Edward Tabash

When we are steeped in promoting controversial ideas that shouldn’t be controversial in an educated society, it’s rare that a colleague comes along who is a true polymath. It’s so unusual to find someone with such a large repertoire of skills that we come to rely on such a person for literally everything. This was Tom Flynn. In terms of ability, Tom was an indispensable leader in the development and dissemination of atheism/secular humanism.

Once we are identified as nonbelievers, we atheists are still the most unjustly despised minority in society. Tom confronted the challenge of trying to normalize atheism in a society that frequently so unfairly despises us. He had tremendous courage, a sharp wit, and a wonderful sense of humor. He had an indomitable drive to work toward achieving a nation and a world in which no one will attempt to deny equal rights to those of us who don’t believe in any supernatural being.

Tom was a classic civil libertarian. He never wanted non- believers to have greater legal rights than the religious. He just wanted to end the special legal privileging of religion so that all of us will be equal before the law.

Tom’s devotion to his work was ultimately sustained by his concern for civilization. He wanted everyone to be able to emerge from superstition into a new era of rational thinking.

Death, which Martin Luther King Jr. called the common denominator of all humanity, has deprived us of Tom’s presence. But death can never erase Tom’s magnificent work in the struggle to raise the world out of its intellectual infancy. In his memory, let us look across the darkness of the present bleak landscape of religious bigotry and irrational thought and try to discern, in the horizon, the vision of a better and more enlightened future.

Edward Tabash is a constitutional lawyer in Los Angeles and chair of the Center for Inquiry (CFI) Board of Directors.

Ronald A. Lindsay

“Secularly Yours” was Tom Flynn’s standard valediction in correspondence, including internal emails. And this was no formulaic closing. Tom meant what he said. He was a thoroughgoing secularist. He had no belief in, no need for, and no patience with anything that had a whiff of religiosity about it. For Tom, religion deserved no place in our natural world—to be more precise, it had no place in our natural world except as a deleterious mass delusion—and he dedicated himself tirelessly to the task of advocating for the truth of naturalism.

This unvarying adherence to secularism was sometimes interpreted as inflexibility. And that interpretation was sometimes correct. From purging Christmas and Santa Claus to supporting the enforcement of burkini bans, Tom took stances that occasionally put him at odds with unqualifiedly secular organizations, such as his own employer, CFI. But Tom had the good fortune of working for an organization that encouraged responsible dissent, and CFI had the good fortune of having a Tom Flynn, a gifted individual who could defend his positions vigorously, cogently, and responsibly.

In working with Tom for many years, one aspect of his character I found especially endearing was his sense of humor. Indeed, there’s one myth about atheists that Tom destroyed through his conduct every day of his life. Always ready with a quip or a groan-producing pun, Tom gave the lie to the claim that secularists are glum, unhappy individuals. Here, let Tom have the last word. In an email I still preserve, Tom said, “I genuinely view the world as [a] sort of senseless cacophony … and yet each day I get up and feel like singing.” We will not hear Tom’s song anymore, but we will not forget the music of his words and their enduring secular motifs.

Ronald A. Lindsay was CFI president and CEO from 2008–2016.

Bill Cooke

Tom Flynn is not someone who can be replaced. He was too particularly his own person for anyone else simply to step in and take over. With Tom’s life’s work properly appreciated, his successors can now forge new paths.

Tom is probably most widely known for his humbug role as Christmas-denier, but this is not his most important achievement. He combined a depth of conviction with a willingness to adapt that is key to all people who do well in an organization over many years. No less remarkable was his willingness to put in the shifts. Though clearly a senior figure at CFI, few people worked harder than he did. Tom led by example. His steadying influence was crucial in ensuring that CFI remained viable after the demise of Paul Kurtz. He wasn’t the only person who deserves credit here, but surely he is among the few whose role was essential. Tom’s other main achievements that truly stand out are keeping Free InquIry (FI) going as a credible voice of American humanism and his work editing The New Encyclopedia of Unbelief.

Everybody will remember Tom’s sense of humor. Only people with a record of achievement as impressive as Tom’s have the confidence to be as self-deprecating as he was.

