The night of Richard Dawkins’ March 4 lecture at the University of Minnesota was quiet. There were no militant Christians with picket signs, no Evangelicals looking for a mass-conversion; even campus’s staple evangelist, Brother Jed, was absent.

Also suspiciously absent were the soul-less, vacant-eyed God-haters that atheists are known to be, as well as the corresponding lightning bolts that God traditionally uses to strike them down.

Dawkins himself appeared to be nothing but a British man, which must have disappointed those eager for the opportunity to look pure evil in the eye.

Dawkins’ lecture, “The Purpose of Purpose,” argued that humans evolved the capacity to develop “neo-purposes” —goals not associated with procreation. He said that these neo-purposes are flexible, so, for example, an instinct for kinship can be subverted into fidelity to the military or a political party or religion.

It’s the religion bit that leaves some people put off. Titles like “The God Delusion” and “The Root of All Evil?” argue that the world would be a better place without religion and that all evidence suggests that there is no God. In both, Dawkins pointedly shoots down anyone willing to argue with him.

For Campus Athiests & Skeptical Humanists (CASH), formed as the United States’ first campus atheist group in 1991, this creates a challenging contradiction. The first goal listed on the group’s web site is “Community – End the isolation experienced by nontheists by fostering a socially and intellectually engaging community.” So is such a polarizing figure a good representative for a group that wants to end isolation?

Least accepted minority
According to a 2006 study by the sociology department’s American Mosaic Project, atheists are the least accepted minority in the country – beating Muslims, gays and conservative Christians.
CASH board members Lauren Hayden, Kalyn Williams and Ryan Schmidt said they’ve been confronted with a number of stereotypes about what it means to be an atheist.

“They’ll be like, ‘Oh, so that means that you hate god.’ Or that you think religious people should be put to death or that religion should be abolished,” says Schmidt.

“‘You eat babies!’” Williams added. “I love getting the question, ‘Where do you get your morals from?’”

“I try to turn that around on them,” Schmidt says. “I’m like, ‘Really? So the only reason you choose to be good to people is because it told you to be good and that’s it?’”

Stereotypes like those make fostering understanding particularly important to the group. Besides events, CASH promotes this goal through working with other groups who may not have similar views, including Cru (formerly Campus Crusade for Christ).

Antagonistic atheists
Atheists aren’t exactly known for being meek bystanders, though.

The U of M’s own PZ Myers, an associate professor of biology at the Morris campus and the faculty advisor for CASH, writes the well-known blog Pharyngula, in which he combines science tidbits with witty diatribes about the foolishness of religion.

In July 2008, he punctured a Eucharist, the Catholic representation of Christ’s body, with a rusty nail, posting a picture of the mutilated cracker jumbled with a page of the Quran, a page of “The God delusion,” a banana peel and some coffee grounds. The act was followed by death threats and a demand from the Catholic League that Myers be fired.

CASH advertising director Hannah Holdt was not amused, “I think he crossed a line and it turned into mockery,” she says.

“I think as an atheist the worst thing you can do is antagonize people,” Hayden says. But she did not go so far as to condemn Dawkins or Myers. “While his approach alienates a lot of people, I think it can give strength and inspiration to atheists who are struggling to find their place.”

“What people like me and Dawkins are accomplishing is that it is making people aware that there’s nothing to be ashamed of,” Myers says. “For years the standard policy has been sit down and shut up.”

Puncturing pomposity
Roll model or polarizer, no one can argue that Dawkins knows how to fill a room. CASH sold 3,100 tickets, making the event one of the largest ever planned by a student group.

The last time Dawkins was in town, Myers was forcibly removed from the premier of the pro-intelligent design movie “Expelled!” at the Mall of America. The irony of the title did not go unnoticed, nor did the fact that the person next to him in line –Dawkins – was not removed.

“I thoroughly enjoyed it!” Dawkins says. “He has a great sense of humor. I enjoy puncturing pomposity and offending where there is no real offense to be taken.”