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 The group Recovering from Religion plans to start a helpline for people struggling with religious doubts.
June 4th, 2013
03:08 PM ET
Atheists to start 1-800 hotline for doubtersBy Dan Merica, CNN (CNN) – Who can people call when religious doubts arise, but they're afraid to talk to their faith leaders or families? A group that helps people "recover" from religion says it's ready to pick up the phone. Recovering from Religion, which has about 40 support groups in the U.S. and Britain, plans to launch a hotline that will offer doubters an anonymous place to ask difficult questions and find communities of like-minded nonbelievers. The group plans to staff the help line 24 hours a day and is modeling it after services like suicide prevention hotlines. Sarah Morehead, executive director of Recovering from Religion, told CNN that the mission is to help people, not convert them to atheism. “A lot of the times they just need someone to talk to," Morehead said. The 1-800 number has yet to be named. Recovering from Religion is trying to raise $30,000 by June 30 to fund "The Hotline Project" with up to 40 counselors. Ideally, the help line would be live by the holiday season, said Morehead, which is often a difficult time for people struggling with religious doubts. Photos: Famous atheists and their beliefs The idea for the hotline sprang up after calls came in to the Recovering from Religion phone line from people who were questioning their faith and needed to talk to someone. Morehead said she gets a few calls every day and hundreds of e-mails a month from people seeking counseling. From there, she said, it seemed a hotline that provided a permanent, anonymous place to talk to someone was the best option. "Coming out" as a nonbeliever - or even a doubter - can often be extremely difficult, Morehead and others say. In addition to the existential worries, budding nonbelievers run the risk of alienating family and friends. The help line’s volunteer counselors will be trained to not engage in religious debate, Morehead said. Instead, they will try to give callers “practical, action-oriented solutions.” When someone first calls the hotline, the counselor will start by simply asking the caller to talk about his or her personal story, said Morehead. Later, the counselor and the caller might work on an action plan. The caller's goals may concern formally leaving religion altogether, but Morehead said that counselors will also offer advice on finding a new faith or connecting with a local community of nonbelievers. Some blogs have questioned the hotline, however, calling it a ploy to increase the number of atheists in America. Headlines like “New 1-800 Number Funded By Liberals To Convert Christians to Atheists,” for example, have cropped up at a number of conservative blogs. Morehead said her critics fail to grasp the point of Recovering from Religion. “Most of the people who contact us are working their way towards disbelief, so of course we are very equipped to handle that,” Morehead said. “That is not the goal, though, or the job of the facilitators.” Photos: 'Born-again' celebrities This hotline is not completely unique in the world of religious "nones" – people who either don’t believe in God or don’t affiliate with any religious beliefs. Atheists have long discussed disbelief in the comfort of online anonymity. “We have seen how important the Internet is, especially young people questioning their faith, and this provides them with another resource with a different focus,” said Jesse Galef, communications director for the Secular Student Alliance. “For people who want more guidance, I think this resource will be very valuable.” Services that help religious doubters have thrived recently. The Clergy Project, an online community for preachers who no longer believe in God, has grown from 52 to nearly 500 people since its founding in 2011, said Teresa MacBain, the former executive director of the project. MacBain, a former pastor who converted to atheism, called the help line "another way for people to contact someone anonymously and discuss the struggles they are having for their beliefs.” “If this project had been around when I found the Clergy Project, I would have used it.” MacBain said she plans to get training as one of the counselors and hopes to be answering calls when the service launches. soundoff (3,878 Responses)« Previous 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 Next »
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its funny how so many people are starting to not like GOD,( Matthew 24:12 ) Because of the increase of wickedness, the love of most will grow cold
Why is your god more valid than the other gods?
Because he says so and/or because your book says so are not valid answers.
Go.
"Because of the increase of wickedness"
Uh? Where do you get this? Please, explain how it is that you arrived to this conclusion.
