The Freedom From Religion Foundation celebrated the Winter Solstice in Shelton, Conn., thanks to a volunteer who puts up the annual solstice sign.

Over the weekend, FFRF member Jerome Bloom (pictured) erected FFRF’s annual Winter Solstice placard in Huntington Green park. It reads:
At this season of the Winter Solstice,
Let reason prevail.
There are no gods, no devils, no angels, no heaven or hell. There is only our natural world. Religion is but myth & superstition that hardens hearts & enslaves minds.

FFRF is pleased to see the banner return to the park for another year, a “ritual” that began in 2016. FFRF and Bloom filed a lawsuit against the city of Shelton and its mayor after the city denied the initial request to put up the solstice sign. The case resulted in a victory for the freethinking viewpoint to be permitted alongside all the other winter displays.

FFRF points out that the Winter Solstice, which occurred on Sunday, Dec. 21, is “the real reason for the season” and was celebrated for millennia in the Northern hemisphere with festivals of light, evergreen decorations, feasts and gift exchanges, long before Christians crashed the party.

“FFRF is glad to see a tradition continued, especially after the hard work we put in nearly a decade ago to ensure that all viewpoints are allowed space in the park,” FFRF Co-President Annie Laurie Gaylor says. “We rejoice that freethinkers in Shelton, Conn., are allowed the chance to celebrate in public just as folks with religious perspectives are.”

Almost a third, 31 percent, of Connecticut residents are “atheist, agnostic or nothing in particular,” slightly higher than the national average of the religiously unaffiliated at 29 percent.

FFRF thanks Bloom for his continued dedication to setting up the Solstice banner — ensuring there’s space in a Connecticut town for the secular viewpoint.

The Freedom From Religion Foundation is the largest national association of freethinkers (atheists and agnostics) with almost 42,000 members all over the country, including more than 500 members in Connecticut. The organization works to protect the constitutional separation between religion and government.

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