Orange County Atheists

Villa Park Letter

Atheists!

This is a long email about an important topic. If you'd busy, read the bold parts. Thank you.

We had a fantastic April meeting, and we discussed the recent rash of church-state problems to hit Orange County - "In God We Trust" in city councils.

My blog at the Register has an index of stories on the topic at http://lav.freedomblogging.com/category/atheist/in-god-we-trust/ - in short, a woman in Bakersfield has been contacting city councils throughout the state in an effort to get them to display "In God We Trust" prominently in their city council chambers. Westminster was first, last July, and in the last eight weeks, 5 other cities (Westminster, Cypress, Mission Viejo, San Clemente, and Huntington Beach) have agreed to the display. Most have been passed without much fanfare, though there were more speakers against the display at Mission Viejo and HB's meetings.

Last week, Villa Park put the topic on their agenda, to be voted on Tuesday, April 22.

We've set up a space to discuss the issue on the OC Atheists website - http://www.ocatheists.com/archives/000056.shtml. Please chime in with your ideas, suggestions, and RSVPs. We're working with UCI's Atheists, Agnostics and Rationalists group to get the word out, and Anthony has set up a Facebook event page (http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=11862584149) for those of you who use that site. We'll also be contacting other likeminded groups in the area. We hope to have 30 or so people come out, total, on April 22 to Villa Park.

Please visit the site and leave your input - only one more notice will go out to this mailing list. We will, however, continue with more regular updates to the discussion mailing list. To subscribe to the discussion mailing list, send a message with the word 'subscribe' in the message body to discussion-list-request@ocatheists.com if you're interested.

We need your help. Obviously, the council will do what the council does. But on discussing this at the meeting, many of us believe having a large presence of people at the meeting, with some address the board officially, will be beneficial. It may influence a member or two, and at the least, it will show other cities that there is opposition. It will also garner a fair deal of media attention.

On that topic, I won't officially participate in the protest, as it's a minor conflict of interest. Travis from OCA and Anthony from AAR are taking the lead, but I can be contacted with any questions. Travis sent out the email below, and it's also reprinted at the OC Atheists website. I hope all of you can make it. Please forward this email to anyone you know who may be interested.