And finally, I will always cherish his ability to peer over the parapet and look at what lies beyond the horizon. Though continually tied up with day-to-day deadlines and tasks, he maintained, as all good editors should, a broader vision of where the cause he devoted his life to was going and how to get there. Though quintessentially American, he realized there was a world beyond its shores.

Bill Cooke is senior editor at FI, author of A Wealth of Insights: Humanist Thought Since the Enlightenment, and former CFI international director.

Barry Karr

Can you possibly summarize an over thirty-five-year relationship with a few anecdotes and funny stories? Every time I think of a fond memory of Tom and jot it down, another, better one comes to mind.

How about my favorite: In the earlier days of working with Tom here at CFI, we would disagree on most things. Over the years, we found that we started to agree more and more (a fact that I am sure caused Tom more than a little consternation). One of the sayings around here was: “If Tom and I agree on something, we know one of us is wrong.” Another favorite: Tom would edit or “Flynnize” each and every fund-drive letter I wrote for the Committee for Skeptical Inquiry. One time, after I sent him an especially intense near-rant, Tom sent it back to me with his improvements, and off to the printer we went. A couple weeks later, we started getting back notes from our readers asking why the title below my name was “Excessive Director.” As a joke, Tom had changed the title to reflect his opinion of the contents of the letter, and no one caught the addition before it went out. Tom maintained it was just a function of the spellcheck.

No, this is my all-time favorite: For years, CFI has maintained a policy of unreserved parking spaces. But people are creatures of habit and tend to park in the same space every day. If I went out to lunch in the afternoon or had an appointment and Tom caught me out, almost without fail he would park in the space I had been in. This went on for years, even during the COVID-19 pandemic. Even if no one else was in the entire parking lot, if he caught me out, he would park in that spot. I never asked him why. I did not want to give him the satisfaction of knowing it bothered me even a bit. It had simply become funny.

No, it’s this one: If you want to see a side of Tom you’ve never seen before, ask me sometime about the “Alien probe” video Tom and I produced to help promote our CSICon conference in New Orleans. Tom ends up becoming the proud father of a miniature ET, and for some reason, it seems the video has disappeared from YouTube.

My favorite invented word: Flynnicism—used when Tom would say something with extreme humor, cynicism, and high-level sarcasm at the same time.

More favorites:

Tom waving goodbye to me from the subway platform in Brussels when he was convinced I didn’t know the correct train to catch. (I did.)

Tom arguing loudly with then–CFI librarian Gordon Stein, and me paging the building over the intercom asking if Tom could define one of the words he had just used.

Tom’s unique use of the office alarm system, leading to multiple police calls to the building.

Tom buys phones!

His rip-roaring laugh thundering down the hallway that made you want to run to his office to see what was so funny.

God, I am going to miss Tom Flynn.

Barry Karr is the executive director of the Committee for Skeptical Inquiry.

Ed Buckner

Many others have presented the facts on how valuable and important—how great—a man Tom Flynn was, and I agree. This piece is about the man I’m proud to say was my friend—a man I loved—and not about his importance.

This reminiscence should by rights be full of wit and clever Flynnzo-esque puns, but I lack the emotional strength even if I had the creativity—and besides, the best editor I ever met is not around to point out what works and what falls flat.

From Erie, Pennsylvania, to Cincinnati (where the Jesuits taught him well; Tom always credited Xavier for educating him properly enough to think clearly and become an atheist), to Buffalo, and beyond the galaxy (2000’s Galactic Rapture was one of his pun-filled science-fiction novels), Tom Flynn was a giant. His greatest loves were Sue Gibbons, FI, and Robert Green Ingersoll (RGI), in that order. But I mostly know about FI and the RGI Birthplace Museum. Tom was, as a steadfast Libertarian, unwilling to let the state or the church set the terms for his loves and commitments. He opposed marriage, period. But he married Sue, because how could he not? Sue has said, “I don’t know how I’m going to live without him.” There are untold numbers of us who will say that about at least some important part of our lives. Tom loved Paul Kurtz and Barry Karr, and they loved him, whether any of the three wanted love from the others or not. Tom was crusty, curmudgeonly, and crotchety at times, but a long list of others I know loved him. Hell, even Joe Nickell loved him.

