‘Show me the evidence, and I shall believe’. All atheists backup their lack of belief in God with the previous statement. And ‘religion’ by its very definition happens to be based on the belief in God without demanding any evidence. That pretty much creates a clear contrast between what atheism stands for, and what religion is all about. It is quite a deep topic of debate, of considering atheism to be a religion, and quite a few people do agree that atheism is a religion. But I believe in the contrary. Analysing all the significant differences between religion and atheism, I would say that atheism cannot under any circumstance, be considered to be a religion. Atheism is the overall absence and rejection of the belief that every religion rests upon – the belief in a certain existence of God or a supernatural power.

Looking at the ‘faith’ part of religion and atheism, one can clearly see that they are two completely different branches of faith. While religious people have faith in an existence and believe that this existence created the entire universe, atheists on the other hand, have faith in the belief that everything appeared out of nowhere. Every inexplicable incident in a religious person’s life would be related by her/him to the superior existence they believe in. Whereas atheists would rather look for a concrete reason behind each and every thing. Notice how the religious category will undoubtedly not only believe in the existence of God, but also relate their entire life’s happenings to God too. And atheists would rather take the path of logical reasoning and find genuine, verifiable facts. The key issue here is not the belief in itself, but rather the reason behind the belief, which is evidence.

Atheism is the absence of one particular belief, which is the belief in God. But religion is a complex web of traditions and beliefs. Every religion follows the revealed wisdom of a supernatural force. It has sacred texts, traditions, rituals and ceremonies, and prayers or an alternative form of communication with God. And atheism lacks each and every one of these things. Moreover, religions are bounded by a certain set of rules and regulations, whereas atheism consists of none. Atheism lacks structure too, which happens to be present in all religions, as they are an institutionalised system. Atheism doesn’t have a single major aspect of religion, and hence cannot be considered to be a religion.

Those who believe that atheism should be considered a religion would say that atheism is all about the belief in the potential of humanity, in the power of reason, in the comfort of love, and in the value of truth, and that religion also has all these beliefs, and hence atheism is a religion too. But here what makes a difference is that these beliefs alone are not enough for atheism to be called a religion as it still lacks the major belief in a supernatural existence. And let’s just say for the sake of arguing that these beliefs are sufficient, then in this case the difference arises in the connections made related to these beliefs. In the sense that, religious people would relate all these beliefs to God, but atheists would relate them to the tangible world around them.

Considering all of the above, would you think of atheism as a religion? Atheism is the position that affirms the non-existence of God. It places its belief in solid facts which are supported by strong evidence. The only thing that atheists are ‘religious’ about is their atheism!