# DISINVITED: Recovering From Religion and St. John's Pride

An episode of [TheThinkingAtheist](https://invisiblenetwork.ai/podcast/412308695), 17 Jul 2025, 17 min.

Audio: https://dts.podtrac.com/redirect.mp3/mgln.ai/e/711/api.spreaker.com/download/episode/67003199/podcast815_disinvitedrfr.mp3

RFR has been disinvited to participate as a vendor at the "in the park" event after the St. John's Pride parade Sunday July 20th. The reasons make no sense. blake@recoveringfromreligion.org St. John's Pride website Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/thethinkingatheist--3270347/support.

## Transcript

[0:05] Speaker 1: The Thinking Atheist. It's not a person, it's a symbol,
[0:09] Speaker 1: an idea.
[0:10] Speaker 2: The population of atheists this country is going through the.
[0:13] Speaker 1: Rule, rejecting faith, pursuing knowledge, challenging the sacred. If I
[0:19] Speaker 1: tell the truth, it's because I tell the truth, not
[0:22] Speaker 1: because I put my hand on a book and made
[0:24] Speaker 1: a wish and working together for a more rational world.
[0:29] Speaker 2: Take the risk of thinking. Feel so much more happiness. Truth,
[0:32] Speaker 2: Fusian wisdom will come to you that way.
[0:35] Speaker 1: Assume nothing, question everything, and start thinking. This is the
[0:43] Speaker 1: Thinking Atheist podcast hosted by Seth Andrews.
[0:56] Speaker 2: This is just a little short form broadcast of Bonus
[0:59] Speaker 2: this week. It's a conversation I just had on video
[1:02] Speaker 2: with Blake coll It recovering from Religion, and this is
[1:08] Speaker 2: kind of a timely thing about an event that is
[1:11] Speaker 2: happening in three days that RfR has been disinvited to.
[1:16] Speaker 2: So anyway, if you want to click the YouTube link
[1:19] Speaker 2: to watch that, as in the show notes, otherwise, here
[1:21] Speaker 2: we go. There is some controversy about an event that
[1:29] Speaker 2: is happening north of our border here in the United States,
[1:34] Speaker 2: and it has to do with a Pride event and
[1:36] Speaker 2: recovering from religion. One of my favorite organizations periods, and
[1:42] Speaker 2: certainly they have been pro LGBT, and yet they are
[1:46] Speaker 2: being denied access to a Pride event in Canada. I
[1:51] Speaker 2: want to get the details on that, so I'm talking
[1:53] Speaker 2: to Blake, call it an ambassador for FR. Blake, good
[1:58] Speaker 2: to see you, thanks for coming.
[2:00] Speaker 3: Thanks for having me on seth.
[2:01] Speaker 2: What's the name of the event in question.
[2:05] Speaker 3: It's the Saint John's Pride in the Park after the parade.
[2:09] Speaker 2: And OURFR wanted to participate in what capacity.
[2:13] Speaker 3: We wanted to be a participant in terms of have
[2:17] Speaker 3: a table set up as we have done at many
[2:19] Speaker 3: Pride events, to have a display, to give out pants
[2:23] Speaker 3: and brochures. As a nonprofit organization, we would be there
[2:27] Speaker 3: just more or less interacting with people based on a
[2:30] Speaker 3: nonprofit vendor.
[2:32] Speaker 2: So I've got an email that you have shown me.
[2:34] Speaker 2: Here an email of acceptance from the code chair of
[2:37] Speaker 2: the event. He said, thanks for reaching out, apologies for
[2:41] Speaker 2: the delay and getting back recovering from religion. Is welcome
[2:44] Speaker 2: to have a space at our Pride in the Park
[2:47] Speaker 2: celebrations after the parade. This seems like an enthusiastic welcome, Blake.
[2:54] Speaker 2: This was your initial response, right.
[2:57] Speaker 3: Yeah, we were very excited. We were welcomed. We immediately
[3:00] Speaker 3: thanked them for letting us attend. Then we immediately started
[3:05] Speaker 3: working in logistic details.
[3:08] Speaker 4: Yeah.
[3:08] Speaker 3: So I went back and told our told Darryl our doctor,
[3:11] Speaker 3: Daryl Ray, our president, we're very excited to have the
[3:14] Speaker 3: first presence ever in the province of up and Land
[3:16] Speaker 3: and Labrador.
