 In 1968, on Christmas Eve, the astronauts completing a loop around the moon and coming to see the earth before them were overcome by a 'spontaneous manifestation of religious awe' and began to read the King James version of the Holy Bible and to pray. Many people were stunned by that -- and the American Atheist community was much concerned. [We learned that the] Bible readings and the prayers were printed in the flight plan [and were] carefully pre-planned for many weeks. ... [We] found out that the entire prayer business had been carefully pre-planned for months ahead in Washington, DC [and] had even been code named 'Experiment P-1'. ... We decided to take it to court for it was obviously government sponsoring of religion. ... No scientist, no civil liberties organization, no university, no Humanist, Ethical Culturalist, Rationalist, or Secularist supported us in any action. The single person to come out publicly to sustain our position was Ayn Rand.
Madalyn Murray O'Hair
From the October 1970 issue of the Society of Separationists Newsletter, reprinted in the April 2004 issue of American Atheists Newsletter
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