Blah-blah-God! Blah-blah Bible! Blah-blah End Times! Blah-Blah Eternal Damnation!
There, I've said it all for you so you can shaddap now.
To Mark: I read about Higgs the other day. Poor man he is very unhappy about the Higg's Bosom.
Tell him to buy a mansierre for his Higgs Bosom.
Each person doing what is right in his own eyes, according to his own concepts of right and wrong, is a sure formula for social chaos. All law extends from a government's ideas about God Who is the law giver. What is right for example, should we apply "tough love" or " unconditional love" to any given happenstance? Such pop culture 'sentiments' are the tip of the social chaos ice berg.
“The government of the United States is not, in any sense, founded on the Christian religion.”
― John Adams
Sharia law? No thanks.
It's so sad how hateful Christians are towards people who use their brains. The fact that they consider this an "attack" on religion shows just how far their heads are up their a $ $ e $.
Well that's because religion requires ignorance to perpetuate.
Take for example VBS. If exposure to religion didn't start until say 25 do you think we would have even half the nutters we have today?
To Mark: Yours is second to none. Verifiable? Well, don't call it Theory any more.
The Theory of relativity has been verified and they don't take the word theory away because scientists distinguish a theory from a hypothesis. You can too.
Yet another person who doesn't understand the meaning of the word "theory" in the context of the scientific method.
The word "theory" has a very specific definition, meaning and application in science. Go read a book other than the babble.
All religions are man made. Just because you were brainwashed into believing nonsense doesn't put you a high moral ground.
Atheists can and do lead successful and moral lives, based on reality, and not fantasy. There is not a speck of proof for heaven or hell.
well said!
@stevie68a
Not well said.
"All religions are man made."
No evidence to back up this positive claim.
"Just because you were brainwashed into believing nonsense doesn't put you a high moral ground."
Generalization without fact. Implying the claim of moral high ground is baseless and is a lef handed way of claiming it for yourself.
"Atheists can and do lead successful and moral lives,"
Agree.
"based on reality, and not fantasy."
Correction, based on your perception of reality.
"There is not a speck of proof for heaven or hell."
You will forgive me if I do not believe you would be open to any type of evidence, empirical or otherwise.
To FreeFromTheism: Invisible? Can you see the wind? Can you see your mind?
Can you see the wind? Yep. They are called tornadoes. Can you see your mind? Yep. I can think of what my mind may look like.
You can't see them, but you can scientifically prove they exist, unlike any of the thousands of gods man invented since the beginning of time. You believe in Ra or Vishnu? How about Zeus? Buddha? You know they're not real, just like I know your god is not real.
you completely missed my point, it seems
You got to read the Bible to find out whether God is Real or Not. Do not look up to any man. Man cannot give you answers to life lessons, but the Bible and God can. Being a Christian is not just by being born in a Christian family or having a name; it is living day in and day out as a Christian. That is tough, but God understands if you put your trust in Him!!! If you define God by looking at Man it would be a disaster.
That's weird, I've never had an atheist knock on my door trying to tell me about things like "logic" and "common sense."
I've had plenty of knocks to talk about Jesus and God, though.
One reason I know that atheists fight for their cause is because many people of religion want to make their beliefs law. Take gay marriage and abortion, for example. For some reason, Christians think that their beliefs are the only beliefs and thus those beliefs should be upheld for everyone though US laws.
“The government of the United States is not, in any sense, founded on the Christian religion.”
― John Adams
Yeah because the US always tells the truth to Muslims and their pirates. *rolls eyes*
Finally, a RailRoad support group.
For those poor christians that fear being oppressed and marginalized now that atheists also have a hotline, here are a few numbers you can call.