I was brought to CFI to fill a position that made me, sort of, Tom Flynn’s boss. I knew that he had refused the job I took (executive director of the Council for Secular Humanism), promotion though it appeared to be. Editor of FI was the highest position Tom wanted. He approached me, quite unnecessarily, in my first week there to warn that I might be his boss, but I couldn’t overrule him as editor. No one, including me, was ever foolish enough to think he or she was Tom Flynn’s boss.

Principled integrity was a Tom Flynn hallmark. Fierce protection of principles was always on hand, as those who didn’t take copyrights seriously learned, for example. Tom had the sort of integrity that led him to turn down a raise because he didn’t need the money.

He cared about logic and evidence: the Jesuits taught him about W. K. Clifford’s 1877 essay “The Ethics of Belief”—one of his favorites.

He wrote interesting, highly readable, and effective let- ters better than almost anyone I have ever known.

Tom was a consummate showman—from Lockport/ Erie Canal productions to anti-Santa celebrations. And he delighted in his book, The Trouble with Christmas, earning another printing when the Jehovah’s Witnesses publicized it (omitting any mention of his atheism).

Skeptics are often more fun to be with than humanists, who sometimes take themselves (ourselves) too seriously—except for Tom. I can only wonder what Tom would think about the fact that the single day many will be most likely to remember him won’t be his own birthday (August 18) or Ingersoll’s (August 11) but December 25. Not Ho! Ho! Ho!—but No! No! No!

Ed Buckner was executive director of the Council for Secular Humanism from 2001–2003. He is a past president of American Atheists and officer of the Atlanta Freethought Society and the coauthor of In Freedom We Trust: An Atheist Guide to Religious Liberty (Prometheus Books, 2012).

Ibn Warraq

Tom Flynn was a kind, affable, and, above all, very witty man whose sense of humor brightened up what otherwise would have been dreary meetings (the now famous “Monday morning meeting on Tuesday”). He was also incredibly generous, according me an almost carte blanche to write what I wanted in FI.

He began editing FI when the previous editor left abruptly. Paul Kurtz asked him to take over, and Tom, unflappable as ever, took over without a murmur of surprise or complaint and did a splendid job until his premature death in August 2021. Tom was already responsible for producing fundraising videos of high quality, which brought welcome attention to the activities of CFI, and if that were not enough, he was also busy looking after the RGI Birthplace Museum.

I shall miss his sense of fun. My only regret is that I never got to know him outside the walls of CFI. But I was glad to have met him, nonetheless. He brought a ray of sunshine into my life, for which I am truly grateful. My condolences to his widow.

Ibn Warraq is the author of several books on Qur’anic criticism. (He uses a pen name for protection.) He is the founder of the Institute for the Secularisation of Islamic Society and vice president of the World Encounter Institute.

Judith Walker

“Abyssally yours.” That’s how Tom signed off on some of our email exchanges about how we decided we were atheists and what we were going to do about it.

Tom and I were both in the meaning business. Prompted by reason and philosophy, Tom spent his years peeling away the onion layers of his old belief, fearing that the universe was meaningless and that his life was without purpose, while I felt only relief that a malevolent god or universe did not actually blame me for my father’s suicide. Tom stared down the abyss and won. I was more than happy to discover that it’s nothing personal. He was a bit more stick and I was a bit more carrot about how we could expand our markets. But I could talk and write with him about it all! Quirky, inquiring minds, no theology needed. Tom was my secular rescue.

Well, I’ll just have to keep writing as if Tom were still around to edit me. He didn’t like the idea of “living on” in memory, because that made our atheism sound too soft. Okay, I get it. I will try instead to use imagination and creativity, two traditional humanist values, in a “What Would Tom Do?” sort of way in my research and writing. Onward! as he would say.

And I get to always miss you, Tom.

Judith Walker is a former CFI board member with a background in law and nonprofit development. She writes for FI and other philosophy and freethought publications.

