We now interrupt your regularly scheduled flame war for this important announcement. As everyone has no doubt heard, Haiti was hit by a colossal earthquake last night; the city of Port-au-Prince is in ruins, and tens of thousands of people may be dead. If you're able to help, please consider making a donation to the Red Cross or Doctors Without Borders. And if simple human compassion doesn't move you, consider it doing it to spite that wicked, heartless old fraud Pat Robertson, who said that … [Read more...]
Atheists Helping the Homeless
December 5, 2009 By 18 Comments
Since I often write about charitable works done by atheists, I'm happy to be able to report on a new one. Joe Zamecki informs me of a new Austin-based charitable group, Atheists Helping the Homeless. I'll let Joe explain his group's purpose and mission: Atheists Helping the Homeless is a new, and still very small group of Atheists who are helping the homeless here in Austin, Texas, by giving them free items that fall into the category of toiletries. Not food, mainly because that's already … [Read more...]
Important Update on Kiva
November 12, 2009 By 6 Comments
Since I've endorsed Kiva in the past (and I stand by that endorsement), for transparency's sake it's worth linking to this post from David Roodman (see also the related article from the Times). The quick summary is that the connection between Kiva lenders and loan recipients isn't as direct as you might have thought. Although the individuals listed on the site are real and their business proposals are genuine, their loan requests don't necessarily sit in limbo until they're funded by Kiva … [Read more...]
Kiva Atheists' Million-Dollar Milestone
October 10, 2009 By 6 Comments
I've written in the past about Kiva, the microcredit site that fights poverty by funding economic entrepreneurs in the developing world, and about how the largest lender community on the site is made up of atheists (and I'm happy to be one of them). Well, we've reached a new milestone. As you can see from Kiva's community page, the atheist team has just passed the $1 million mark in total dollars loaned, becoming the first team on Kiva to do so. Kiva's official blog has commemorated the … [Read more...]
The Secular Tithe
August 19, 2009 By 45 Comments
How much money do you give away each year? For the sake of full disclosure, I'll start by answering my own question: I try to give at least $200 a month to nonprofit educational and charitable causes. I think it's a reasonable amount, although I know I could (and should) be doing more. Speaking out as nonbelievers is well and good. There will always be a need for forceful, effective advocacy for atheism. But I've come to realize that, if we really want to build a secular and enlightened … [Read more...]
Holier-Than-Thouism
March 21, 2009 By 12 Comments
My recent post encouraging readers to join the atheists' group on Kiva stirred some controversy in a comment thread on Reddit. One commenter, whose sentiments were echoed by several others, writes: You should give because you believe in something - not just to prove a point and rig this like it's some kind of game. With respect, I say that these are not mutually exclusive options. I believe that Kiva is an excellent idea; I wouldn't have recommended it if I didn't. But at the same time, our … [Read more...]
Atheists, Do Some Good: Join Kiva
March 15, 2009 By 18 Comments
An accusation that's often leveled against atheists is that we lack charitable impulses, that faith-based organizations do the hard work of caring for the needy and atheism only promotes selfishness. This is a hateful slur, and to counter it, I've discussed outstanding acts of charity by individual atheists in the past. Evidence like this shows that, as a group, we do not lack compassion. On the contrary, we know that this life is the only one we'll ever have, which gives us the strongest … [Read more...]
A Profile in Atheism
January 14, 2008 By 30 Comments
The Washington State Tri-City Herald ran a lovely story last month profiling a local atheist: Atheism - A belief in the here and now. Fernando Aguilar, the story's subject, is the kind of person every atheist should strive to be like: a dedicated and courageous humanitarian, an outspoken activist, and a loving family man. When mortar shells were exploding near Fernando Aguilar in Iraq, he didn't pray to God for help. He doesn't believe God exists. And his long-held conviction didn't change … [Read more...]
Futile Good Will
June 21, 2007 By 144 Comments
In the recent post "Atheist Charity", I quoted one example of a charge often laid against atheists: that we have not done nearly enough to help the needy among humanity, as opposed to religious groups that build hospitals, run soup kitchens, and so on. I have a counterclaim: in terms of actual good done, rather than the narrow measure of dollars donated to charity, atheists can rightly claim credit for a great deal. Since the dawning of the Enlightenment, atheists and humanists have played a … [Read more...]
Atheist Charity
May 23, 2007 By 44 Comments
"Let's see, we have scores of Baptist Hospitals, Method[ist] Hospitals, Jewish Hospitals, Catholic Hospitals, etc., etc.. Each of these have 'outreach' programs both here and in the most dismal places on earth, staffed with dedicated medical doctors and nurses. Where oh where are the Atheist's hospitals, or soup kitchens?" —quoted by Jonah Goldberg for National Review Online "One hundred years after Christ had died, suppose someone had asked a Christian, What hospitals have you built? … [Read more...]
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