Christian counseling services:
General needs 1-888-NEEDHIM
New Life Clinics 1-800-NEW-LIFE
National Prayer Line 1-800-4-PRAYER
Bethany Lifeline Pregnancy Hotline 1-800-BETHANY
Liberty Godparent Ministry 1-800-368-3336
Grace Help Line 24 Hour Christian service 1-800-982-8032
The 700 Club Hotline 1-800-759-0700
Want to know Jesus? 1-888-NEED-HIM
Biblical help for youth in crisis 1-800-HIT-HOME
Rapha National Network 1-800-383-HOPE
Emerge Ministries 330-867-5603
Meier Clinics 1-888-7-CLINIC or 1-888-725-4642
Association of Christian Counselors 1-800-526-8673
Minirth Clinic 1-888-MINIRTH (646-4784)
National Christian Counselors Association 1-941-388-6868
Pine Rest 1-800-678-5500
Timberline Knolls 1-877-257-9611
I really don't want you to feel left out.
Well don't stop there. Here Christians, here's more help to alleviate your oppression:
Bibles in every motel room
God on our money
Prayer before public events
Christian cable networks 24/7
Discounts on insurance for being christian
Churches every 6 blocks in every city over 100,000
Laws that prevent non-christians from holding public office
Christian bookstores in every town over 12,000
God in the Pledge of Allegiance
Televangelists 24/7
Christian billboards along the highway advertising Vacation Bible School and “Repent or go to He.ll”
Federally recognized christian holiday
Radioevangelists 24/7
Religious organizations are tax free
75% of the population claims to be christian
National day of prayer
God in the National Anthem
Weekday christian education for elementary students.
Christian clergy led prayer at Presidential inaugurations
And still, they moan.
There are many people who believe in god but have no religious affiliation, so they believe in god but don't have a religion. If you can wrap your mind around that, why can't you get that atheists don't believe in god and don't have a religion?
I think that a hotline for people who want to talk about their fears, doubts, and questions associated with their faith, or lack thereof is a good thing. If a persons faith is so weak that an anonymous stranger on the phone can break it then they were not believers to begin with. If after talking they decide they do believe then they press on with pride. As an athiest I remember trying to talk to my theist friends about my feelings and having them get angry with me...lost some lifelong friends and a few family members when I came out...it would have helped to have had some support during this time...
I hear you, but thankfully most of the family i am with are not that religious in nature. Hopefully your family and friends will realize they lost someone special.
Why do atheist try so hard to convince that there is no God? Always mud slinging and demonize people of religion and vandalize other people religious relics. Always suing someone about being offended or something. I just don't get it. Everyone religious or athiest we are all people and bleed the same way. Why can't we treat each others like people and not demonize and dividing people into some category, sound like something liberals do when they don't like the oppositions. Everyone, let's make peace and live in utopia, oops that is socialism. What the heck! let's live in a country that persecute all religions and make a country of athiesm and socialism. I think we will love that. If someone religious should speak a word of God shall be persecuted and tried for federal offense and inprisioned for life.
Actually we only go after the foolish religious folk that try to force people to believe in them and trying to fearmonger their followers by saying that anyone who doesn't believe exactly what they are will go to hell.
These people aren't doing ANYTHING to you. They're just supporting people who share different beliefs from you. Seriously, what's you're problem?
freedom of speech, that's all it is
"make a country of athiesm and socialism"
Any other unrelated, irrational nonsense you want to add to your rant?
Freedom,
"Why can't we treat each others like people and not demonize and dividing people into some category, sound like something liberals do when they don't like the oppositions."
Get serious. Do "liberals" ever use "conservative" as a word of condemnation like right-wingers do with "liberal"? It's the right-wingers who are far more likely to put people into categories and demonize them.
"Why can't we treat each others like people and not demonize and dividing people into some category"
"sound like something liberals...."
lol
Observer
"Do "liberals" ever use "conservative" as a word of condemnation like right-wingers do with "liberal"? It's the right-wingers who are far more likely to put people into categories and demonize them."
You are correct the right wing do the same exact thing. Istand corrected.
