteer Vietnam-era atheist-in-

the-foxhole Army veteran of a law-abiding,

family-raising, wage-earning lifelong

Kentuckian taxpayer get a Kentucky auto

license plate that says "In Reason I Trust?

Today I received in the US Mail a letter from Steve

Beshear dated July 22, 2008 in which he says:

Thank you for taking the time to

contact me regarding your opinion

about the option of having an "In God

We Trust" license plate. "In God We

Trust" is essentially our national motto,

no one should have to pay extra to

have the national motto reflected on

their license plate. This new license

plate would be provided at no addition-

al cost and would be an alternative to

the standard-issue "Unbridled Spirit"

plate, which will continue to be avail-

able at no extra charge.

Yours views are important to me,

and I am grateful for your willingness

to be involved in Kentucky's future.
Please feel free to contact me when-

ever an issue is important to you.

In short, our governor replied but did not answer the

question that I asked him. I guess this is just what

I should have expected from a professional politician,

but it nonetheless disappoints me. Candor from our

elected leaders is clearly a thing of the past (along

evidently with clarity of thought and an acute under-

standing of the lessons of history).

-- Frank

===============================================================

http://www.koco.com/news/16976219/detail.html

Man Watching Steeple Ceremony Killed When Crane Collapses

Dozens Attended Church Ceremony In Southwest Oklahoma City

POSTED: 10:47 am CDT July 24, 2008

UPDATED: 6:42 pm CDT July 24, 2008

OKLAHOMA CITY -- One of dozens of churchgoers watching a steeple being mounted on top of a newly constructed building in southwest Oklahoma City was killed when a crane collapsed on top of his vehicle, fire officials said.

Winfred Stafford, 79, was killed while watching the ceremony at the newly constructed South Pointe church, located at Southwest 134th Street and Straka Farms Terrace just west of Interstate 44.

His 78-year-old wife was injured and taken to St. Anthony Hospital in good condition. Witnesses told Eyewitness News 5 that the woman was in the back seat of a vehicle talking to a friend when the crane overturned.

Witnesses said she was able to get out of the vehicle, but her husband was in the front seat and unable to get out in time. People gathered at the ceremony were shouting for the couple to get out of the way of the falling crane.

Fire officials said the church is an additional campus to the Grace Assembly of God church, located at Southwest 54th Street and Young Avenue.

Officials with the U.S. Department of Labor and OSHA are at the scene investigating.

The name of the victim's wife has not been released.

===============================================================

www.orlandosentinel.com/entertainment/tv/orl-exodus2108jul21,0,7755323.story

OrlandoSentinel.com

Holy Moses! PBS documentary suggests Exodus not real

Hal Boedeker

Sentinel Television Critic

July 21, 2008

BEVERLY HILLS, Calif.

Abraham didn't exist? The Exodus didn't happen?

The Bible's Buried Secrets, a new PBS documentary, is likely to cause a furor.

"It challenges the Bible's stories if you want to read them literally, and that will disturb many people," says archaeologist William Dever, who specializes in Israel's history. "But it explains how and why these stories ever came to be told in the first place, and how and why they were written down."

The Nova program will premiere Nov. 18. PBS presented a clip and a panel discussion at the summer tour of the Television Critics Association.

The program says the Bible was written in the sixth century BC and that hundreds of authors contributed.

"At least the first five books of the Bible come together during the Babylonian exile," says producer Gary Glassman.

The program challenges long-held beliefs. Abraham, Sarah and their offspring probably didn't exist, says Carol Meyers, a religion professor at Duke University.

"These stories are unlikely to represent real historical events, but rather there's some kernel of ancient experience in there which has survived and which helps give identity to the people at the time the Bible finally took shape centuries and centuries later," Meyers says.

There's no archaeological evidence of the Exodus, either, she says, but "it doesn't mean that there's no kernel of truth to it."

Nova series producer Paula Apsell says she found it "extremely shocking" to learn that monotheism was a process that took hundreds of years.

"I was always brought up to believe that the minute Abraham and the patriarchs came on the scene, the Israelites accepted one God and there was just always one God and that was it," Apsell says. "I think people are going to really be stunned by that."

Another shocker: The program contradicts the biblical view that the Israelites came from somewhere else into the land of Canaan. "The film shows that they were Canaanites," Apsell says.


Hal Boedeker can be reached at 407-420-5756 or hboedeker@orlandosentinel.com. Read Hal's TV Guy blog at OrlandoSentinel.com/tvguy.

Copyright © 2008, Orlando Sentinel