{"id":1324,"date":"2017-01-27T13:37:00","date_gmt":"2017-01-22T21:04:33","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/eastlondon.humanist.org.uk\/?p=1324"},"modified":"2017-01-22T21:04:33","modified_gmt":"2017-01-22T21:04:33","slug":"bha-announces-integration-of-faith-to-faithless","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/eastlondon.humanist.org.uk\/?p=1324","title":{"rendered":"BHA announces integration of Faith to Faithless"},"content":{"rendered":"

The British Humanist Association announced on 16 January that Faith to Faithless<\/a>, a community support network for \u2018apostates\u2019 and the ex-religious, is now a part of the BHA.<\/p>\n

Founded by Aliyah Saleem and Imtiaz Shams in 2015, Faith to Faithless<\/a> has already helped hundreds of people raised in religious backgrounds find peer support and community at difficult times in their lives. In partnership with the BHA and its student section, Atheist, Humanist, and Secular Students, it has put on events across the country highlighting the haunting experiences of ex-Muslims, ex-Mormons, ex-Plymouth Brethren, and various others who have suffered after leaving their religion behind.<\/p>\n

BHA Chief Executive Andrew Copson commented, \u2018A brief look at the statistics \u2014 which show that two thirds of younger people in Britain are non-religious \u2014 can create the misleading impression that this new majority faces little hardship because of what they believe or don\u2019t believe.<\/p>\n

\u2018But look a little further, and you\u2019ll find many non-religious people are discriminated against. Many who are treated this way are overlooked \u201cminorities within minorities\u201d who face rejection, victimisation, and abuse when they leave behind the religion they were raised in. As the national charity supporting the non-religious to live free and full lives, we are happy to take on the challenge of supporting ex-religious people either in crisis or in search of community. I\u2019m delighted that we\u2019ll soon be ready to offer that support much more widely through Faith to Faithless.\u2019<\/p>\n

Faith to Faithless\u2019s most recent event was held order valium medication<\/a> last Tuesday at Kings College London, and brought together a wide audience to hear from ex-Jehovah\u2019s Witnesses about the difficulties they face.<\/p>\n

The BHA intends to develop Faith to Faithless to be a full service supporting ex-religious people in times of need across the UK. \u2018Aliyah and Imtiaz have built something remarkable, and we\u2019re now in a position where we can begin to fundraise for and develop what Faith to Faithless offers to ex-religious people,\u2019 said Teddy Prout, the BHA\u2019s Director of Community Services.r<\/p>\n

\u2018We will be building on Aliyah and Imtiaz\u2019s peer support networks to develop a robust, trained, and accredited volunteer force for Faith to Faithless, much like the volunteer force which supports our pastoral care work in hospitals and prisons, or our school speaker scheme. Further down the line, we have ambitions to develop a hotline and other direct support services, as well as measures to ensure that schools, social services, local authorities, and charities for vulnerable people, are all properly trained to offer appropriate support to \u201capostates\u201d.\u2019<\/p>\n

\u2018It\u2019s important for me,\u2019 says co-founder Aliyah Saleem, \u2018that people in the position that I was in don\u2019t have to feel alone. If you feel scared, we want to be there to support you. If you feel alone, we want to remind you that you\u2019re not. And if you feel strong, we\u2019d like to invite you to join us in raising awareness of minorities within minorities and the challenges we face.\u2019<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The British Humanist Association announced on 16 January that Faith to Faithless, a community support network for \u2018apostates\u2019 and the ex-religious, is now a part of the BHA.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"spay_email":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p9c4oP-lm","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/eastlondon.humanist.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1324"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/eastlondon.humanist.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/eastlondon.humanist.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eastlondon.humanist.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eastlondon.humanist.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1324"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/eastlondon.humanist.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1324\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1325,"href":"https:\/\/eastlondon.humanist.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1324\/revisions\/1325"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/eastlondon.humanist.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1324"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eastlondon.humanist.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1324"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eastlondon.humanist.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1324"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}