Timothy Binga

I knew Tom for over thirty years, having met him as a reader of his science-fiction books and series. When CFI needed a librarian, my wife mentioned to his wife, Sue, her friend, that I was a librarian. The next thing I knew, I was standing in our kitchen, still dripping wet from the shower I had been taking, having an unscheduled phone interview with Tom and Gordon Stein.

I worked with Tom on many different projects over the years: the Humanist Perspective cable access show, articles for FI, The New Encyclopedia of Unbelief, conferences (the superheroes Tape Man and Knifeboy sprang from this— don’t ask), the Ingersoll Museum, the Freethought Trail, and many others.

Making video promotions were always fun, from the “Alien probe” for CSICon New Orleans to the promo for following Tom carrying out his regular workday routine on Christmas that benefitted Secular Rescue. I used to bring him (and later former Development Director Martina Fern) lunch from one of the local Chinese restaurants on Christmas Day while they were at the office.

There were two activities Tom and I engaged in regularly: freethought history research and pun wars. We would try to nail down some particular freethought fact or obscure reference and would spend hours in discussion. Tom had an encyclopedic knowledge of it all, whereas I had to look things up. We talked science fiction and movies and always tried to outdo the other with puns (he won most of the time but not always).

I will miss his laugh. You couldn’t if he was in the building; it was so full of joy (and volume). I found a review of the Ingersoll Museum on the website Tripadvisor and printed it

out for him. The review was good; he laughed for an hour because of a tagline that read “#1 of 1 things to do in Dresden.” The sheet is still on his door today.

Tom will be missed. Indeed.

Timothy Binga is director of CFI Libraries, the RGI Birthplace Museum, and the Freethought Trail.

Margaret Downey

How much I will miss my dear friend Tom cannot begin to be expressed. I knew him for thirty years, and he was enmeshed with many aspects of my past and present activism. Tom always loved to tell the story of the first time we met. I greeted him at the Wilmington, Delaware, train station in the company of other members of the Freethought Society. We were carrying placards with anti-Christmas slogans that made Tom laugh out loud:

Save a Tree in 1993 Stop Jingle Bull Santa—The Big Lie

Deceive Your Child—Promote Santa Claus Welcome Anti-Claus

Ugh! The Helladays Are Coming

After we fetched Tom and took him to dinner, we ac- companied him to a local radio station where he talked about his book The Trouble with Christmas. We also arranged for him to sign books at a local Barnes & Noble, and he was a big hit. We hosted Tom as a speaker for a December 1993 meeting, and I dressed as an elf to introduce him! Tom referred to me as his “Anti-Elf” after that.

I loved to give him handmade gifts. The best one was a black felt and white fur hat. It was emblazened with the word HUMBUG. Just a year ago, I made an anti-Christmas tree for him. The black plastic mini-Christmas tree was decorated with little sayings demeaning the holiday. He loved it. I worked closely with Tom to increase interest in the RGI Birthplace Museum. Tom and I spent many hours discussing everything from tours to producing my one-woman play about Eva Amelia Parker and Robert Green Ingersoll. He had an encyclopedic knowledge of everything related to the freethought movement in the United States. He would often provide details for my articles, and he graciously helped me polish my Parker/Ingersoll love story play. He loved to promote little-known or untold stories of freethinkers and was very excited that Eva Ingersoll could be acknowledged in this way.

I included him in as many freethought events as possible. I was especially proud of his endorsement of the Freethought Society’s Tree of Knowledge. He was anti-everything related to religious holidays, but the Tree of Knowledge concept received his full support. See Tom’s appearance at the 2020 online Tree of Knowledge event at https://youtu.be/a_9GR_vwG2k.

He most recently participated in the June 2021 Thomas Paine Day event, providing us with a wonderful description of a portion of the life of Thomas Paine. I never thought it would be the last time we would work together. See his eloquent presentation at https://youtu.be/iAo3ifwZza8.

I hope I brought the same joy to Tom as he brought to me. I’ll never forget his importance to the secular/freethought community. His life legacy is commendable. He will be honored and remembered often.

