All Voices Reading Room is a wonderful place in downtown Winchester. Located on the third floor of the McEldowney Building at 5 Cleveland Avenue, AVRR houses a library of over 1,000 books, many of which aren’t available in school or public libraries.
Why is that? Many libraries are hesitant to offer books that have been “banned” by certain groups or are highly controversial. AVVR has an extensive collection of books on LGBTQ+ issues, women’s issues, spirituality, mental health, young adult fiction, African American studies, Appalachian studies, religions and philosophies other than the dominant evangelical fundamentalist interpretation of Christianity, and more.
The facility also offers for sale works of art created by members of minority and marginalized communities.
Folks come to visit and enjoy the cozy, safe space where they can read books at their leisure. They can also check out books and keep them for up to a month. It’s a wonderful project, one that aligns perfectly with the ideals of Humanism, which is why we have made a major contribution to All Voices Reading Room.
Thanks to the generosity of one of our members, we recently donated $500 to the organization. In addition, we partnered with WinCity Voices to donate 22 books—including three children’s books—to their spirituality collection.
The books were either purchased by WinCity Voices or donated by our own members from their personal libraries. They include the following.
- In Defense of Secular Humanism
- The Ten Commitments: Essays for Religious Humanists
- Deconverted: A Journey from Religion to Reason
- Good Without God: What a Billion Nonreligious People Do Believe – The Positive Humanist Alternative to New Atheism
- The God Argument: The Case Against Religion and for Humanism
- The Skeptics’ Guide to the Universe
- Heaven and Hell: A History of the Afterlife
- Jen Hancock’s Handy Humanism Handbook
- The Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark
- Behaving Decently: Kurt Vonnegut’s Humanism
- Misquoting Jesus: The Story Behind Who Changed the Bible and Why
- The Age of Reason
- Star Stuff: Carl Sagan and the Mysteries of the Cosmos (Children)
- Why I Am Not a Christian and What I Believe
- Atheism for Children (Children)
- Humanism from the Heart: Building Bridges Beyond Belief
- You’re Not Going to Hell: Growing up Without God & Living Without Fear (Children)
- Godless: How an Evangelical Preacher Became One of America’s Leading Atheists
- The Evolution of God
- Sacred Cows: Lighthearted Look at Belief and Tradition Around the World
- Creationism’s Trojan Horse: The Wedge of Intelligent Design
- Fundamentals of Extremism: The Christian Right in America
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