8.0.11.2 Community Meetings

Version 1.2 August 2014                                    (Previous Version)

Many of us have grown up attending temple, synagogue, church or mosque, and are familiar with the routines regularly followed in religions involving the supernatural.  Many religions have regular meetings at which there is no specific agenda except to enable us to be connected to other like minded people, to confirm our chosen path and feel validated and normalised, by a variety of public expressions of what we believe. 

These typically include readings from sacred texts, reciting creeds or prayers, listening to an exposition from a leader, ritual actions such as lighting candles, music, singing and dancing.

But reading, reciting, listening, interacting, singing and dancing have nothing to do with God(s).  They are methods we use to share our sense of community and commonality – our communion.  Secular and atheist groups can have meetings with this broad agenda:

·               We perhaps begin, or end, by sharing drinks (tea, coffee or wine) or a meal.

·               We welcome each other and newcomers;

·               We have some form of presentation, a lecture or a video, followed by discussion;

·               Sometimes we can have an artistic presentation, not necessarily linked to the meeting’s theme: reciting poetry or prose or a musical or dance performance;

·               Perhaps we end with games, music and dancing, or retiring to plan future activities.

Many – perhaps most – of the followers of this reasonable global way may not see a need for such meetings.  Stylised ceremonies involving unbelievable supernatural beings and arbitrary demands are too unrealistic for non-believers.  However, isolated believers in any cause are likely to lose touch and stray from what they originally believed unless there is community support.

We are not suggesting that there should be any fixed or prescribed format or content for meetings of atheists, agnostics, sceptics and freethinkers.  But it would be good to generate some material that will be useful for regular meetings that can provide some focus and interest and provoke discussion and reflection. 

Meetings in support of this reasonable way should, overall, be positive.

·         We should regularly focus on beliefs and values that we share, rather than focusing on negative issues and criticism of traditional supernatural religion and other unrealistic beliefs. 

·         We certainly do need to offer guidance to those who are uncertain or still coming out of religious oppression, and we certainly do need to criticise and address misinformation, threats to secularism, taxpayer subsidies of supernatural beliefs, and so on.  But these specific issues should flow out of a positive analysis of what this Reasonable Global Way offers.

Below are some suggestions, for themes and some indication of why these were offered.

Possible Formats for Regular Meetings

There may be some benefit on arranging for monthly meetings to cover a specific topic rather than simply be an open ended discussion.  The topic of the month would hopefully be related to the "real world" - the community we live in.

We could construct a pattern of ongoing, broad themes:

·         Each theme may be considered in a specific month each year.  

·         Each theme could be broken down into many aspects, all worthy of discussion, to get an almost inexhaustible supply of "topics".

One strategy is to focus on the values we choose if we follow this Reasonable Way.

• We can discuss how we justify our values and how we can assertively promote these. 
• Many believers in the supernatural can't imagine that a godless Atheist could have a moral compass.  We need to find ways to communicate that we can.
• Many Atheists are themselves dubious about how we can hold and openly share declared values that go beyond evolutionary instincts and enlightened self interest.

So focusing each month on different values is an educational exercise for believers, non-believers and waverers.

Within each theme, we could focus on specific issues.  We can discuss and analyse what this month's positive value means and whether it matters – there is no compulsion in Atheism. 

Each theme can be discussed at various levels:

      Philosophical:  For those who want to explore the depths of their beliefs

      Scientific:        To learn what we can from science (and history) on the topic;

      Religious:        To examine religion, refute its errors, and learn from its success;

      Cultural:          To look at how various have explored related themes;

      Personal:          How the topic might be explored in our personal behaviour;

      Political:          What action we can take in the wider community.

If discussion groups became weekly then we can split these over different weeks.

For example, if the theme for the month is Truth, we can discuss

• At a philosophical level: whether the truth is actually knowable.
• In a social context: anti-science, scientific method, creationism, reason and faith.
• Within a religious context: god(s) supposed omniscience, or how god's incomprehensibility could possibly help us know how to behave.
• Challenges to  our own personal understandings of the issue.
• Those interested in taking action may wish to participate in campaigns such as promoting teaching philosophy or the science of evolution in primary schools, or more direct political action.  As a group we must still welcome and appreciate those who wish to join the discussion but for whatever reason decline to participate in such action.

There are still ongoing decisions required, to work out how to address each theme as a group.  But hopefully the theme is linked to our community and personal life as well as to our intellectual knowledge and potential "political" action.

All that said, the list in the links below don’t satisfy all these requirements but are drafts for discussion.  If there is some support for the idea we can work on it with anyone else who is interested, individuals or Atheist groups.

For possible topics for weekly meetings, click here and for monthly meetings, click here.