[3:17] Speaker 2: So how long did this agreeable exchange go on? This
[3:20] Speaker 2: back and forth of emails in preparation.
[3:23] Speaker 3: The exchange went on for approximately one week, back and
[3:27] Speaker 3: forth saying, yep, you guys can show up the proper application,
[3:31] Speaker 3: which we did. They said, because you're a nonprofit organization,
[3:34] Speaker 3: there was no fee when you come in. You know.
[3:37] Speaker 3: They did ask that we co exist with the out
[3:40] Speaker 3: in Fate and l group, so we had discussions with them.
[3:43] Speaker 3: Everything went back and forth. Tell about June ninth. The
[3:46] Speaker 3: acceptance came on June second, and the final correspondence was
[3:50] Speaker 3: on June ninth.
[3:51] Speaker 2: I want to read from that email if I may.
[3:53] Speaker 2: It says, Hello, Blake, thank you for your interest in
[3:56] Speaker 2: participating as a vendor at Pride in the Park, your
[4:00] Speaker 2: thoughtful consideration and consultation with our board and broader community.
[4:06] Speaker 2: We have decided to respectfully withdraw our approval to participate
[4:11] Speaker 2: in this year's event as a vendor. While we appreciate
[4:14] Speaker 2: the important work you do, we did not find a
[4:17] Speaker 2: strong alignment with the focus of Pride in the Park,
[4:22] Speaker 2: particularly in regard to visible engagement with the two S
[4:27] Speaker 2: lgbt QI A plus community. That's a mouthful for me.
[4:31] Speaker 2: I just usually say lgbt Our event aims to center
[4:35] Speaker 2: and celebrate this community, and we carefully consider how each
[4:40] Speaker 2: vendor supports that mission. Forgive my ignorance, Blake, real fast.
[4:45] Speaker 2: Can you help me teach me what this means? Two
[4:48] Speaker 2: S l gbt Q I A plus. What do those mean?
[4:51] Speaker 3: Oh?
[4:52] Speaker 2: The acronym.
[4:52] Speaker 3: Yeah, so it's two spirit lesbian, gay trans I intersects
[5:04] Speaker 3: and plus cows all of the groups. So that's the acronym.
[5:08] Speaker 3: It's an expanded acronym. It used to be just LGBTQ plus,
[5:11] Speaker 3: but now they've been in by the two spirit.
[5:13] Speaker 2: All right, Well if I use lgbt we're good. I
[5:18] Speaker 2: will you assume the rest for me? Okay, for Breathabe's sake.
[5:21] Speaker 2: What was interesting is that the co chair did some
[5:25] Speaker 2: media after there was a public response by you did
[5:29] Speaker 2: you guys go to the press when it was over, like,
[5:30] Speaker 2: did you say, hey, if we're not invited to participate?
[5:34] Speaker 2: And I think Darryl Ray said that roughly a third
[5:37] Speaker 2: of r f r's leadership is LGBTQ. Is that right?
[5:43] Speaker 4: That is a fact?
[5:44] Speaker 3: Yep, about a third of our leadership and probably a
[5:48] Speaker 3: little less. We're not Suready exact numbers of our volunteers
[5:51] Speaker 3: identify as part of that community.
[5:53] Speaker 2: And as I understand it, according to Daryl, one of
[5:57] Speaker 2: the people on the board who may have uped to
[6:00] Speaker 2: your appearance and participation is himself a minister.
[6:05] Speaker 4: Is that right?
[6:07] Speaker 3: To my knowledge?
[6:08] Speaker 4: That is correct?
[6:10] Speaker 2: So we can intuit or we can infer maybe that
[6:16] Speaker 2: religious people are weird about a non religious organization being
[6:20] Speaker 2: in their midst You're not going after churches though, You're
[6:23] Speaker 2: not showing up and saying screw the rest of you guys.
[6:25] Speaker 2: You're not holding up banners that say all of this
[6:27] Speaker 2: mythology is stupid and superstition. It's not about any religious
[6:32] Speaker 2: criticism and RFI really doesn't do that anyway.
