Welcome to the Grand Traverse Humanists. If you value science, reason, and compassion and believe that humans are responsible for their own destiny, you have come to the right place. We are a community for the non-religious in the Grand Traverse area, offering a forum for discussing and advancing a secular worldview based on our common humanity. Our programs include monthly speakers and discussions, film and book groups, and various volunteer and social events. All are free and open to the public. Check out Upcoming Events below, or click on the calendar. Nontheists, agnostics, atheists, freethinkers, rationalists, humanists, and more…we welcome you to join us!
Upcoming Events
- Humanists Book Club: All the Light We Cannot See
Sunday, March 19, 4 p.m.
Home of Richard and Lin Foa
1415 Lake Dr., Traverse City
The next book selection for the Grand Traverse Humanists Book Club will be Anthony Doerr’s Pulitzer Prize-winning novel, “All the Light We Cannot See.” We’ll meet at the home of Richard and Lin Foa; email rfoa70@gmail.com to RSVP. A potluck dish to pass is welcomed but not required.
Description from Amazon:“Marie-Laure lives in Paris near the Museum of Natural History, where her father works. When she is twelve, the Nazis occupy Paris and father and daughter flee to the walled citadel of Saint-Malo, where Marie-Laure’s reclusive great uncle lives in a tall house by the sea. With them they carry what might be the museum’s most valuable and dangerous jewel.
In a mining town in Germany, Werner Pfennig, an orphan, grows up with his younger sister, enchanted by a crude radio they find that brings them news and stories from places they have never seen or imagined. Werner becomes an expert at building and fixing these crucial new instruments and is enlisted to use his talent to track down the resistance. Deftly interweaving the lives of Marie-Laure and Werner, Doerr illuminates the ways, against all odds, people try to be good to one another.
Doerr’s “stunning sense of physical detail and gorgeous metaphors” (San Francisco Chronicle) are dazzling. Ten years in the writing, a National Book Award finalist, All the Light We Cannot See is a magnificent, deeply moving novel from a writer “whose sentences never fail to thrill” (Los Angeles Times).”
- G.T. Humanists Meeting: The Hermit of Grand Traverse Bay
Monday, January 9, 6 p.m.
Traverse Area District Library
610 Woodmere Ave., Traverse City
Join the Grand Traverse Humanists in welcoming Jordan Owen, TC historian and storyteller, for a program called “The Mostly True Legend of Dick Bassett: Celebrity Hermit of Grand Traverse Bay.”
- G.T. Humanists Meeting: Climate Change and its Impact on the Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore
Monday, December 12, 6 p.m.
Traverse Area District Library
610 Woodmere Ave., Traverse City
Join us for a discussion led by park ranger and naturalist David Fenlon of how climate change is impacting Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore.
- G.T. Humanists Meeting: The Endangered Monarch Butterfly
Monday, November 14, 6 p.m.
Traverse Area District Library
610 Woodmere Ave., Traverse City
Join the Grand Traverse Humanists for a discussion about the monarch butterfly with guest Cyndie Roach, curator for the G.T. Butterfly House & Bug Zoo in Williamsburg.Cyndie Roach is degreed in both Business and Zoology and has worked with both exotic and native butterflies for a decade. She will discuss the monarch’s lifecycle, migration, Eastern vs Western populations, and why the International Union for Conservation of Nature declared the monarch an endangered species. She’ll provide answers about why they are disappearing and include ways to help the monarch butterfly rebound.
- G.T. Humanists Book Club: Starry Messenger
Sunday, November 13, 4 p.m.
4813 N Indian Lake Rd.
Traverse City, MI
Grand Traverse Humanists will gather to discuss Neil deGrasse Tyson’s book “Starry Messenger: Cosmic Perspectives on Civilization.” The book is available for a discount at Horizon Books in Traverse City. To RSVP, please text Scott at 231-313-7214.Description from Amazon.com: “Bringing his cosmic perspective to civilization on Earth, Neil deGrasse Tyson shines new light on the crucial fault lines of our time―war, politics, religion, truth, beauty, gender, and race―in a way that stimulates a deeper sense of unity for us all.
In a time when our political and cultural views feel more polarized than ever, Tyson provides a much-needed antidote to so much of what divides us, while making a passionate case for the twin chariots of enlightenment―a cosmic perspective and the rationality of science.
After thinking deeply about how science sees the world and about Earth as a planet, the human brain has the capacity to reset and recalibrates life’s priorities, shaping the actions we might take in response. No outlook on culture, society, or civilization remains untouched.
With crystalline prose, Starry Messenger walks us through the scientific palette that sees and paints the world differently. From insights on resolving global conflict to reminders of how precious it is to be alive, Tyson reveals, with warmth and eloquence, an array of brilliant and beautiful truths that apply to us all, informed and enlightened by knowledge of our place in the universe.”
- Hungry Humanists: Red Mesa
Monday, November 28, 6 p.m.
1544 US-31 N, Traverse City
Grand Traverse Humanists will gather at Red Mesa Grill in Traverse City for dinner and conversation.
Please RSVP by texting Mark at 231-392-1215.
