Other than the ones that seek one another out specifically for meetings, I can’t really say there’s much of a community.
It’s as absurd as having a community based on not being a fan of Pokemon. If you’re not a fan of Pokemon, then it doesn’t interest you enough to bother congregating about it. Unless Pokemon have literally sprung from little balls and started devouring your children, there’s no reason to have an “apokemon” group.
Atheists are the same way. We see there are groups of theists out there. We say, yeah not interested, and go about our lives, for the most part. Sure, there are some outspoken atheists, who make a living promoting atheism, but they’re sort of like the overprotective mothers who complain that pokemon teaches cruelty to animals. They’re kind of on the fringe.
Atheists don’t spend hours every Sunday specifically not going to church. Atheists don’t have a moment of silence to not pray before they eat. They don’t spend Christmas morning specifically not opening presents. Atheists are not the opposite of theists. Atheists are people who are simply not interested in your imaginary friend, and don’t generally feel the need to form a club protesting your imaginary friend.
Now, when you say that my kid has to learn about your imaginary friend in school using my tax dollars, then George starts gettin’ upset. But until then, I really don’t give a flying fig.
And if you don’t believe in the imaginary ones, there’s no next level. You’re just as much a non-believer as anyone else who doesn’t believe. So no one is more atheist than any other atheist. Would be a silly distinction.
Last year I performed at an “Atheist Church”, it was called Humanitarian Something-or-other", and it meets every Sunday morning for a three hour service. Seems to me there was a thread around here on that subject few months ago. Anyway, while the “preacher” didn’t mention Deists too often, at the meet-and-greet afterwards (hey, they had doughnuts) many of the members sort of went on about how they were Anti-Religious and were proving that you could do all the same things as a religion, meditate, have fellowship, etc., and not be a bad person for not believing. I think it would have been more fun to just meet for pizza or go play miniature golf together … the readings were sort of repetitively anti-God, and the sermon was pretty much like a religious homily with the word “Nature” replacing “God”.
As long as they’re happy, I don’t really care, but it was an interesting group. Just as dull as a religious service.
I never went to church and I never felt the need to do so, going to atheist church just to prove that you don’t need religion to go to church is, to use my analogy again, like going to non-Pokemon meetings to celebrate your lack of being a fan of Pokemon.
According to my mother, if you ever said you accepted him at any time in the past, you go to heaven even if you don’t want to. I told her that I will just sit outside because I am not going in there.
Not sure this is responsive - and, if not, I apologize - but, yes, there are different flavors of atheism and each naturally considers itself most reasonable. I recently tumbled across a study by a group at the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga which identifies atheists as generally falling into six recognizable groups: Intellectual Atheist/Agnostic, Activist, Seeker-Agnostic, Anti-Theist, Non-Theist and Ritual Atheist/Agnostic. Salon has published an interesting article summarizing the study. It includes a link to the study group’s website.
I have it on the highest authority that in the afterlife you still have and suffer from the ailments that killed you. That sucks. Sounds like if you die from horrible injury or illness, you end up in heaven still suffering. Could be horrific.
(And, if Timo is still out there - THIS is why you got the reception you did. If jesusguy is posting in the spirit of true inquiry, I’ll say a rosary - a full one, all the way around three times, praying for the salvation of SDMB souls. Course, I’m guessing that isn’t much of a threat, as his type tends to be divided on the Christianity of Roman Catholicism. However, I happen to have a rosary within reach).
