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Atheist Church? Why Not Atheist Temple?

I saw what appeared to be a survey asking what people thought about atheist churches on the main screen a while back. That puzzled me. If the question was about having facilities to help indoctrinate secular values into youth, I would think that atheists would have the sense to not indicate a particular religion when doing so. Atheists can be former Christians, Jews, Muslims, Hindus, etc. and even born and raised atheists. I support the notion of advocating secular values, but I would like to use a term like temple. I know, some people would say that temple indicates Judaism, but there are many cultures that make "temples". There are Buddhist temples, Jewish temples, Greco-Roman temples and temples of doom. What do you think?

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Permalink Reply by David on August 5, 2009 at 8:28am

I definitely prefer "temple" to "church." It's more general.

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Permalink Reply by Claudia M. Mazzucco on August 5, 2009 at 9:06am

Hi David,

What is the difference between Temple and Church?

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Permalink Reply by Johnsky on August 6, 2009 at 2:29am

I think the point we're missing here is that none of these names make any sense. Churches are for Christianity, just as Mosques are for Islam, etc etc.

Why don't we just call Atheist meeting places "Agoras"?

(Agora, a word meaning a large amount of people meeting in one place, it's where "Agoraphobia" comes from.)

We can take the name for ourselves, it's an old word that most people don't use any more... we can make it ours.

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Permalink Reply by Nathan Phillips on August 20, 2009 at 10:45pm

I like the idea of building more lasting structures where atheists and other non-theists can network and have some of the benefits that religious people have without the associated dogma and pressure.

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Permalink Reply by Nathan Phillips on August 20, 2009 at 10:43pm

I was trying to make the point that temple is not particular to any religion. however, your agoras aren't affiliated with any religion, so that is awesome.

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Permalink Reply by Gila Guerilla on June 20, 2010 at 8:18pm

Why not just use the term FORUM? Is it that you want something not only non-religious, but also recognised to be non-religious, (ie. atheist)?

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Permalink Reply by Michelle on June 20, 2010 at 8:48pm

No offense meant to you Gila, but Angora is just a cool word. I like it. Then people will be able to say I'm going to the Angora and make everyone wonder what they mean. Forum just isn't as cool or fun to say. Also, it would be great to have a place to meet and do some useful things like clothing and food drives, homeless outreaches, social events or any number of things useful to the community that a group may want to do.

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Permalink Reply by Nathan Phillips on June 20, 2010 at 9:57pm

Well, the term that was being thrown about was "agora", and I'm not sure how cool it actually sounds. However, it sounds like something that is more permanent than a forum. I do not wish to build anything that is dogmatic, but as long as there are permanent structures that hold memes for culture for religion, but those who have secular culture have only structures which apparently have both secular and religious aspects, the secular will be at a disadvantage. You won't find a lot of science in a church library, but you will find a lot of religion in a municipal library.

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Permalink Reply by William C. Walker on June 26, 2010 at 6:56pm

The word Agora I find preferable to either temple or church. There are already all too many churches & temples, esp. churches.

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Permalink Reply by Joe McCarthy on June 27, 2010 at 5:06pm

I like that

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Permalink Reply by Susan Manor on June 29, 2010 at 2:29pm

oh I like that one!!

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Permalink Reply by Mihai on August 5, 2009 at 8:55am

The word "church" implies religion and this is exactly what atheism isn't supposed to do: replace a religion with another. Atheism is about free thinking, which religion forbids.