KINGMAN – There’s going to be a slight change at Tuesday’s Kingman’s City Council meeting.
For the first time in a long time (if not THE first time), a non-religious invocation will be given before the start of the evening’s business. Humanist Luke Douglas will be delivering a secular message from Phoenix via Zoom.
The announcement was made on the Kingman Freethinkers Forum Facebook page Wednesday and the response among the secular and atheist community was ecstatic.
“I’m excited,” said freethinker J’aime Morgaine. “It’s wonderful that all voices in Mohave County can express peace and compassion in different ways.”
Kingman Freethinkers was started in 2018 by the late Mark Nisski and is a nonpartisan, secular social group formed to help people through secular life via education, advocacy, outreach, community service and fellowship. Other purposes of the group include promoting critical thinking, logic and reason and supporting the separation of church and state.
Douglas is an attorney serving as Executive Director and General Counsel of the Humanist Society of Greater Phoenix and an ordained humanist celebrant, meaning he can legally officiate weddings in addition to invocations and memorial services when he’s invited.
He described secular humanism for the uninitiated.
“I have no supernatural beliefs,” he said. “But I do believe in humanity, its potential, its dangers, and above all the obligation on all of us to work for the best in ourselves.”
Douglas’s connection to Kingman comes through his friendship with Nisski and his passion to bring freethought representation to Mohave County.
“I was honored to be his reference to become ordained as a humanist celebrant,” Douglas said. “Though (Nisski) is not here to follow through on his longtime vision, I am honored now to give a Humanist invocation in his honor just like he wanted to do himself.”
Douglas has given other Humanist invocations from the state legislature down to the city level – mostly without issue. He ran into resistance in Scottsdale once.
“They were fighting the Satanic Temple in court about whether they had to allow non-traditional religious voices equal access,” he said. “I intentionally opened with a literary reference that used Lucifer as a metaphor for freethought in a gesture of solidarity with my neighbors at the Satanic Temple. I don’t share their faith, but I do share the value that one religion’s privilege should be the equal privilege of every faith and of those who have no faith at all.”
Working with the City of Kingman has been an easy process.
“I requested information on giving an invocation and the staff just gave me a list of available dates to choose from,” he said.
As for the actual meeting Tuesday, Douglas said the audience shouldn’t expect anything resembling the Scottsdale incident.
“Kingman has been nothing but welcoming so far, and I will be reading from an author whose insights will elevate the council meeting in a way that respects (Nisski’s) legacy,” he said. “I look forward to engaging in this small way with Kingman’s faith perspectives, and I want to thank everyone in the town for welcoming me to share your city meeting.”
Mayor Jen Miles, who said she considers herself a spiritual woman and actively participated in the National Day of Prayer May 6, recognizes beliefs that don’t include a spiritual realm, including Humanism.
“Nevertheless, their focus remains on human happiness, dignity and individual accountability,” she said.
Miles recognizes Kingman’s diversity and the importance of providing an inclusive and equitable environment for everyone who shares positive moral codes and ethics.
“It strengthens our community’s fabric of tolerance and dedication to empathy for the different points of view,” she said.
Douglas will appear via Zoom and the meeting will be broadcast on the City of Kingman YouTube channel for those not able to attend the meeting in person.
Kingman City Council meets at 5 p.m. 310 N. Fourth St.
Kingman Freethinkers Forum is a public forum. Visit their Facebook page for more details.
Aaron Ricca
EDITOR’S NOTE: Humanist Definition: an outlook or system of thought attaching prime importance to human rather than divine or supernatural matters. Humanist beliefs stress the potential value and goodness of human beings, emphasize common human needs, and seek solely rational ways of solving human problems. [Oxford English Dictionary]
Humanists reject the idea or belief in a supernatural being such as God. This means that humanists class themselves as agnostic or atheist. Humanists have no belief in an afterlife, and so they focus on seeking happiness in this life. They rely on science for the answers to questions such as creation, and base their moral and ethical decision-making on reason, empathy and compassion for others. [https://www.bbc.co.uk/bitesize]
For more information on Humanism and Kingman Freethinkers go to American Humanist Association: AHA https://americanhumanist.org; Humanist Society of Greater Phoenix https://hsgp.org; The Humanist Society; https://www.thehumanistsociety.org/; https://kingmanfreethinkers.org/
