It’s time for our annual Summer Solstice Party!

We have reserved a pavilion at beautiful Pinchot Park just north of York. Please bring a covered dish to share with other people, and we hope to see you there!

It has electric for slow cookers and other devices. All are welcome (Members, non-Members, Kids, Pets, wayward relatives).

If you know what you plan to bring with you, please share it here: http://www.luckypotluck.com/potluck/PANonbelieversSolsticeParty

If you are on Facebook, please RSVP here: https://www.facebook.com/events/395368893840454/

CAMPING RESERVATIONS (OPTIONAL)
http://www.pa.reserveworld.com/SelectCampArea.aspx?PK_ID=6306

RULES AND REGULATIONS
http://www.dcnr.state.pa.us/stateparks/rulesandregulations/index.htm

DIRECTIONS
Sunnyside Pavilion (Pavilion 2) is located in the Conewago Day Use Area York side, located off Alpine Road. When entering the day use area continue to Kiosk and turn right. Sunnyside Pavilion is located adjacent to back parking loop. Directions to the park are here.

3rd Annual Riverboat Service

WHEN: Sunday June 10, 10:00am-11:30am at the City Island Doc for the Pride of the Susquehanna, Harrisburg’s own riverboat!

Join us atheists, agnostics, freethinkers and heathens for a complimentary ride and service on Harrisburg’s very own riverboat. Meet us at the Pride of the Susquehanna doc on City Island, in Harrisburg, PA. Please be there at 10:00am – The riverboat leaves the dock at 10:30 sharp.

We also plan to meet up for lunch afterwards on land.

Freewill donations will be collected to support the Harrisburg Area Riverboat Society.

You can get easy-to-follow directions from this link. Once you get to City island, walk north and follow the path down to the riverboat dock.

If you are on Facebook, please RSVP here.

Free Thought Forum Episodes updated!

For those that don’t know, we’ve moved to using Youtube for the Free Thought Forum video distribution. Our latest videos that we have on file have just been uploaded, and are now available on our Youtube Channel:

http://www.youtube.com/panonbelievers

If you subscribe to our Youtube Channel, you will know automatically from Youtube the minute they are available, as well as various other video of events throughout the year. Enjoy!

PA Nonbelievers to be at the Olde York Street Fair this weekend

This weekend we will be operating a booth at the Olde York Street Fair on Mother’s day in York, PA. The Fair is from 12:30pm to 6pm on Sunday, and we will be setting up from 10am. Our booth will be at Beaver and Market Streets, and we welcome e

veryone to drop by, pitch in, or just say hi and enjoy the day!

Please note: This festival usually has a local street preacher guest stop by and try to save our souls. He’s typically engaged in friendly conversation with us, and usually comes by in the early afternoon.

Reason Rally Recap

Hello all!

First I want to say that I think the Reason Rally was a smashing success. It was covered in every major news outlet, as well as hundreds of smaller outlets. I can say quite clearly that it succeeded in all of it’s goals.

On behalf of PA Nonbelievers, “Thank you!” to every single person who went. You helped all of us nonbelievers nationwide stand up in public and reach an official count of at least 25,000 attendees. This number is larger (by a factor of nearly 10!) than any other Atheist rally to date. To put this into perspective, this number is larger than Glenn Beck’s “Tea Party” rally. Some of the unofficial numbers have also indicated that the count could have been as high as 40,000!

Personally, I had a blast, and I hope you all did too. After the rally, I (and several other PAN members – Thank you to them too) went to the American Atheists national convention in Bethesda, MD. It was re-energizing, informative, helpful, and above all, fun!

Now comes the hard part – we all had fun, there’s no doubt about that – but we can’t stop there. There’s a lot more work to do. If you are local to PA Nonbelievers and can find ways to get active, donate or volunteer, we need to keep this up! This is an election year. With everything going on in PA, we can’t stand by and let theists inject religion into our secular government. There are a many issues coming up and lots of events. We need all hands on deck!

