An atheist group which created a stir earlier this year with ads on buses in Des Moines has launched another campaign for the holidays. The Iowa Atheists and Freethinkers group ran ads on buses in August that said “Don’t believe in God? You are not alone.” I-A-F spokesperson Lily Kryuchkov, says the new ads say “Being good for goodness sake.” She says they are a follow up based on the comments they heard after the first ads.

Kryuchkov says most of the comments were positive, but they also had people ask them what they believed in and what good they stood for. “And we’re just trying to tell the public, that while we not believe in God, we still have all the morale values, and we still believe in doing the right thing,” Kryuchkov says. Kryuchkov says they’ve also always wanted to do a campaign during this holiday.

Kryuchkov says: “Simply because it’s kind of a difficult time for non-believers, because everybody around you is going to church, there’s always religious charities, there’s religious songs and stuff like that, and people feel really alone and kind of left out. And so we just wanted to speak to them and say ‘hey we know that you are a good person too’, basically.” Kryuchkov says it’s all part of the groups mission.

She says the main goal is to give atheists a voice as she says they are a large part of the population — at least 15-percent according to the lastest polls. Kryuchkov says the group is not out to shut down religious groups.

Kryuchkov says that has never been their intent and they are “not at war with anybody.” She says they’re just speaking to the people that are like them and share their views and are open to dialogue with people who don’t share their views and we can all co-exist. The bus ads that ran in August were pulled, and then returned after the transit system clarified its policy on the ads.

The design of the new ad was supplied by United Coalition of Reason, a national organization that provides support to local groups. To find out more, go to iowaatheists.org.