[6:34] Speaker 3: Right now. The mission of our ers to provide hope
[6:38] Speaker 3: and support for those people who have been harmed by
[6:41] Speaker 3: our religion or questioning their faith. So we have been
[6:44] Speaker 3: there for the two s LGBTQIA plus community for a
[6:48] Speaker 3: long time, since our beginning. One of our members has
[6:51] Speaker 3: attended thirty Pride events in thirty years. So no, we
[6:55] Speaker 3: don't go there. We're not there to debate. And in fact,
[6:57] Speaker 3: one of our mandates if somebody shows up and says, hey,
[7:01] Speaker 3: you know what do you guys believe in God or what,
[7:03] Speaker 3: we don't engage that. That's not what recovering from religions for.
[7:06] Speaker 3: We're here to provide helping support.
[7:08] Speaker 2: That's it. So then you told the organization if we're disinvited,
[7:13] Speaker 2: even though we are an advocate organization, we're disinvited, you
[7:17] Speaker 2: feel that you might have no choice but to go public.
[7:20] Speaker 2: Would that include talking to the press, etc. And did
[7:22] Speaker 2: they consider that a threat?
[7:25] Speaker 3: They did? At first the wording we used was we
[7:30] Speaker 3: may have to look to alternative methods to get answers
[7:32] Speaker 3: for our board. We were as gentle as possible because
[7:35] Speaker 3: we weren't getting a reply, and that prompted a reply,
[7:39] Speaker 3: and then Daryl came back.
[7:40] Speaker 2: With his reply from the email which was sent in
[7:44] Speaker 2: July the sixth. Dear Eddie the Coachair, this is doctor
[7:48] Speaker 2: Darryl Ray, president of the Board for Recovering from Religion International,
[7:53] Speaker 2: our Canadian volunteers, let me know of the Saint John's
[7:57] Speaker 2: Pride acceptance then rejection a month later. Looking over the correspondence,
[8:02] Speaker 2: I cannot but think some mistake has been made in
[8:05] Speaker 2: the research of your team. We are about as LGBTQ
[8:08] Speaker 2: allied as is humanly possible. We have several LGBTQ board members,
[8:13] Speaker 2: Several of our director level people are LGBTQ. We have
[8:17] Speaker 2: over five hundred volunteers worldwide, with around twenty percent or
[8:21] Speaker 2: more identifying as LGBTQ. We create hundreds of hours of content,
[8:26] Speaker 2: with around twenty five percent being directly related to issues
[8:30] Speaker 2: LGBTQ people face. Our resource library is full of curated
[8:35] Speaker 2: help for LGBTQ people all over the world. Now what
[8:39] Speaker 2: I find interesting, Blake, is that Eddie the co chair,
[8:42] Speaker 2: did a media interview himself. Is it a radio interview
[8:46] Speaker 2: that he gave, Yes.
[8:47] Speaker 3: It was a radio interview with VOSDM News.
[8:50] Speaker 2: And when he was talking about you, he said that
[8:54] Speaker 2: there was a concern that you had tokenized LGBTQPE.
[9:00] Speaker 4: The big thing here is is like this group isn't
[9:03] Speaker 4: part of our community, and at first we had looked
[9:05] Speaker 4: at it and we saw the application. We kind of
[9:07] Speaker 4: did a really high level outreach to members in the
[9:09] Speaker 4: community and said, you know, how do we feel about this?
[9:12] Speaker 4: And at first, at face value, people said, you know,
[9:14] Speaker 4: this shouldn't be a problem. And then we then there
[9:17] Speaker 4: was some concerns I got raised in the community about
[9:19] Speaker 4: how and this again just no no connection to our
[9:23] Speaker 4: local community. People were ensure what their motive was. There's
[9:29] Speaker 4: always a concern that queer people are tokenized in these
[9:32] Speaker 4: kinds and these kinds of groups and these kinds of movements,
[9:35] Speaker 4: so purely just said of an abundance of caution, we
[9:37] Speaker 4: had reached out to them and said, you know what,
[9:39] Speaker 4: we looked into the Zeber, we don't have an established
[9:43] Speaker 4: relationship with you folks, and what we and we said
[9:45] Speaker 4: to them, we said, your representatives are more than welcome
[9:48] Speaker 4: to attend and be part of Pride because as far
[9:51] Speaker 4: as as we understand it, they're local. The person that's
[9:53] Speaker 4: connected to them locally is a member of the kind
[9:56] Speaker 4: of the queer community, just not in Saint John's or
[9:58] Speaker 4: the Avalon. So we had said, you know, we still
[10:01] Speaker 4: encourage a person to attend and like they to take
[10:04] Speaker 4: in the festival and participate and kind of get some
[10:06] Speaker 4: time in community and if we can, we'll talk about
[10:09] Speaker 4: this in August and see what next year looks like.
