Atheism starts its megachurch: Is it a religion now?
Organized Atheism is now a franchise.
Yesterday, The Sunday Assembly—the London-based “Atheist Church” that has, since its January launch, been stealing headlines the world over—announced a new “global missionary tour.” In October and November, affiliated Sunday Assemblies will open in 22 cities: in England, Ireland, Scotland, Canada, the United States and Australia. “I think this is the moment,” Assembly founder Sanderson Jones told me in an email last week, “when the Sunday Assembly goes from being an interesting phenomenon to becoming a truly global movement.” Structured godlessness is ready for export.
The Assembly has come a long way in eight months: from scrappy East London community venture (motto: “Live Better, Help Often and Wonder More;” method: “part atheist church, part foot-stomping good time”) to the kind of organization that sends out embargoed press releases about global expansion projects. “The 3,000 percent growth rate might make this non-religious Assembly the fastest growing church in the world,” organizers boast.
There’s more to come: In October, the Sunday Assembly (SA) will launch a crowdfunded indiegogo campaign, with the ambitious goal of raising £500,000 (or, about $793,000). This will be followed by a second wave of openings. “ The effort reads as part quixotic hipster start-up, part Southern megachurch.
Like any attempt at organized non-belief, the Sunday Assemblies will attract their fair share of derision from critics. But the franchise model might dismay some followers too. For a corporate empire needs an executive board; a brand needs brand managers; a federation needs a strict set of guiding tenets—and consequences for those who stray from the fold. And isn’t that all wholly opposed to Freethought?
Mess. Those atheists should just shut the **** up. I don't believe in anything and I'm not gonna fight and insist to make religious people stop believing.
Mess. Those atheists should just shut the **** up. I don't believe in anything and I'm not gonna fight and insist to make religious people stop believing.
Why not? Theists insist we believe, besides some people think religion is holding humans back from progressing, and I'm one of them.
I'm an atheist myself, but I don't have any idea what they would do in a 'church'. If it is to bash other religions, then they should be called the skeptics or something, idk. I just don't see the need to turn a 'non-religion' into an organised 'non-religion'. Pointless.
She might be too religious for them after BTW though.