Spoken like a true hypocrite. Well done!
why are Christians and religious folks so concerned about atheist converting their members? If they are so confident in their message, then why worry right? If a product you are selling is as good as advertised, then why worry about someone going after another product? I mean, whats wrong with a Middle Eastern guy dying for my so-called "sins" 2014 years ago, a story that mirriors that of many Pagan dieties, why wouldn't that sell a little better? How about a Jellous father who will cast you to hell if you don't believe in him, who would flood the earth and send all sorts of natural disasters your way for misbehaving, I mean that's normal parenting right? Geeze, some people just don't get it.
Think of your religion like your penis. You're welcome to be proud of it, but keep it to yourself and shoving it in everyone's face.
Proof that Atheism is just another religion. They are trying to convert others.
Where did they say they were trying to convert people with a hotline?
You are right about converting others to believe an ideology. The word believe is not a concrete truth. It is people idea amplified to the mass and convince you there is or there isn't a God. Belief is man made, truth is facts.
Saying "We're available to talk to you if you're having doubts" is not trying to convert. Going on mission trips and handing out flyers to attend religious functions is trying to convert. Also, for something to be a religion, it has to involve having "faith" in things without evidence. Atheists are atheists precisely because they DONT believe in silly things that are unsupported by evidence.
The best response I've ever heard to that tired cliché was in this Belief forum: "Atheism is a religion in the same way that not playing baseball is a sport." I wish I could give credit where it's due, but I've lost the original source.
Using the word 'proof' to support an extremely poorly-thought out and ill-informed statement is exactly the kind of thing atheists find so incredibly annoying about so many believers...
Somewhere between taking in information and processing said information, there would appear to be an epic fail in the way your brain works – or doesn't.
Atheism is not a religion. You people understand that, right? The same way that not speaking German is not a language. Atheism is not having any religion, not believing in myths, and not having any sort of common beliefs with any group. Being atheist says nothing about what you do believe. You can't really group people like that.
Atheism is a leap of fate just like any religion. You believe dogmatically that there is no god or higher power, yet you can't prove it. Deny if you wish, but it's a type of religion.
(sigh) Disbelief, by definition, is not belief.
You are right athiesm is not a religion but according to liberal thinking it is a cult, why? The word "believe" is always there, man made ideology religion and athiesm are a cancer of mankind.
Truth of the matter is, That Atheism goes through all the motions of a religious group. They have meetings, make donations for such meetings, talk about their way of life and what makes it better for them. Do reading from notable atheists (Dawson and such) You have discussion groups and most of all. You all talk about it in a manner that puts down the religious in order for people to "give up" on their and turn over to atheism. So yeah, you are a religion.
So BBJ, I and I assume you as well also follow the "Non-Belief in Unicorns" religion.
Atheist Hot line: Hello, how might we assist you today?
Caller #3: Hi", You guys are smart. I was wondering, do you-know-what the K K K think atheist are good for? Kindling. Get it.Hell isn't quite hot enough. Satan needs the fuel. Thank You. Have a Smiley face day : )
Allied with the KKK are you?
Nope.
You assume too much, or protest too much.
Are you aligned with Satan? Who's your daddy?
Got JESUS?
Easy too have. Just a prayer away. Don't need a calling number or web site.
Anon...then why do you need churches? Tax exempt status? Websites, hotlines, payer groups, yadda.
Oh ye of much hypocrisy...
Atheism is another form of religion. It also has a Trinitarian Creator: The Nothing, Chance and Evolution.
And they also have a God Particle. Ah, and of course, they need to believe in something too. They also need to believe that there is no God that's vital for them, so, their lives could have meaning. They simply call things differently. Men from antiquity did the same thing.
Atheism isn't even an "ism," much less a religion.
What religion do the people with no religious affiliation but believe in god belong to?
To bostontola: A la Carte religion.
atheism doesn't commit one to anything other than not believing that invisible super friends exist
This is one of the most ignorant statements I've read all day. The reason evolution is widely regarded as fact is because is demonstrable and verifiable. Additionally, the God particle has nothing to do with "god." In fact, the physicist who first theorized this particle doesn't quite like the nickname is claims that name arouse from a joke. A bad joke he calls it.
