Chris Stedman

Sam Harris--I know you're a busy man, but I'd like to ask you out. Will you go to mosque with me?

I'm not trying to convert you to Islam. Like you, I'm not a Muslim. Like you, I don't believe in any gods. I'm happily, openly atheist. A...

It felt good to pick my own pastor.

He was young--so much so that nearly everyone called him "Pastor Doogie" --gracious, eloquent and kind, with a biting sense of humor that showed he didn't take anything too seriously (besides the love of God). After meeting and working with him on...

Earlier this year, a friend sent me a message on Facebook that said, simply: "You might want to watch yesterday's episode of The Daily Show."

In the episode, host Jon Stewart did a segment on a lawsuit by American Atheists, the most visible atheist organization in...

John Grant may be responsible for one of the most critically acclaimed albums of the last decade, but when I spoke with him two days before Thanksgiving, he informed me that he'd be spending the entire next day in the back seat of...

This piece was coauthored by Chris Stedman and Greg Epstein, the Humanist Chaplain at Harvard.

With Republican debates dominating the political conversation in recent weeks, the most circulated religion-related stories have pitted the "Godly" against the "Godless." As part of a motion that passed 396-9 in favor of...

When I was in high school, civil disobedience excited me. I participated in a school walkout in protest of the Iraq War, staged a demonstration outside of a conference for anti-gay "reparative therapy," and regularly got together with friends to make T-shirts boasting our political positions. Though the underlying political...

Recently, while talking to my mom, I used the word "queer" to describe myself. Though it wasn't the first time she had heard me use it, she paused.

"I don't really like that word," she said. "'Queer.' When I was younger, it was a slur."

"Well, when I was younger,...

The number of students who do not believe in a higher power is rising, but these students often find themselves marginalized and struggle to gain acceptance on campus. Using data from the Secular Student Alliance, this article explores the interests of nonreligious nontheistic students, identifies issues these students...

On the ninth anniversary of 9/11, I listened to a woman who was in Lower Manhattan during the attacks reflect on her experience. Through tears, she recounted the horror and fear she felt on that day. But she added that 9/11 was a wake-up call to her: it was a...

For the last several years, my work as an interfaith activist has been largely defined by a single question: "Wait -- you do interfaith work, and you're an atheist?!"

That question, posed by religious people (to be fair, I've gotten that question from many atheists, though usually for a different...

This year, two notable controversies have been brewing in Tennessee: a proposed bill that would forbid educators from using the word "gay" in the classroom, and a court battle to determine if Islam is a religion. (The verdict? Islam is in fact a religion -- for...

These last few weeks, I've gotten a lot of questions about my newest tattoo -- a portrait of Abraham Lincoln on my right shoulder.

"Why Abraham Lincoln? Is it because there are rumors he was gay?" Well, no, but I do appreciate the opportunity to make a Gaybraham Lincoln pun,...

Recently, there's been a lot of talk in the organized atheist, humanist, skeptic and freethought movements about the potential benefits and drawbacks of interfaith work.

Over at Patheos, the Executive Director of the American Humanist Association, Roy Speckhardt, recently made an excellent case that -- while...

I am sitting in Oregon, adoring the all-too-brief bouts of sunshine interrupting the more extended periods of drizzle. The sky is clouded, as it apparently often is in this part of the world, and for the first time in a while I feel like the least hipster person in the...

As a committed Christian and a queer atheist who both work to advance interfaith and intercultural understanding, we've watched with heavy hearts as Sojourners and its evangelical founder Jim Wallis have been taken to task in the blogosphere this week for declining to run an advertisement sponsored by...

The attacks on the United States of America orchestrated by Osama bin Laden occurred during my first week of high school -- what was supposed to be the start of my transition into adulthood.

Due to construction on my school, the academic year had been delayed for several weeks. On...

"I would like my life to be a statement of love and compassion -- and where it isn't, that's where my work lies." -- Ram Dass

Ten years ago, in the summer before my freshman year of high school, I went with my church to the Pine Ridge Reservation in...

As I sit here contemplating Representative Peter King's (R-NY) upcoming "Muslim radicalization" hearings, trying to discern if my stomach ache is the result of the cookies I'm scarfing or the prospect of congressional hearings that specifically target one community, I'm comforted by rapper Lupe Fiasco's new single, "

This February, as friends of mine flocked south to escape the unrelenting cold of Boston, I headed to the Midwest.

It was my first college and university speaking tour, put together in partnership with eight institutions in Indiana, Illinois and Iowa that extended invitations for me to come speak to...

In the weeks following 9/11, a Sikh man named Balbir Singh Sodhi was shot down at a gas station by a man shouting "I'm a patriot!" In 2009, a 9-year-old girl named Brisenia Flores and her father were murdered in Arizona, allegedly at the hands of...