May we continue his work with enthusiasm to fulfill his dream of placing a statue of Robert Green Ingersoll at the Birthplace Museum. That was the subject of our last brainstorming session, but now our plans to meet at the Museum to determine the best location and pose will never happen. I will always cherish my memories of our time together in the here and the now.

Margaret Downey is the founder and president of the Freethought Society, founder of the Anti-Discrimination Network (which supports atheists), and the former president of Atheist Alliance International.

Jeff Ingersoll

When Tom Flynn asked me to chair the Robert Green Ingersoll Birthplace Memorial Committee, he did so with his characteristic wit, saying, “The job comes with no responsibility and commensurate renumeration.”

I was privileged to have worked with Tom for over twenty years on maintaining and improving the RGI Birth- place Museum property. I know he was thrilled to have met our endowment goal earlier this year, in large part because of his own generous initial donation. As a result, the Museum will not be threatened with closure in the future, as it has twice in the past, because of lack of funds.

At the time of his death, Tom and I were working on plans to install a parking lot, walkway, and gazebo on the Museum’s rear property. I look forward to working with Museum Director Tim Binga to complete this project and to dedicating the gazebo as a memorial to Tom’s longtime commitment to the memory and birthplace museum of Robert Green Ingersoll.

Jeff Ingersoll is a painting and restoration contractor, a descendant of Robert Green Ingersoll, and chair of the RGI Memorial Committee.

Roderick Bradford

In the past few decades, I was fortunate to collaborate with Tom Flynn on several projects. We shared an interest in freethought history and recognized those whose shoulders upon which we stand. Tom was a kindred spirit. (Of course, he’d probably bristle at my use of the word spirit.)

We always assumed that Tom would be joining us in our commemoration of The Truth Seeker’s 150th anniversary in 2023. As Tom knew better than anyone, I always preferred writing about dead atheists. Needless to say, I never imagined Tom would be among them.

Not only did Tom have an encyclopedic knowledge of freethought, but he edited The New Encyclopedia of Unbelief. He was especially amused when—and it was often—I declared that his New Encyclopedia was my bible.

Tom eloquently expressed—in writing, speaking, and on camera—the importance of the freethought movement and the debt we all owe to the freethinkers of the past. Tom’s ability to articulate the historical significance of those courageous men and women is crystal clear in his comments from our American Freethought series:

Freethought was not without its martyrs. D. M. Bennett went to jail. His time in prison probably ruined his health and hastened his death. But that was the price he was willing to pay in his fight for freethought and especially for freedom of expression. So yes, there were martyrs to freethought. There were casualties in these battles. This was a true culture war. And I think it’s fair to look back at some of these towering figures from the Golden Age of Freethought and say yes, these are heroes.

Had Tom Flynn been born a century earlier, one could easily imagine him standing shoulder to shoulder with those fearless nineteenth- and early twentieth-century free- thinkers—our heroes.

Roderick Bradford is the editor and publisher of The Truth Seeker, http://thetruthseeker.net.

S. T. Joshi

Throughout his productive life, Tom Flynn was fired with a passion for banishing religion, superstition, and other follies from the human mind. That goal may be eternally unreachable, but that does not make it any less worthy of pursuit, and Tom plunged into the fray with a wry humor that may have worked better than any amount of cold philosophical logic.

But, for all his own contributions—chief of which was the monumental New Encyclopedia of Unbelief —Tom fully understood that he could not do the job by himself. The task of championing reason required many hands, and he worked effortlessly with like-minded individuals to pursue his vision. When, in 2011, he tapped me to take over the editorship of The American Rationalist, I initially demurred, wondering if my many other literary activities would allow me to be a capable editor. Tom offered some sage advice: “It’s the busy person who gets things done.”

The one time I had a chance to be Tom’s editor, he came through splendidly. When I was asked to edit Icons of Unbelief (2008), I commissioned Tom to write a piece on the nineteenth-century firebrand Robert G. Ingersoll—and he contributed a luminous essay that stressed Ingersoll’s importance to the freethought movement. He concluded: “Our time still awaits a lyrical visionary able to express the freethinkers’ dream of living without religion, someone who can movingly implore, ‘Let the ghosts go. We will worship them no more. Let them cover their eyeless sockets with their fleshless hands and fade forever from the imaginations of men.’” Tom himself was that lyrical visionary who did landmark work in bringing that dream of living without religion just a bit closer to reality.

