Darrel Ray

Ray was raised a fundamentalist Christian in Wichita, Kansas, by parents who eventually became missionaries, and among family members highly involved in church life.^[1] This fundamentalist upbringing informs much of his later writing.^[2] In 1979, Ray joined the Quaker church, and later he attended the Presbyterian church.^[3] From 1969 to 1984, he taught Sunday school, preached, and was a tenor soloist in several church choirs.^{[citation needed]} He became agnostic by his early 30s and an atheist by 40.^[4]

Ray is the father of two children and also a grandfather.^[5] He is also openly polyamorous.^[6]

In 1972, Ray earned a bachelor's degree in sociology/anthropology at Friends University in Wichita, and in 1974 he completed an MA in Church and Community at Scarritt College for Christian Workers in Nashville, Tennessee. In 1978 he finished a doctoral program in psychology at Peabody College of Vanderbilt University, earning his Ed.D.^[7]

Ray became very involved in organizational culture and in clinical psychology.^[5] He has written two books on team-building and served as the director of The Institute for Performance Culture.^[8] He also founded Teaming Up, an organizational and team-building coaching program.^[9] Ray co-authored two books with Howard Bronstein which describe how to create and manage self-directed teams.^[10]

In 2009, Ray founded the organization Recovering from Religion (RfR), an international, non-profit organization which helps people dealing with issues stemming from religious trauma, doubt, and non-belief.^[3] As of 2024^[update] Ray serves as the president of the RfR Board of Directors.^[11] He also founded the RfR's Secular Therapy Project, which has the goal of helping clients find therapists offering secular and science-based therapy.^[12]

Ray has written books about secularism and atheism: The God Virus: How Religion Affects Our Lives and Culture^[13] and Sex and God: How Religion Distorts Sexuality.^[14] Ray's books about secularism and religion explore how religion interacts with human beings on a personal and cultural level. Ray explores how religious institutions and ideas can be used to control human thoughts and behaviors, especially sexual behaviors.^[5] Ray pays special attention to placing sexuality and various religions into context culturally and historically.^[6] He takes the stance that many human impulses, feelings and sexual behaviors are normal and can be desirable.^[15] Ray's books have influenced other atheists, and his psychological interpretation of Richard Dawkins's concept of religion as a virus has influenced the atheist and secular movement in America.^[16]

On August 30, 2014, Ray launched a podcast about human sexuality and atheism called Secular Sexuality, where is he also the host.^[17]

Ray has also appeared as a secular psychological expert on television, including ABC News show, Nightline, where in 2011 he spoke out against exorcisms and took a scientific viewpoint towards psychological illnesses that might look like possession.^[18]

In June 1982, Ray and several other authors released a paper describing a study done on male youth offenders in a juvenile correction institute. Ray and the group studied whether population density had any effects on the participants.^[19]

In May 2011, Ray and Amanda Brown (an undergraduate at the University of Kansas studying sex and sexuality) released the results of a self-reporting online survey of over 14,500 American secularists, titled "Sex and Secularism: What Happens When You Leave Religion?", and concluding that sex improves dramatically after leaving religion, and that people who are religious exhibit similar sexual behaviors as the non-religious, but experience markedly increased guilt.^[20] The study has been criticized for suffering from self-selection bias, due to its recruiting of participants via the science blog Pharyngula.^[21]