To Mark: Verifiable? Then Stop calling Evolution a Theory. Poor Higgs is very unhappy.
To FreeFromTheism: Invisible? Can you see your mind? Can you see the wind?
Wow – that was a big bowl of assumptive ignorance.
The God Particle is only called that because of how evasive and hard to pin-point it has been. It is properly known as the Higgs Boson and it belongs to science, not Atheism.
Shall we blame Muslims on christians given that the Koran is based off of the bible?
To Mark and all atheist parisioners: You people married God when you decided to deny him. The God Particle name implies that there is a main cause, an essential block for everything else, where every thing is based upon. Good choice.
Ignorance? Let's see: I don't believe my car appeared from nowhere or at random. How can I believe that Universe did it? Simple reasoning.
They also need to believe that there is no God that's vital for them, so, their lives could have meaning.
What a stupid statement. That's like saying your need to believe that there's no Santa Claus is vital to you so your life has meaning.
My life has more meaning now that I have shed my delusions because I'm not constantly focused on the false promise of another one. My work, family and friends, activities, volunteer work all make my life more meaningful. No god required.
By the way, it wasn't addressed to me, but the wind is measurable and verifiable. My brain activity can be measured and verified. A lot of invisible things can be measured and verified, but god isn't one of them.
I need you to define a group for me. We all know that there are such people as heroin addicts in the world. We call them variously, "heroin addicts," "recovering addicts," "lapsed addicts," and so on. They are a clearly identifiable group based on their relationship to heroin.
Now, what would you call the mass of humankind that doesn't need heroin, doesn't use heroin, doesn't know anyone who uses it, has never even seen the stuff, will never use it, rarely thinks about it and frankly doesn't give a hoot about heroin? I need a name for this group and an explanation of their relationship to heroin addiction.
I have to admit there's something truly miraculous about you xtians. It's dumbfounding how you can take tomato paste, onions, garlic and meat (or not) of choice, and create a birthday cake. Truly amazing. Not exactly loaves and fishes, but close.
As expected, here comes all the theists knocking atheists when the theists THEMSELVES are also atheists about all the other thousands of imaginary gods that they reject for the SAME EXACT REASONS that belief in THEIR IMAGINARY GOD is rejected. Ignoring all the other rational reasons for disbelief in imaginary gods, what's more likely, that all the thousands of gods except the ONE GOD that you believe in is real, or that all the thousands of gods plus one more is false? Add to that that the reasons for disbelief in those gods is no different than reasons for disbelief in your god, and the answer is obvious, even to a delusional theist.
Every person on earth is an atheist.
Well said, Lou! Theists don't realize that everyone is born an atheist. One's religion is nothing more than the product of geography and ancestry. Christians don't like to consider that, had they been born in Iran or Saudi Arabia, they would almost certainly be Muslim. As Muslims, they would denounce Christianity as a false religion.
Lately CNN appears to me to have a strong agenda to give as much visibility to the atheist viewpoint as they can. I think somebody (or somebodies) at CNN is (are) promoting a personal viewpoint.
No they aren't. It seems more and more people like you wish CNN would write articles on your own personal beliefs, but CNN isn't in the business in writing what you want to hear or listen.
But when they re talking about Baptists, or Catholics or Metodists, or Lutherins, they are not. I think has been unpopular to be an athiest in the country that is called a christian nation. But I hope we hear more about atheism.
I don't think so. It's just that no other news media is talking about it, so it stands out on CNN.
They get more key clicks if they are controversial.
So they don't shy away from controversial topics – except for some opinions on boy scouts.
Gee, someone thinks they are a rocket scientist.
CNN, nothing but atheists.
Paranoid much? Oh yeah, it's that xtian persecution complex coming out. Nevermind.