jamesabrazeal

First week of the year

Only a few days into 2026 and we have been busy already. Many of us attended various hikes on January first. I myself went on 2. One was the Sunrise hike hosted by Ryan of  the local RfR group. Ryan has been doing this sunrise hike for over 27 years at various places he has lived in since he was a Marine serving in Japan. I myself have only joined him for the last 2 years but it is a fun and sentimental way to welcome in the new year, by seeing the first rays of light break through.

Starting at 1 a few of the FFRF members joined together to enjoy the 1st day hike sponsored by Hobbs. There was roughly 275 people who was part of this celebration to start of the year.

First Day Hikes | Arkansas State Parks https://share.google/hNFHshSijGm5FtgGb

On January 3rd LaDonna and I went to Little Rock to take down the Bill of Rights Display. It is home safe and sound and secured away for the season.

We have a few more events coming up right around the corner. Please come by and join us for these and many more to come in 2026.

January 11th (Sunday) – 10:00am to 11:00am

Secular Sunday Meetup – we will be holding our first General Meeting of 2026 at the Meteor Cafe (401 SE D St, Bentonville, AR 72712).

January 24th (Saturday) – 10:00am to 1:00pm

NWA Women’s Shelter Thrift Store – volunteer opportunity at the Thrift Store, supporting the NWA Women’s Shelter.  Consists of sorting clothes and light cleaning. 

jamesabrazeal

2025 Charitable Contributions

I wanted to share that we have distributed the FFRF Grant to the following organizations:

$350 was awarded to KUAF, the public radio station and NPR affiliate for northwest Arkansas, the Arkansas River Valley, eastern Oklahoma and southwestern Missouri, whose mission is to be a leader in public media, serving our audience with programs that challenge, entertain, educate and inform.  Our members appreciate this resource, and in light of funding cuts to public radio stations, our group decided to increase our charitable contribution from $250 in 2024 to $350 in 2025 (No picture).

$350 was awarded to the Northwest Arkansas Women’s Shelter, whose mission is to provide shelter and support at any hour for those affected by domestic violence in our community.  Our members volunteer annually at the NWAWS Thrift Store, and we are happy to contribute to the important work they do. 

Pictured with Chris Sweeny is Community Education & Engagement Director, Rachael Schmidt [holding check], and Director of Operations, Vanessa Harper


For the first time, the Ozarks Chapter of FFRF awarded $300 to the OMNI Center to support their mission to educate, empower, and connect people to build a non-violent, sustainable, and just world.  This organization has many parallels with FFRF and we are excited to partner with the OMNI Center!  

Chris Sweeny pictured with Gladys Tiffany, Director of the OMNI Center)

Finally, on a side note, our group was able to install the “Bill of Rights” Nativity Display at the Capitol in Little Rock, AR, earlier this month.  LaDonnan and I will take it down on Saturday Jan 3rd.

Let’s have a few fun hike on New Years day. See events.

jamesabrazeal

Seasonal Festivities – Festivus, Solstice, and Yule

As we come to the years end often people sometimes ask what secular people (agnostic and atheist) do for the the holiday season. The answer to this questions varies quite a lot and FFRF did a poll and discussed this here (link) in detail.

As for me and many members of our local chapter, it is about coming together as a community, be it with your family or just your friends. Part of my yearly ritual this time of year, start by helping set up the FFRF and ASL display in Little Rock. See earlier post here.

Often I find the next best way for me to celebrate is to enjoy the Winter Solstice, as the days return to start to get longer and longer. For me this year that started with out local chapter meeting on Dec 21st in Fayetteville, for our Solstice Secular Sunday meeting in the morning. It was part business meeting part social gathering – meeting notes here.

I then got to hang out with some other secular friends at Trailmix Solstice event in the evening in Bentonville.

Finally I celebrated Festivus with Chip at Flavors in Bentonville. This event is a way to bring multiple communities together to socialize and share a greater sense of community. This was the 2nd annual Festivus event. It had many different groups. FFRF, Trailmix, Juggling group, Vegan community, and the NWA Freethought members, all got along and had a great time. There was a Festivus pole, airing of grievances, and feats of strength. As well as great food, beverages, and delightful conversation.

Pagans and Solstice is the real reason for the season and celebration. Both Yule and Saturnalia are traditional festivities which precedes the traditionally ideas of Christmas. Below are a few links one from FFRF and one from the History Channel that discusses some of these historical festivities and details.

https://www.history.com/articles/saturnalia

Heathens Greetings – If interested you can buy these tracks from FFRF. https://ffrf.org/product/heathens-greetings/

As we wrap up the year, we look forward to 2026. We will kick off the new year with several events. These will include multiple walk/hike options on New Years day. I plan to do 2 of them. If you are interested please join the Charity Miles team (link), it helps me keep motivated, and generates money for a charity of your choosing. On the Jan 11th in Bentonville we will have our first business meeting of 2026. We will have yearly charitable activity kick off on Jan 24th in Rogers.

I hope you and yours all have a wonderful holiday season however you celebrate.

Merry Yule and Happy Solstice!!!

jamesabrazeal

Congratulations to our local Chapter for being randomly selected as the Underwriting recipient from KUAF.

