I often joke that I'm not arrogant enough to be either true believer or athiest. Or maybe, as Stephen Colbert says, I'm an athiest who lacks balls.

Or maybe that's me, too...

Damn, my insecure self!

I'm an atheist in the sense that I have seen absolutely no reason to even begin suspecting a god exists and therefore live my life as if this is true.

But I'll readily admit that I could be wrong but that I see no reason to change my views just because, without any concrete evidence indicating so, I might be wrong.

So, while you could technically say this is agnosticism, I would then have to say I am similarly agnostic about whether there are invisible phase-shifted evil robots in my bedroom closet just waiting for me to go to sleep tonight so that they could kill me.

I could be wrong that they aren't there but lacking any positive reason to believe it I'm not going to be putting a padlock on that door. So there really is no functional difference between atheism and my behavior.

The current big names in atheism (Richard Dawkins, Sam Harris, Daniel Dennett and Christopher Hitchens) all agree that we can't know for certain that there is no God. They rather say that the probability is so remote, it doesn't merit accepting the idea as true. (Sam Harris, alone in this group, has stated that the term "atheist" is too problematic, given its negative connotation, especially in the US, and might best be avoided.) I am comfy with the term atheist, and would like to help remove the stigma by being a kind and good-hearted specimin. On the other hand, like many of you here, I don't wish to dogmatically assert there is no God. Luckily, the terms atheist and agnostic are not mutually exclusive.

One worry I have about the example given earlier regarding prayers at athletic events is that they can become tools of group exclusion. If you are the only non-theist on the team, and opt to stand off to the side while the other members circle together, I can't help but think that this is going to have a huge negative effect, on how the team perceives you, how the crowd in the stadium sees you, and so on. Given the extremely personal nature of faith, and seeing how little it means if it is not voluntary, this sort of situation seems to me to sow distrust and disunity.

When I was in High School Theater - we'd do a "group prayer" before each performance - sort of a round robin where whoever wanted to put in their brand of good will/mojo.

I recall being put off by the terminology - but I suppose it was accurate, and I participated, never feeling someone was imposing a religion on me.