About Us
What is the Secular Alliance of IU?
The Secular Alliance is a group on the IU Bloomington campus for secularists. Secularists may include atheists, agnostics, freethinkers, humanists, skeptics, and those with other self-described secular world views.
For more information about secularism, continue to the Understanding page.
What does the SAIU do?
A lot. We have regular, weekly meetings which include discussion, movie screenings, and community service.
Sundays @ 8pm – Russell’s Tea Parties: These are the group’s weekly discussion meetings, where we talk about anything from secular ethics to the Bible to alternative medicine. (The location changes week to week, so check our events page to find us this week!)
Thursdays @ 8pm – Movie Nights: We get together to watch movies related to science, reason, atheism, or religion. (Normally in Student Building room 150, but check our calendar to make sure you find us.)
Sundays @ 2pm – Community Service: We are currently collaborating with two local charities, Pages to Prisoners and Mother Hubbard’s Cupboard. We switch between the two organizations on different weeks, so be sure to check our events page to find out how to get involved this week!
In addition to weekly events, we often bring speakers to the IU campus for public lectures and debates—we have hosted Richard Dawkins, author of “The Selfish Gene” and “The God Delusion,” as well as other speakers including John Loftus (author of “Why I Became a Christian”), Eddie Tabash (constitutional lawyer and member of CFI), and Annie Laurie Gaylor (Co-president of Freedom From Religion Foundation).
We have also been involved with the Indiana Atheist Bus Campaign, a group which has put ads saying “You can be good without God” on buses in Bloomington and other places around Indiana.
We occasionally take group field trips to places that pique our interest. Last year, we went to the Creation Museum, a “museum” advocating creationism and intelligent design, and made a video of our adventure. We also took a trip to the Stone Age Institute, and were given a private tour of this center for the study of early human technology.
We are always looking for more ways to serve our members, so if you have ideas for events you think would be interesting or fun, contact us and let us know!
Who is allowed to join SAIU?
Most of our members tend to be secular students at IU, but anyone from IU Bloomington is welcome to join, be they faculty, staff, or student, young or old, secular or religious. We will be friendly and welcoming to religious people, and we invite you to come and ask questions and get involved with our discussions. If you’re shy about going to meetings or just don’t have time, you’re welcome to post on our forum, too! There’s even a special section called “Ask an atheist/secularist.”
How do I get a t-shirt?
A t-shirt design is posted under the resources section of our website. T-shirts can be order by emailing Sarah Kaiser, the president of the group, with your size. The price is $16, part of which goes towards donations to the group which pay for activities, food, and other group-related items and help with our goals of strengthening IU’s secular community, educating the public about secularism, providing service to Bloomington and IU, and supporting the values of separation of church and state. If any of our causes interest you, you are welcome to donate to the group (see the button on the sidebar!).
