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North Texas Church of Freethought Unitarian Universalist Infidels newsletter Suggestions from Humanists of West Suburban Chicagoland |
North Texas Church of Freethought
From: "Timothy Gorski"
To: "Robert Park"
Subject: Re: A few questions
Date: Mon, 23 May 2005
RP - I was very interested to learn that you are a graduate of the UW Medical School. If you still have ties in Madison that bring you back on occasion, we'd love to have you talk to a monthly meeting of the Humanist Union of Madison (http://humanist.madisonwi.us).
I will keep that in mind. It's quite possible since my mother and one of my 4 brothers still live in Milwaukee.
RP - Have you ever attended a National Convention of the Freedom From Religion Foundation (which, as you probably know, is based in Madison)? Perhaps you subscribe to their Freethought Today newspaper.
Yes, I am a Life Member of the FFRF. I think they do very good work.
best wishes,
TG
Mr. Park,
Thanks for writing.
Yes, my work for the NTCOF is as an unpaid volunteer.
My doctorate is in medicine. In fact, I graduated from the University of Wisconsin School of Medicine right there in Madison, WI in 1982. That education and subsequent training, of course, included experience in psychiatry and counseling.
We have not considered affiliating with other religious organizations as a) we have not felt the need to and b) we believe that we are pursuing a unique course in our explicit rejection of superstition even as we embrace the project of making sense of what are widely considered to be "religious" questions and issues within the context of a church community.
Sincerely,
Tim
Dr. Tim Gorski, Pastoral Director
The North Texas Church of Freethought
http://www.churchoffreethought.org
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Unitarian Universalist Infidels newsletter
Date: Mon, 23 May 2005
Date: Fri, 13 May 2005 |
Suggestions from Humanists of West Suburban Chicagoland
From: "Jack Sechrest"
In this post I want to say basically two things.
First, be exceptionally thorough in keeping your lists of names, addresses,
phone and email.
Keep two lists. One for your members, and a second for visitors. Be sure
to go the extra miles to let the people know that they are important and
that you value them. Be diligent in inviting them to every event that you
have, and don't just expect that they will come because they have been sent
a card, or could read it in the Church Bulletin. Call them on the phone.
Really work to assure that they will attend if possible. Don't leave it up
to someone else. Do it yourself and do it with evangelical fervor.
When you send out a mass mailing to both your Membership list, and your
Friends list, put them in the Bcc line. Reason: Disgruntled people will
try to contact your membership and cause trouble.
I have that problem going on right now with someone I bounced off our chat
list. Fortunately, he did not have the Chapter lists. In your email group
lists write Members and Friends of your Chapter,
and give that name your address. Therefore all replies will come back to
you only.
We have a chat list at Humanists-WestSuburbanOfChicagoland@yahoogroups.com
and we have a web site, http://www.humanistswestofchicago.org/ , which you
can visit. You will need a web master.
Second point for this post: Determine to be an AHA Membership Chapter from
the start. Yes, you will have some who will not want to join the AHA.
Count them as friends and invite them to everything. However, they can not
vote. They will join later. Besides, everyone interested is welcome to
your group.
You will have no trouble being both the Humanist Discussion Group in your
Church, and a Membership Chapter of the AHA at the same time.
We hope that your Church will become an affiliate of the AHA.
We hope that you will establish your group as a Membership Chapter of the
AHA.
There are benefits. There is an initial kick back of personal dues money to
one's Membership Chapter. Second, there are several benefits that you might
not be able to pay for that comes from the AHA office and staff. I can
spell these benefits out in greater detail, however, I will simply say now
that Tony Hileman, Executive Director of the AHA, was our guest, here, this
last week end, and he addressed the HNEI at Beth Or, and our Chapter, and
did two Services at DUUC, all in three days.
I'm sure you get the idea. btw Sarah Oelberg and Mike Werner, our
co-founder, know each other well. Just for starters, we could trade speakers at some convenient time.
HWSC is a Humanist Membership Chapter operating within a UU Church, DUUC,
and we have 67 members who are AHA members. Two dozen are both DUUC and AHA
members, and the rest are Humanists from elsewhere. I consider this a great
outreach program for DUUC. We are preaching a "gospel" of ethical living
that is completely consistent with the vision and mission of DUUC.
I hope that you are able to promote Humanism within the UU context. I know
that David Schafer's hope is to have a Humanist Discussion Group in every UU
Church. My hope is that they become AHA Membership Chapters as well.
Jack Sechrest
btw, Congratulations of having Sarah Oelberg in your midst.
You say you have a congregation of about 95. If your meeting place can
provide a free meeting place for your Humanist Discussion group, you
will be able to operate almost "cash" free.
You will need volunteers to provide and make "coffee" and provide
"cookies".
While your group is between six and twenty-four, or so, you can rely on
one another to present topics for discussion. As the group grows the
dynamics change. Increasingly you will need to locate speakers. First
depend on one another, and other ministers and friends and associates.
Particular areas for programs include epistemology, ethics, evolution,
environment, and esthetics.
Try pizza nights and potluck's two or three times each year.
Try a picnic in June or early September.
We have had a chapter picnic/potluck at my house the last two years on
the Sunday of Labor Day week end. At the first one, we had 40 people,
and this year we had 56. That is important because that included 60% of
our membership. These repeated social events brings the people
together, and they establish friendship among themselves. We work at
building a sense of Community.
