What We Do:

Frances Parker was born on January 9, 1968 in Baltimore, Maryland.  Born Catholic, she was adopted at the age of three and was raised as a Christian Fundamentalist.

After many negative experiences and her questioning of doctrine, which culminated in her ex-communication in 1992, she slowly began to question and probe the concepts of God, hell and salvation.  She encountered the PBS series of Joseph Campbell's 'The Power of Myth' which slowly began to open to her the possibility that, like the ancient Greeks, the modern western world had created mythology, and turned it into Christianity.  She began reading Baron d'Holbach, Bertrand Russell, Thomas Paine, Voltaire and modern writers such as John Shelby Spong and Karen Armstrong.  It dawned on her that the majority of Christianity was mythology and fable, and she became an atheist in 1997.

She began her career with the federal government, at the Pentagon.  She has been a librarian for four years, first at the Library of Congress, and then on to the Federal Trade Commission and the Environmental Protection Agency, where she is now employed as a Public Information Technician.

Frances began studying Philosophy at the Catholic Univesity of America in Washington, DC.  She intends to transfer to the University of Maryland where she will complete her degree.  Her first novel, 'Bad Faith' will be published by iUniverse in May of 2001.  It tells the story of a Black clergyman who clashes with his identity as a Christian and a man of God.  She writes a monthly column at the Themestream website, under the category of Atheism. 

African-American Atheism and the Appeal to Culture
Author: Frances Parker, Subject: Christianity, Logic, Politics, Self Esteem, Sociology, American Culture, Type: Informal, Size: 7 K, Date: 2001-3-10