Best Blasphemy Awards Announced
Center for Inquiry declares 'Faith is
no reason' the winner. 
The Center for Inquiry (CFI) is pleased to announce that Ken Peters of California is the Grand Prize winner of its Blasphemy Contest, which asked contestants to submit statements of no more than twenty words critical of religious beliefs. The entry Mr. Peters submitted was: “Faith is no reason.”
In announcing the award, CFI president and CEO Ronald A. Lindsay said “This entry, using only four words, summarizes nicely one of the key principles of post-Enlightenment thought. Beliefs should be based on evidence and reason. Faith is not a basis for logically sound belief.”
When CFI decided in September to hold a contest in conjunction with its commemoration of International Blasphemy Day, it generated a firestorm of controversy. Some observers claimed that CFI was soliciting hate speech, and they likened CFI to Nazis publishing anti-Semitic attacks.
CFI rejected those mischaracterizations then and continues to reject them now. “In holding a blasphemy contest, we wished to underscore our position that religious beliefs are subject to examination and criticism, just like other beliefs,” said Lindsay. “Sometimes that criticism may take the form of a scholarly essay; sometimes the criticism may take the form of a pithy, pointed remark. Both are appropriate forms of free expression.”
CFI emphasized it wanted clever, concise statements that might capture some of the flaws of religious beliefs. CFI was not interested in crude attacks on believers. CFI was not disappointed in the entries—either in their quality overall or their quantity. Approximately 650 contestants submitted over a thousand entries (contestants could submit two entries).
In addition to the Grand Prize winner, there were four other winners. Their entries were:
All
top five winners will receive a CFI T-shirt with their submission imprinted on
the shirt. Ken Peters, the Grand Prize winner, will also receive
a coffee mug with his slogan and he will be officially
recognized in a forthcoming issue of Free Inquiry, the magazine published by
CFI’s affiliate, the Council for Secular Humanism.
The contest judges also decided that ten other entries,
including a couple of limericks, would receive “honorable
mention.” Those entries, and further information about the
contest, can be found at the official announcement on CFI’s Web site.
The Blasphemy Contest was one component of CFI’s
continuing Campaign for Free Expression. Another ongoing
contest that is also part of the Campaign is the Free Expression essay contest ($2,000 Grand
Prize).
CFI thanks everyone who took the time to submit an entry. Your participation helped make the contest a success.
CFI SUMMIT
OCTOBER 24-27 2013
TACOMA, WASHINGTON
Joint Conference of the Council for Secular Humanism, Center for Inquiry, and Committee for Skeptical Inquiry
The transnational secular humanist magazine
Renew your FREE INQUIRY subscription