S. T. Joshi is the former editor of The American Rationalist and author of its column “The Stupidity Watch.” He is also a literary critic who focuses on supernatural and fantasy fiction.

Russell Blackford

I’m glad to have known Tom Flynn. He was someone whom I greatly liked and respected and to whom I felt much gratitude.

I knew Tom mainly though our interactions over my regular column for FI and my occasional book reviews and articles. However, I did meet him in person in March 2012 when I visited the United States under the auspices of CFI. I well recall his persuasive and comprehensive, but as always good-humored, speech at the CFI’s annual conference in Orlando that year, where he defended Florida’s strong constitutional protection of church-state separation. He must have observed with disappointment the steady erosion since then of America’s wall of separation, as case after case has gone the wrong way when it’s reached an increasingly conservative and pro-religious U.S. Supreme Court.

Along with Ron Lindsay, Tom took a risk in adding me—an obscure author and academic from Australia—to FI’s stable of contributors. When I took a deep breath and offered, rather diffidently, to write a column for the magazine, he replied immediately and positively. That was a decade ago. From my perspective, at least, it worked out. In all our subsequent dealings, Tom was remarkably supportive, generous, and patient.

Tom and I shared the same birthday, and we were about the same age. He was, in fact, exactly one year younger than me. That’s my reminder that his death came much too early—and, if I needed it, of my own mortality.

I’ll miss Tom Flynn, and at this sad time my heart goes out to his family and loved ones.

Russell Blackford is a writer, philosopher, and literary critic. He is a fellow of the Institute for Ethics & Emerging Technologies and a contributor to The Australian Book of Atheism.

James A. Haught

Tom Flynn was wonderful—always witty but also philosophical, highly intelligent, and learned. He bombarded us writers with wisecracks yet made us feel we were part of a crusade for human intellectual progress.

Tom died too young at sixty-six—like Carl Sagan and Christopher Hitchens, both sixty-two, and even Isaac Asimov at seventy-two. They deserved more creative years. Life is unfair.

Tom wrote about growing up an ardent childhood Catholic but losing it traumatically. “It took me seven years of tortured, solitary, often furtive reading and research (starting at about age fourteen) to recognize first that Catholicism was untrue, second that Christianity was utterly false, and finally that even God did not exist.”

He emerged a brilliant freethinker and leader of secular- ism. It’s a shame that he left us so early.

James A. Haught, almost ninety, is editor emeritus of West Virginia’s largest newspaper, The Charleston Gazette-Mail, and a senior editor of FI. He has written more than fifty essays for this magazine.

Brian Bolton

My only in-person interaction with Tom Flynn occurred in the fall of 2005 when Paul Kurtz, Richard Hull, David Koepsell, and Tom traveled to Texas to give the Austin chapter a progress report on CFI’s work and raise funds. All my subsequent interactions with Tom were via email concerning manuscripts for FI magazine. I recall three incidents that revealed Tom’s dedication to his work and his friendly, supportive, professional attitude.

A few years ago, Tom published a letter I penned that was critical of several aspects of his editorial judgment, including what I referred to as his fixation on blasphemy and his endless quibbling over humanist history. In his rejoinder, Tom calmly responded with precise answers to my various opinions. I am sure FI readers were enlightened by his thoughtful reaction to my freewheeling barbs.

When I later wrote praising his op-ed prophesying the end of Roe v. Wade, Tom thanked me for the compliment but added a few corrections and clarifications. Tom was a stickler for accuracy!

The third incident involved a manuscript I submitted that summarized animal cruelty in the Bible. I had previously written articles addressing prayer failure, Christian nationalism, and fundamentalist lies, which required only minor editing. But the manuscript dealing with animal welfare, which is a subject of personal importance to me, received special editorial attention from Tom. After two major revisions entailing substantial reorganization and modification based on Tom‘s very helpful suggestions, the article was published as a much-improved addition to the literature. I really appreciated Tom’s willingness to work with me on a topic that was not one of his special interests.

