When most people think of the religion Atheism, they think of satanic rituals and animal sacrifices. This is not the case.

Atheism is simply the absence of a belief in God to the point where the belief is denied.

Atheists believe the universe was created through a natural evolutionary process. They do not think an entity created the world in a week.

They believe human beings create their own moral code and ethics system They do not believe that one was handed down on stone tablets.

Some atheists hold the belief because of philosophy, others simply because they never had a set religion or they lost interest, and still others because they believe the world is such a bad place, and a loving God wouldn’t let the world be the way it has become.

Atheism started in the Greek and Roman times with philosophers such as Epicures and Lucretius.

Epicures put forth the theory of materialism. This means the only thing that exists are bodies and the space in-between them. Therefore, this means that body and soul are both made of matter, so an afterlife does not exist.

A religious web site states that he believed, “Religion was the human activity of trying to live in a the way such noble (but unknowable) gods might have lived.”

Lucretius believed that humans created the gods to explain things they feared. He stated this saying combined with the fear of death made humans unhappy.

His main belief was that the afterlife didn’t exist so people should not fear it.

In time, these beliefs combined with a person’s personal feelings about the existence of God became the religion of Atheism.

Even though most people think that Atheist’s don’t have set rituals, this is also not true. Atheism has a specific organization called the British Humanistic association, which trains people to run Atheists Naming (like catholic baptism), weddings and funerals.

When the naming ritual takes place, a place has to be picked that is liked by both parents as well as the baby’s mentors. These members of the family give speeches and then the babies name is officially announced.

Most Atheist weddings are not legal, but some places in the west do hold these ceremonies. The weddings are a time to announce the purpose and plans of the marriage.

There is a ritual that goes along with marriages. There is not religious music picked by the family. The bride and groom must tell the congregation why they are getting married. There are non-religious readings or poetry read, the bride and the groom talk to each other about the marriage, actions such as the lighting of a candle and the exchanging of rings takes place, and then a non religious blessing and the final words are said.

The funerals take the same course as the weddings accept that humanist afficiant resides over the funeral.