[10:12] Speaker 4: And they did not like that response, and there was
[10:16] Speaker 4: an escalation protocol that got launched. City councilors were contacted
[10:23] Speaker 4: for comment on this, which why we don't understand. They
[10:28] Speaker 4: got very aggressive demanding to see our internal policies and
[10:32] Speaker 4: we were given timelines of when we had to respond
[10:34] Speaker 4: or things are being escalated. And I can understand people
[10:37] Speaker 4: being upset because Pride of fun time you want to
[10:40] Speaker 4: be a part of it. But just the way that
[10:43] Speaker 4: things have played out over the last couple of weeks
[10:45] Speaker 4: since we since we informed them and just ask them
[10:48] Speaker 4: to come and be in community, is really interesting and
[10:52] Speaker 4: it really speaks to an entitlement to access to our
[10:56] Speaker 4: community that some groups have and it's something that we
[10:58] Speaker 4: try to be really cognizant of and that we try
[11:01] Speaker 4: and navigate as best we can. And we're never going
[11:02] Speaker 4: to get at one hundred percent right, and we're covering
[11:04] Speaker 4: from religion. Maybe an apt group that should be at
[11:08] Speaker 4: that pride, But the big thing is that they're not
[11:11] Speaker 4: a part of our community and they don't have a
[11:13] Speaker 4: connection to our community, but there is a sense of
[11:16] Speaker 4: there is a sense of entitlement that that that they
[11:21] Speaker 4: should have access to our community. And the reality is
[11:24] Speaker 4: is that these are events that are put off by
[11:26] Speaker 4: Saint John's Pride, and first and foremost we try and
[11:29] Speaker 4: make sure that the community that we know are protected
[11:32] Speaker 4: and that they're going to have a good time. Not
[11:35] Speaker 4: to say that anything wouldn't have happened, but that it's
[11:37] Speaker 4: that missing it's that missing connection piece. So I think
[11:41] Speaker 4: that if we're covering from religion wants to participate in
[11:44] Speaker 4: future pride, that there's just some work that has to
[11:46] Speaker 4: happen between both organizations so that we know who they are,
[11:50] Speaker 4: we know that we know what they're about, and then
[11:53] Speaker 4: that can be future times. But I think if things
[11:56] Speaker 4: keep going the way that they are, it's it's going
[11:58] Speaker 4: to be hard for us to kind of build that
[12:01] Speaker 4: relationship in So the door isn't closed, no, And we
[12:06] Speaker 4: told them that, we were very very clear in our
[12:08] Speaker 4: email correspondents to them, look like, we encourage your members
[12:12] Speaker 4: to attend because they're queer. They're they're queer members in
[12:15] Speaker 4: Newfoundland and Labrador and if they're looking to fine community,
[12:18] Speaker 4: that's what we offer up. And we just told them
[12:20] Speaker 4: we're in the middle of our festival, we don't we
[12:22] Speaker 4: can't dedicate time towards this, but we'd be willing to speak,
[12:26] Speaker 4: to be willing to speak after the festival. And then
[12:28] Speaker 4: press releases started going out and we were accused of
[12:32] Speaker 4: only catering to faith groups, which for it. And that
[12:35] Speaker 4: was the other thing. Is anybody that's anybody that's in
[12:39] Speaker 4: organizing in pride, organizable pride organizing to be accused of
[12:43] Speaker 4: making a requirement to participate is that you have to
[12:46] Speaker 4: be a person of faith. That would not be a
[12:49] Speaker 4: very full Pride festival. And I think it's indicative and
[12:52] Speaker 4: how there's a little bit of a disconnect there between
[12:54] Speaker 4: their organization and what it is that pride too.
[12:57] Speaker 2: You would assure anybody and everybody who was and within
[13:01] Speaker 2: listening distance of that interview that LGBT people are not
[13:07] Speaker 2: tokenized within RfR, right.