Tom’s work was not limited to editing FI and The New Encyclopedia of Unbelief. He managed the Ingersoll Museum and curated the Freethought Trail website. He was also an excellent photographer. Tom’s contributions to secular humanism were monumental, and he was also a nice guy. He will be missed.

Brian Bolton is a retired academic psychologist living in Georgetown, Texas.

Mark Cagnetta

It’s quite ironic that the common theme of my initial contact with Tom Flynn and this inadequate remembrance is death. The very first essay I sent to Tom was titled, “Why I Am Not a Catholic: Sundays with Estelle.” Essentially, the story was about the skewed religious views of my mother, but it was also about the death of my eight-year-old son. Tom didn’t offer the compulsory “thoughts and prayers.” He was much too keen of intellect. He offered his condolences and told me that my essay was very powerful and needed to be shared. Not only was it published in FI, but Tom also included it in the book The Faith I Left Behind. From that point forward, Tom and I became friends.

As an atheist, I harbor some radical views about religion and the religious. In volleys of emails, Tom shared some of his intimate thoughts with me. We embraced many of the same views on Catholicism because we both attended Catholic school; he believed in no gods, as do I, including the mythological Jesus. Tom and I both recognized the threat the religious Right poses to our democracy. We could talk politics with ease. We were both fans of Robert Green Ingersoll. The only knock I had on Tom was his choice of football teams: he was a Buffalo Bills fan, while I follow the New England Patriots.

Tom epitomized the role of editor. He was compassionate, critical, decisive, and always kept the FI reader first and foremost in his mind. I’ve submitted several essays since my first. Some Tom told me he loved; others, he said, needed work. But each article brought a certain edification: Tom taught me how to write more clearly and rid my writing of extraneous nonsense, and he offered perspective and insight, regardless of the topic I was writing about.

I will miss Tom. His sudden passing has deeply saddened me. Only recently we worked together on an essay about Dr. Duncan McDougall and his quest to weigh the human soul. We both agreed it was rubbish, but now I find myself wishing it were true. Regardless, whenever I touch my keyboard, Tom’s “spirit” will forever linger on.

Mark Cagnetta turned to freelance writing after a long career in law enforcement and earning a doctorate in organizational leadership.

Mark Kolsen

Be concrete. Be clear. Be concise.

Tom Flynn’s writing and editing always manifested those commandments of composition and thus made FI such a pleasure to read. Often perfunctory in other journals, Tom’s editorials were always well-conceived, well-structured appetizers to FI’s smorgasbord of interesting pieces. In fact, his introductory words often complemented the journal’s feature stories and increased readers’ desires to “read on.” Has anyone ever counted the number of readers who sent letters to Tom, telling him that—like me—they read FI cover to cover?

Writers often wonder why their submissions were rejected. But Tom always offered to discuss his reasons for rejecting a piece, and on a couple occasions, he gave me lengthy written explanations of what I could do if I wanted to take a “second whack” at the topic. His suggested improvements were always clear and sensible; yet—respecting a writer’s thoughts and diction—he never rewrote my sentences or paragraphs. His guiding words always led me to produce a better piece, but it was a piece that I could truly call my own.

Over time, Tom made me wish I could relive my teaching career. In contrast to the gallons of red ink I had splashed on my students’ papers, Tom taught me that a few well-chosen comments elicit more improvement in budding writers. And how I wish that I had followed Tom’s example and told my hard-working students that—comments and grades aside—“I love your writing,” as he once told me. Coming from a mentor such as Tom, the words encouraged me to write more. And more.

Mark Kolsen has written for FI and is a regular contributor to American Atheist magazine.

Nicholas S. Molinari

It was decades ago—I no longer remember the year— when Tom Flynn, Paul Kurtz, and other luminaries of rationality hosted/presented a workshop at the Rockleigh, New Jersey, Country Club. I identified with Tom immediately because he described his Catholic upbringing and his seven-year process of “renunciations.” He proved a lot cleverer than I, as it has taken me considerably longer to achieve relief from superstition and magical thinking. I suppose my seminary years followed by a period of priestly ministry played a powerful role in slowing my journey of renunciations.