You will find that some of your members are members of other groups like
the ACLU, NOW, People for the American Way; People for the Separation of
Church and State, Americans for Religious Liberty, Religious Coalition
for Reproductive Choice, etc. Ask if any of those groups will provide
you with a free speaker. We have used all of these. Also, we have
people in our group, and others in our congregation who do social work,
counseling, or are escorts at abortion clinics, etc.etc.etc.
We ask people to come and talk with us about their personal service
organization.
Before I suggested that you become a Membership Chapter of the AHA from
the start. You only need five or six AHA members to start the
Membership Chapter. Non-members just have to be invited guests. The
AHA will provide a kick back from their membership dues, and provide
assistance which could be extensive. In the last 12 months we have had
Fred Edwords, Jende Huang, Tony Hileman and Edd Doerr from the AHA.
Also, we were able to get Howard Radest in September because we knew he
was coming to speak at the Ethical Humanist Society in Skokie and he was
willing to address our group on a Friday evening. You have a University
in Madison that may provide you with contacts for speakers from
literature, to evolution, to ethics, etc.
Write up a simple set of by-laws.
Continuously contact your local news papers with your calendar events.
Try having a noon time lunch one a month for those who are retired or
self employed.
Try having a monthly dinner on the first Monday, for example.
Establish a book review club, or make that a meeting topic. Select a
good article that provokes discussion.
Plan for a Darwin Day Event in Feb to honor the bd of Charles Darwin on
or near Feb 12 th.
Take a firm stand that you are UU Humanists and not all UU's. If you
are a Humanist Discussion Group, you must hold to a scientific world
view. You most likely are willing to say that you are free of
supernaturalism. Now focus on what you are for. Don't spend time god
bashing or attacking religion in general like some groups do. Consider
the third Humanist Manifesto as a guide for discussion.
Try to encourage all ages to attend your group meetings. Consider
providing childcare if you have young parents with children. That does
cost money.
Build a sense of "Community".
I am sure I will think of other things to tell. Maybe you have some
specific questions.
Jack Sechrest
To: "Robert Park"
Subject: Re: DuPage church AHA affiliation
Date: Mon, 23 May 2005
The Humanist Union of Madison has held
regular monthly meetings since we formed last fall, with attendance generally
falling between 12 and 20. We have heard presentations on and discussed a
number of interesting topics, as can be seen by the Past Events table on our
Events Page at http://humanist.madisonwi.us/events.htm. As our last
event before summer, several of us will be attending morning and early
afternoon activities on May 29 at the Memorial Day weekend getaway at Lake
Geneva held every year by the Ethical Humanist Society of Greater Chicago, at
the invitation of Thomas Hoeppner. Earlier this month we
voted to affiliate with the AHA, but we have not yet identified 5 participants
who are themselves AHA members as needed to qualify the group for Charter
Chapter status.
We have approached the summer months of June
through August as outreach opportunities. We are not planning any meetings at
the Prairie UU Society Meeting House, but we are exploring meeting the
possibilities with members of the UU congregations in Sauk City and Janesville
Wis. and with the UU student group on the University of Wisconsin-Madison
campus.
At 04:00 PM 5/18/2005 -0500, you wrote:
Hello, Robert Park,
The
Rev. Gene Kreves was the founding minister 50 years ago of the DuPage UU
Church. Gene was fully a naturalistic humanist, and was not
uncomfortable calling himself an atheist. The founding group of
members included the affiliation with the AHA and the UUA in their
Constitution. In the years since Gene retired (1979) the DuPage Church
as well as the UU denomination has become less Humanist and more
mystic. As with many UU groups the orthopraxy included god
language. I personally have much difficulty with the imposition of god
language in those parts of the "services" which request group participation.
Much like having people say the Pledge with the under god part when they, in
fact, hold no personal belief nor want to be known as holding any such
belief, let alone appearing to affirm it.
We have established a
healthy and growing AHA membership chapter here, and have founded a
sister/daughter Chapter in Deerfield called the Humanists of North Eastern
Illinois.
All of the organized AHA Chapters and Affiliates in
Illinois are in the collar counties of Chicago and are in direct contact and
cooperation with each other.
How is your Humanist group coming
along?
Jack Sechrest
630 554 8058
----- Original Message -----
From: "Robert Park" <rwpark@loonfoot.com>
To:
<Jack@skognet.com>
Sent: Monday, May 16, 2005 10:22 AM
Subject:
DuPage church AHA affiliation
I see that the DuPage Unitarian
Universalist Church is the only UU congregation that is affiliated, as a
congregation, with the AHA, according to the listing at http://www.americanhumanist.org/chapters/aha-chapters.html.
Can you tell me how that came to be? I see that, unlike Prairie UU
Society, the DuPage church uses the term "worship service" on its Web
site.
Bob Park
Humanist Union of Madison
From: "Jack Sechrest"
I am going to respond further to you in a second and/or third post.
I want to let you know that your concerns are ours, and that we,
The Humanists of West Suburban Chicagoland, are very interested in helping
you repeatedly in making your venture a sterling success.
630 554 8058
----- Original Message -----
From: "Robert W Park"
========================================================
From: "Jack Sechrest"
From: "Jack Sechrest"
The core of our group, HWSC, originally was the UU Humanists of DUUC,
and they continue to be the solid center. You seem to have a group of
fifteen or seventeen from which you will find a solid center of six or
more.
630 554 8058