We all know and respect our local NPR station KUAF. Many of us listen daily, many of us are contributors as individuals. This is one of the reasons our local chapter has chose to give to KUAF as part of our charitable contribution the last 2 years running. 

Last Tuesday (Dec 2nd) KUAF decided to give back to the community to one nominated non profit. Nominate your favorite nonprofit for KUAF’s Giving Tuesday giveaway! https://share.google/fPtW7Upi7ZRWYl0yU

Great news – our organization was nominated for the KUAF Giving Tuesday nonprofit underwriting giveaway and was randomly selected. The Arkansas Chapter of Freedom From Religion Foundation! We will receive $1,000 worth of underwriting messages on KUAF over the next 12 months. Which will reach approximately 75,000 listeners across Northwest Arkansas, the Arkansas River Valley, eastern Oklahoma, and southwest Missouri.

The plan is to use this advertising to spread the word of out local Chapter and our upcoming 2026 Speaker Series. 

Please consider donating to KUAF if you have means. Support KUAF 91.3 FM https://share.google/2kuHXE5xCJ8W7MpQE

jamesabrazeal

Little Rock Trip and Displays Up

This weekend has been rather fantastic for our local chapter. Shortly I will make another post regarding the good news we got from KUAF. 

But for now let me discuss the trip that 4 of our members took yesterday [Saturday Dec. 6th] from NWA to the state Capital in Little Rock. George, Gail, Ladonna and I (James) all started our trip at 8AM to get to the capital by 11ish. It was a foggy morning drive.  

The plan was to meet up with another secular group – Arkansas Society of Freethinkers, and both set up our respective displays on the South lawn of the Capital. The FFRF Bill of Right nativity display and the ASF Winter Solstice Display was set up quickly. 

After we set up the dispay we met up at a local eatary – Blackberry Market Agrenta. It was good food but a bit crowded. We had a good chat with Chris and discussed how the year went for each group and plans for 2026. It was a really great day with great friends. 

Special thanks to the following people for various steps in making this possible.

Storage and Transportation of Display: Ladonna Powell

Acquiring display from FFRF: Chris Sweeny 

Purchasing of needed hardware:

Solar Lights – Ruth Stanfield

Post Driver –George Naidl 

Filling put Paperwork and getting state approval: Chris Sweeny 

Installation: George, Gail, Ladonna, and James

These displays will be up until Jan 3rd weekend. So if you are in the area and take a picture please post your pictures to Facebook Facebook Iconor Discord Community Discord Icon. Alternatively email any pictures to Email Email Icon (ozarksffrf@gmail.com) and we will add here on website. 

jamesabrazeal

Happy Thanksgiving!

Happy Thanksgiving to you and yours.

I know this year there have been many times and events that may have had us feel discouraged and sometimes overwhelmed.

Know that you are not alone, that there are many secular people and communities in the area. The local FFRF chapter has been focused on bringing the local secular community together.

I am very grateful and thankful for the community and the friendships I have built. I am thankful that our local chapter continues to grow and help the community. We have many more activities planned for 2026.

jamesabrazeal

Speaker Series – Forest Valkai from Fayetteville Library

On July 13th we had Forrest Valkai (YouTube: Renegade Science Teacher) speak as part of our 2025 Secular Speaker Series. He spoke at the Fayetteville Library at 1pm.   Forrest presentation was on “How Learning Science Makes You A Better Person”.  This event was FREE and open to the public, but seating had limited. We were able to get the recording and I have been able to link it here for your viewing pleasure. Allowing any who missed it live to enjoy it now or revisit it.

jamesabrazeal

We had a great year.

Our local chapter of FFRF has been very active in the community this year, from Fayetteville Farmers Markets tableting events, Pride events (in both Fayetteville and Ft. Smith), No Kings Days march, as well as our fantastic 2025 Speaker Series. We had 4 great speakers, Kate Cohen, Forest Valkai, Mickey Dollens, and Alessandro Terenzoni (Americans United). The year is not quite over yet. We plan to again put up the Bill of Right display at Little Rock.

At todays meeting (11/23/25) we reviewed the years activities, things we felt were accomplishments, and areas where we hope to improve next year. We discussed what we still want to accomplish before the end of the year. We also organized some preliminary plans for 2026.

Please join the Facebook and discord to fully engage with the community.

Last Thursday several of the members was able to attend the “learn in” at the University of Arkanasas, where Professor Caldwell discussed his first hand experience with Arkansas 573. Stephen spoke passionately about protecting his son, and working with ACLU and FFRF in fighting this battle.

Derek

Welcome to FFRF of the Ozarks new website!

We are so excited to debut our new website to all of you today! More content will be coming soon, but please take a look around! We’ve got Blog posts, Contact Info, Links to more great sites, and an About page to well…learn more about us

Soon we will have Event listings, Meeting Minutes, and more!

Your Friendly Neighborhood Site Editor,

-Derek

Derek

March 1st Event – Amanda Tyler: Christian Nationalism and the Threat to American Democracy

Join us Saturday March 1st for a free reception and lecture about the threat of Christian Nationalism to American Democracy by award-winning speaker Amanda Tyler! Amanda Tyler is executive director of Baptist Joint Committee for Religious Liberty (the BJC) where she leads the organization in upholding the historic Baptist principle of religious liberty: defending the free exercise of religion and protecting against its establishment by government.