Please – Come to our meetings – Come to our booths. And if you can spare it, donate to this organization. We are a 501(c)3 non-profit organization, and all donations are tax deductible as permitted by law. Keep an eye on our website (http://www.panonbelievers.org), and at the risk of overselling, don’t forget that donating is as easy as filling out the small donation form in the upper right of that page. Our meeting information is here: http://www.panonbelievers.org/about/

Brian Fields
President
PA Nonbelievers

Interfaith Coalition of Washington County to hold a discussion panel with Nonbelievers

Hello all,

The following press release has gone out from the Interfaith Coalition of Washington County:

The Interfaith Coalition of Washington County presents a “Non-Theist Dialogue- Conversations with Local Free-thinkers, Agnostics and Atheists” on April 11, 2012 at 7 p.m. This presentation will be held at the Hagerstown Church of the Brethren on the corner of Washington and Mulberry Streets. An overview of beliefs and definition of Nontheism, with members of the panel sharing how they became Nontheist and the major influences in their beliefs, will be followed by a Q&A time. Light refreshments will be served and a Goodwill Offerings accepted.

The Interfaith Coalition exists to bring people of different beliefs together to promote peace, respect and compassion in our local community. Through dialogue and public presence we welcome each person’s unique spiritual perspective, strive to learn more about each other and honor the diversity of our various traditions. The Coalition provides a monthly ‘Second Wednesday’ series from September through May.

In addition to this press release, I’d like to add that I am one of the three speakers invited, asked to speak from the perspective of an atheist. If you can make it, please do, I’d love to have the support!

Brian Fields
President
PA Nonbelievers

Reason (Rally) Bound

I’m hoping that all of you that can have already made your travel plans to go to the Reason Rally. I can’t wait to see you there!

A few last minute things:

1. We have a few signs we will be holding with the organization’s logo on it. There’s a copy of the sign’s design below the fold, please, join us to show your support. We’ll be arranging volunteers with those signs to try and herd all of us into one area.
2. It may rain tomorrow. Please, bring a poncho to stay dry, and we’ve been asked that people favor the color red if at all possible. Umbrellas may block the view, so if you can avoid them, please do so.
3. If you haven’t already, please review the Reason Rally FAQ list online here: http://reasonrally.org/info/faq/

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PAN Celebrates St. Patrick’s Day in York

Submitted by our PANViews Editor, Pam Zerba

Ten members of PAN marched proudly in York’s St. Patrick’s Day parade, marking the third year of PAN’s participation in such parades in Central PA.

We had a three-fold goal this year: first, to make a statement of solidarity with our Irish Atheist brothers and sisters in opposition with Ireland’s incredible blasphemy law; second, to emphasize the outrageousness of the PA legislature’s Year of the Bible resolution; third, to remind York residents (especially closeted atheists) that there are atheists in Central PA.

The upcoming April issue of PANViews discusses the Irish blasphemy law (and no, it is not a holdover from the Dark Ages.) PAN Board Member Carl Silverman found a great quote from the renowned Irish writer, George Bernard Shaw, about the Bible, that our members carried on a banner: No man ever believes that the Bible means what it says. He is always convinced that it says what he means. Let’s hope that some of the parade watchers took a minute to think about that.

We’re happy to report that the PAN marchers received only a few rude gestures and boos, while also garnering plenty of smiles and cheers.

photo credit: Carl Silverman

Billboard Apology

I want to say that I’m truly sorry that many people have misunderstood this billboard. It was never our intention to use “race” as our message itself – The point of our billboard was:

1. The bible is NOT holy or moral as promoted by the PA House of Representatives in the “Year of the Bible”.
2. The bible was used as an excuse for many very bad things – Including American slavery.

We would have hoped this message was clearer to observers. In any case, the point is currently moot. The billboard was destroyed by vandals overnight. Attached is an image, submitted by one of our members who discovered it, of the destruction.

The irony of course is in what they destroyed: they left the bible verse that supports slavery, one of many missed opportunities in the bible for the authors to actually say “Slavery is bad”. They removed the entire point of the billboard, the criticism, and left the actual ignorant and savage part.

Brian Fields
President, PA Nonbelievers

FAQ: “Slaves Obey Your Masters” Billboard

As expected, the billboard put up in partnership with American Atheists this month is generating a lot of controversy. To help answer many of the questions we’ve been receiving, we have compiled this list of answers for you. We will add to it as needed.
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