AMES, Iowa -- As the stigma of atheism has diminished, campus atheists and agnostics are coming out of the closet and fueling a sharp rise in student clubs.
Campus affiliates of the Columbus, Ohio-based Secular Student Alliance, a sort of Godless Campus Crusade for Christ, have multiplied from 80 in 2007 to 100 in 2008 and 174 this fall.
The growth is providing the atheist movement new training grounds for future leaders.
In another sign of growing acceptance, at least three universities, including Harvard, now have humanist chaplains meeting the needs of the not-so-spiritual. With the growth has come soul-searching - or the atheist equivalent - about what secular campus groups should look like.
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