Tom always saw some value in the essays I submitted. I think he had more confidence in my thinking, my writing, my value system than I do! He chose to publish several of my essays in recent years. Perhaps he was watching and encouraging my personal journey, in some ways parallel to his.

He was my editor, yes. But, more important, I considered him my friend; and it is my hope that he considered me his friend. My editor and friend Tom Flynn died at age sixty-six. I shall soon achieve my eighty-fourth birthday. Although he was considerably younger than I, I thought of him as my mentor, my counselor, and my truest teacher. There are times when a nonbeliever might wish for an afterlife, a reward for a life well lived, an eternity of peace and happiness. This is one of those times. How I wish I could commend this great person to eternal happiness!

Alas, I cannot. The happiness must be experienced and lived by everyone who knew this truly great man.

Nicholas S. Molinari advocates for humanist values in his articles and letters.

Sarah Haider

I knew Tom Flynn through my participation in FI. He had reached out to me with an invitation to write an article, and I was honored to be considered for inclusion.

In Tom, I had a kind, thoughtful, and encouraging editor. He was gentle in his critique and effusive with his praise. Under his leadership, FI was a compendium of the best of secular thought and a fantastic representation of all the lights our world has to offer.

It is not easy to describe all that our community has lost with the departure of such a giant. I am grateful to have known him and worked with him, and to have experienced his cheer and brilliance, however briefly.

Sarah Haider is a Pakistani-American writer, public speaker, and political activist. She is the founder of Ex-Muslims of North America.

Karen I. Shragg

Some heroes you only get to meet through literature and email. When they are gone, you regret never having had the pleasure to have met them in person but are oh so glad that you knew their greatness while they were alive and made the world better with their intelligence and bravery. Tom Flynn was just such a man. As an unapologetic free thinker and what I would call an “eco-humanist,” he is unchallenged in his leadership. The last correspondence we had was about his great op-ed on our shared passion for setting the record straight on overpopulation. I am deeply grateful for his enthusiastic support of my op-eds on this shunned topic. I just wish I could tell him about the guy who read my article in FI, bought my book, and contacted me to say that he was an ally on this issue.

Tom’s gifts will keep on giving as his writings are still there for all to see. It is now up to us to shoulder the burden of speaking up and working passionately to challenge dominant culture on its dodging of religious dogma and its responsibility in human and planetary suffering.

Karen I. Shragg, EdD, is an environmental writer and overpopulation activist from Bloomington, Minnesota.

Janet Factor

“Death closes all; but something ere the end, Some work of noble note, may yet be done, Not unbecoming men that strove with Gods.”

—Alfred Lord Tennyson, “Ulysses” Tom Flynn was my first real editor, and he was a great one.

Editors are so much more than glorified English teachers, taking a red pencil to our, the writer’s, efforts. They are our first readers and, often, the only ones we ever get to hear from.

Writing is a difficult, solitary endeavor. We pour our hearts and minds out onto the page, send them into the world, and we never get to see those words read, never get to hear the responses they evoke. Our love goes out into the world, and most of the time it just vanishes. Great editors understand this.

Tom did. He was always open with his responses and happy to engage in an intellectual give and take, critical when necessary but always pursuing the goal of best conveying the ideas I was striving to express. I could trust him to be honest, and that gave all his words great weight.

Most precious of all, he gave lovely and generous praise. He knew, I am sure, that it was often the only reward I would receive, the only chance I would have to know that I had struck the right note and that somewhere out there it would reverberate, even if I never got to hear it. I am sure Tom gave this gift to many writers and kept us dipping into the inkwell when we would otherwise have laid down our quills far too soon.

Tom’s love for his unseen work as first reader gave great gifts to all of you, the final ones. You may not have known it, but you, too, will miss him.

Janet Factor has written for FI and contributed regularly to the Secular Humanist Bulletin and Freethought in Action. She is the founder of the Springfield (Illinois) Area Freethinkers.