NEW PLAYERS
At our January meeting we elected a new Board of Directors for the Central Minnesota Friends Free of Theism. President Doug, Vice-President Bruce, Treasurer Bill and Secretary/PR Brooke and Dennis will each serve two-year terms. Tom, Bryan and Clint are also on the Board as members at large.
A special thanks to Clint who has guided us through the last couple of years. We know is wasn’t always easy, trying to drag some of our more reluctant members into the 21st century of computers, but he did a great job and deserves our heartfelt thanks. Fortunately, he has agreed to continue serving as our “I.T.” guy. Otherwise we’d go back to sending smoke signals, like we did before. We should also recognize Bill, who has diligently looked after our meager bank account for the last several years, and Brooke for her help organizing our monthly coffees at Caribou Coffee and our participation St. Cloud’s first Gay Pride event this year.
MEMBERSHIP
At this meeting we also discussed formalizing membership in our organization. Because we are growing and more of our activities require some sort of funds to maintain, we thought that a small annual membership fee ($20 individual/$30 couples and families) would cover most of our expenses. Clint is setting up a membership program that will keep track of who joins and help send out reminders when the memberships are about to expire. Payments can be made either through Paypal or by sending them directly to Tom. Check our website.
You don’t have to be a formal member to attend our coffees, meetings and special events but your membership will help support our organization. You will (eventually) receive a membership card, get a quarterly newsletter, receive reduced fees for special events that require one and you will be eligible to vote and serve on the Board. For those of you concerned about your name being made public, we assure you that our membership list will be kept absolutely confidential.
Besides maintaining our organizational expenses (bank accounts, software costs, printing expenses, etc.) your dues will help support some of the programs with which the CMFFOT is involved. For example, we provide an annual scholarship for a student to attend a week at Camp Quest each summer. Camp Quest is a secular camp for the children of free-thinkers of all kinds, held at the Voyageur Environmental Center in Minnetrista. We also collect donations at each of our Solstice Celebrations for Anna Marie’s, a battered women’s shelter here in St. Cloud. We participate in the annual Red Cross Blood drive and help with the Highway Cleanup program as well.
The CMFFOT is an organization of free-thinking people in the St. Cloud area from all walks of life. It provides an opportunity to meet and talk with like-minded folks, exposure to the many writers, speakers and thinkers in this movement and helps promote our ideas in the community. Your support through membership will go a long way to continuing our efforts.
ANNUAL CALENDAR
Here is a list of some of the CMFFOT events for the coming year –
Coffee Gatherings (Caribou Coffee by the Mall) – 1st Sunday of each month (10-12 am) – an intellectual free-for-all with good friends and good coffee.
General Meeting (Unitarian Universalist Fellowship Hall) – Monday, Feb. 21 (7-9 pm) – Stefanie Sanden will speak about Camp Quest, its mission, goals and the need for adult councilors to help out this summer. The next general meeting will be held in April – location and program to be announced.
Board Meeting (Doug Petersen’s home) Monday, Mar. 21 (7-9 pm) – CMFFOT business will be discussed – these meetings will be held every other month during the year – anyone who is interested is welcome to attend.
Solstice Celebrations – a potluck celebration for our members and friends scheduled on a Saturday as near the Summer and Winter Solstices as we can manage – watch the website for details.
SURVEY PARTICIPATION
We've been contacted by a doctoral student at the University of Nebraska regarding a survey for atheists.
Thank you for taking the time to read this research request. I am a graduate student at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln and I am conducting a research study on stigma and secular individuals (atheists, agnostics, humanists) located in the Midwest for my doctoral dissertation. I invite you to contribute to this research by taking part in my web-survey. The survey should only take about 30 minutes to complete. I want to ensure you that I do not have any means to connect your personal information or IP address to your survey so your participation will be anonymous. The data collected in this survey may be used for future research projects as well. I also ask that you forward this email to other secular (atheist/agnostic/humanist) individuals you know. This is a population that is hard to find and I need as big of a sample as I can get.
This research is important because it provides more information about a highly understudied group. It also contributes to identifying seculars as a religious minority in the U.S.