Dale McGowan
DALE McGOWAN, Ph.D., is a committed atheist, a devoted husband and father, and a recognized expert on raising caring, ethical children without religion. He is the author of Parenting Beyond Belief, a collection of essays by and for loving, thoughtful nonreligious parents hailed by Newsweek as “a compelling read,” and Raising Freethinkers, the first comprehensive resource addressing the unique challenges secular parents face. He teaches workshops to nonreligious parents throughout the United States and Canada and was named a Harvard Humanist of the Year. Dale also founded the nonprofit Foundation Beyond Belief, a charitable organization dedicated to encouraging and demonstrating acts of humanist generosity.
At age 28, Dale married his true love, Becca, a Southern Baptist. They had a traditional religious wedding in a beautiful, historic Lutheran church in San Francisco, with two ministers—a Methodist friend of the family and the bride’s Baptist uncle—plus an Episcopal organist. “No one would have guessed there was an atheist in the room,” Dale reflects, “much less that he was the one in tux and tails.” Twenty-three years and three kids later, their marriage is, happily, still going strong. Yet, as Dale knew from the experiences of others, including close friends, many mixed-belief marriages are marked by frequent conflict and pain, and some end in divorce, caused directly by the couple’s differences in worldview. Why do some secular/religious marriages succeed and others fail? Dale’s fascination with that question and search for answers culminated in the book, In Faith and In Doubt: How Religious Believers and Nonbelievers Can Create Strong Marriages and Loving Families.
Before finding his calling as a writer, Dale McGowan enjoyed a 15-year career as a professor of music and conductor. He holds degrees in physical anthropology and music theory from the University of California, as well as a doctorate in music composition and theory from the University of Minnesota. In addition to his books on secular parenting and mixed-belief families, he is the author of Atheism for Dummies, Voices of Unbelief, and two works of satirical fiction, Calling Bernadette's Bluff and Good Thunder. He makes his home near Atlanta, Georgia, with his wife Becca, a second grade teacher, and their three kids.
“That churchgoers do the lion's share of the charitable work in our communities is simply untrue. They get credit for it because they do a better job of tying the good works they do to their creed. But according to a 1998 study, 82% of volunteerism by churchgoers falls under the rubric of "church maintenance" activities -- volunteerism entirely within, and for the benefit of, the church building and immediate church community. As a result of this siphoning of volunteer energy into the care and feeding of churches themselves, most of the volunteering that happens out in the larger community -- from AIDS hospices to food shelves to international aid workers to those feeding the hungry and housing the homeless and caring for the elderly -- comes from the category of "unchurched" volunteers.”
“Spirituality is about being awake. It’s the attempt to transcend the mundane, sleepwalking experience of life we all fall into, to tap into the wonder of being a conscious and grateful thing in the midst of an astonishing universe. It doesn’t require religion. Religion can, in fact, and often does, blunt our awareness by substituting false (and dare I say inferior) wonders for real ones. It’s a fine joke on ourselves that most of what we call spirituality is actually about putting ourselves to sleep.”
“...it was like finding a brother who farts in key.”
“A decision has been called for. The Nodders sit paralyzed. The Men crouch in their various holes. Tradition and Revolution, having spoken, perch high and unflinching. Fear and Loathing quietly cha-cha down the table’s length.A distant referee’s whistle.”
“I should’ve been a nun, he says, half aloud, as his feet leave the ledge.”
“It was like finding a long-lost brother who farts in the same key.”