Organizers prepare atheism-themed Fort Bragg event

Organizers prepare atheism-themed Bragg event
By Tom Breen - The Associated Press
Posted : Wednesday Feb 29, 2012 13:41:13 EST
RALEIGH, N.C. — It has been more than a year in the making, but organizers of the first concert at a U.S. military base aimed at atheists and other non-religious service members and their families say they’re putting the final touches on the Fort Bragg event.

“Rock Beyond Belief” is scheduled for Saturday, March 31, and plans to feature bands and speakers, including Richard Dawkins, the famed British scholar and atheist author. It will be the highest-visibility event so far in a growing effort by military personnel without belief in God or religions to be recognized by their peers and the Pentagon.

“We just want an equal place at the table,” said Sgt. Justin Griffith, primary organizer of the event and the military director of American Atheists.

Griffith is also trying to gain official recognition at Bragg for a chapter of the Military Atheists and Secular Humanists, which would give it the same privileges enjoyed by Christian denominations and other religious groups at the post. An active duty officer stationed at Bragg is applying to be the first humanist recognized as a “distinctive faith group leader” by the Army, a position roughly equivalent to a lay leader in a religious group.

Organizers hope the concert, with its high-profile speakers and openness to the public, will be the first large demonstration of the extent of the military’s non-believing population. They expect a crowd of 5,000 for an event initially planned as a rejoinder to a Christian event called “Rock the Fort” held at Bragg in 2010 by the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association.
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