[13:11] Speaker 3: They're not.
[13:12] Speaker 2: They're really not.
[13:13] Speaker 3: It's we don't. I mean, we're there to support them,
[13:17] Speaker 3: We provide we have a support group once a month,
[13:19] Speaker 3: which is huge. I've actually been a host in it.
[13:22] Speaker 3: We've got to bring an extra host because we have
[13:24] Speaker 3: so many, so many people show up, you know, we
[13:27] Speaker 3: take calls every day from people in that community. I
[13:32] Speaker 3: think that the furthest from tokenized as you can get.
[13:35] Speaker 2: So what's the goal now with the event which is
[13:38] Speaker 2: coming up in a few days. If they were to
[13:40] Speaker 2: invite you or reinvite you after disinviting you, after inviting you,
[13:45] Speaker 2: would you participate or is the goal now something else?
[13:50] Speaker 2: What are you trying to achieve with this publicity here?
[13:54] Speaker 3: One our goal is to be welcome. We will show up,
[13:59] Speaker 3: we will shake every body's hand. There will be no
[14:02] Speaker 3: ill will bygones be bygones. If that doesn't happen, we
[14:07] Speaker 3: will be going to the event and attempting to attend
[14:10] Speaker 3: in some capacity. I'm not sure. Where it's a public park,
[14:13] Speaker 3: it will be asked to leave given the nature of
[14:15] Speaker 3: the event that I'm not sure. But our goal in
[14:19] Speaker 3: this either way is to attend, and we really want
[14:21] Speaker 3: to attend as equals. That is our only goal here
[14:24] Speaker 3: to be included.
[14:27] Speaker 2: So Blake isn't going to be out there with the
[14:28] Speaker 2: big sign that says screw these guys trying to march
[14:33] Speaker 2: in the parade, that's not going to be your MO
[14:36] Speaker 2: That's not what's going to helpen No.
[14:38] Speaker 3: And I have lots of you know, family and friends
[14:40] Speaker 3: who are part of this community as well, so I
[14:42] Speaker 3: not only represent our air, I'm representing them as well.
[14:46] Speaker 2: How can we support you at this measure? Just getting
[14:48] Speaker 2: the word out that you were disinvited and that all
[14:51] Speaker 2: you want to do is be an advocate. I know
[14:53] Speaker 2: we want to promote secular humanist values and talk about
[14:56] Speaker 2: how we are advocates and agents of good. Beyond that,
[15:00] Speaker 2: is there anything we can do for you?
[15:03] Speaker 3: I think reaching out to not not in a protest manner,
[15:08] Speaker 3: but reaching out to you know, Saint John's Pride in
[15:11] Speaker 3: a manner to ask we feel these this group should
[15:14] Speaker 3: be included. Pride is about equity, diversity, and inclusion, so
[15:17] Speaker 3: include us. What we don't want is anybody calling up
[15:20] Speaker 3: in any kind of militant fashion or any kind of anger.
[15:24] Speaker 3: We want to do this right. We've We've conducted ourselves
[15:26] Speaker 3: with professionalism, you know, and I've had the very fortunate
[15:30] Speaker 3: task of working under doctor Daryl Ray who has been phenomenal,
[15:33] Speaker 3: and we want to continue to build the reputation and
[15:38] Speaker 3: you know, support us call Saint John's Pride pop Us.
[15:43] Speaker 3: You know some we're actually accepting some things on our
[15:45] Speaker 3: social media from people who have been helped by recovering
[15:49] Speaker 3: from religion. So anything like that just we asked, not
[15:53] Speaker 3: in a militant fashion. The deal, the idea here is
[15:55] Speaker 3: to get acceptance in this.
[15:57] Speaker 2: We just want to see it at the table, just
[16:00] Speaker 2: on a fair and equal seat at the table, to
[16:05] Speaker 2: fight for a worthy cause. Blake, call it ambassador for
[16:09] Speaker 2: recovering from religion. All AA, accumulate some links, throw those
[16:14] Speaker 2: in the description box, and we'll keep an eye on
[16:17] Speaker 2: your story and let us know if anything else happens.
[16:19] Speaker 3: Okay, brother, thanks Seth, greatly appreciate your talk.
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