Archive for March, 2011

On Wednesday, we welcomed Hull & East Riding Humanists secretary Tim Stephenson over to Leeds to present the Perspective Citywide session on Humanism. Tim’s talk was excellent, looking at both the philosophical side behind Humanism and also why it is important to stand up and be counted as a Humanist.

On Tuesday, Atheist Society hit Stick and Twist for what was officially a Think and Drink, though more importantly was also steak night at Wetherspoon’s :D.

Last Sunday, myself, James and Elina headed down to Hope City Church.

Officially I think they come under the label of a “charismatic” church, which means they are hip, young and evangelical. They were founded twenty years ago by a mysterious figure that everyone refers to as Pastor Dave and has now spread to six different cities – one of which is in Africa.

Their new “Megacentre” is located in a former warehouse, which seems to be the trendy place to put a church these days and as we went in, we made or way to the brand new auditorium complete with an iMac controlled technical set-up, full band on stage and video link-up facilities so they can broadcast the news from across the Hope City Church family.

After the service, Joel very kindly sorted us out with tea and coffee (actually, I somewhat threw them when I asked if they had any cold drink) and we hung out in the “Impressions Cafe” on some very comfortable sofas. The biscuits were good but not quite up to the standard of York Rock Church which even had branded cups!

We came away with a welcome pack of goodies which included Hope City Church magazine, which was incredibly glossy and well printed, and featured a story on 20 years of Hope City Church. It was interesting to see that they had tried to start a number of satellite churches over the past two decades, some of which had worked out, others apparently hadn’t. It was interesting to see that they have become a success story – expanding into Frankfurt this November – by sheer force of will and not giving up. It may not be our cause, but it could certainly be good inspiration.

For the forth session of Perspective Citywide, we welcomed Joel Baker to talk about Christianity.

Joel is currently serving as the interfaith secretary for the Christian Union at Leeds and discussions were very forthcoming – I had to call an end to them in the end because we ran out of time. A big thanks to Joel for coming down and very much looking forward to Tim tonight.

Last Tuesday I delivered a talk entitled “A History of Atheist Charity” at Leeds Atheist Society. I’m not sure how accurate the title was, it also looked at religious charities and why we shouldn’t expect atheist charities, before going on to discuss atheist charities past and present. The feedback was positive however, so it seemed to go quite well.