I'm sure Alan has a much longer and more detailed response than I do, but in the meantime I'll go ahead and address parts of drjean's information.
(Kennedy)
They have their own worldview. Materialism (the view that the material world is all there is) is the lens through which atheists view the world. Far from being the open-minded, follow-the-evidence-wherever thinkers they claim to be, they interpret all data ONLY within the very narrow worldview of materialism. They are like a guy wearing dark sunglasses who chides all others for thinking the sun is out.
Since when is materialism a prerequisite for atheism? I can point you to places full of non-theists that believe in magick and spirits and all sorts of things like that. Atheism is lack of belief in a deity; it does not necessarily preclude other supernatural occurrences.
They have their own orthodoxy. Orthodoxy is a set of beliefs acceptable to a faith community. Just as there are orthodox Christian beliefs, there is an atheist orthodoxy as well. In brief, it is that EVERYTHING can be explained as the product of unintentional, undirected, purposeless evolution. No truth claim is acceptable if it cannot be subjected to scientific scrutiny.
Atheism does not equal evolution, nor does it equal science. This is like saying because most NBA players are black, being black is a part of the professional basketball "orthodoxy".
They have their own brand of apostasy. Apostasy is to abandon ones former religious faith. Antony Flew was for many years one of the worlds most prominent atheists. And then he did the unthinkable: he changed his mind. You can imagine the response of the open-minded, tolerant New Atheist movement. Flew was vilified. Richard Dawkins accused Flew of tergiversation. Its a fancy word for apostasy. By their own admission, then, Flew abandoned their faith.
In this context, this is the definition of tergiversation:
: desertion of a cause, position, party, or faith
If one wants to go ahead and focus on the "faith" part and define apostasy that loosely, fine. If you use that as part of your definition of "religion", however, you're severely diluting the term such that any particular political stance or cause is a "religion" as well.
They have their own prophets: Nietzsche, Russell, Feuerbach, Lenin, Marx.
Because atheists must also be socialists? A patently ridiculous claim, to be sure.
They have their own messiah: He is, of course, Charles Darwin. Darwin in their view drove the definitive stake through the heart of theism by providing a comprehensive explanation of life that never needs God as a cause or explanation. Daniel Dennett has even written a book seeking to define religious faith itself as merely an evolutionary development.
Atheists existed before Darwin was even born. Evolution =/= atheism.
They have their own preachers and evangelists. And boy, are they evangelistic. Dawkins, Dennett, Harris, and Hitchens (Speaking of which, our prayers goes out to Christopher Hitchens in hopes of a speedy recovery for his cancer, we need more time with him Lord) are NOT out to ask that atheism be given respect. They are seeking converts. They are preaching a gospel calling for the end of theism.
Openly challenging theism and asking people to consider things from a different viewpoint is hardly evangelism, but alright, however you wanna define it.
They have faith. Thats right, faith.
You don't say.
They would have you believe the opposite. Their writings ridicule faith, condemn faith. Harriss book is called The End of Faith. But theirs is a faith-based enterprise.
The existence of God cannot be proven or disproven. To deny it takes faith.
If I look at the evidence available for the existence of God (or lack thereof, perhaps), and I remain unconvinced of God's existence, where is the faith there?
Evolution has no explanation for why our universe is orderly, predictable, measurable. In fact (atheistic) evolutionary theory has no rational explanation for why there is such a thing as rational explanation.
Evolution is change in allele frequency over time. It accounts for the biological diversity we see today and how species have changed. That's it. I really wish people would stop trying to make evolution claim more than it does.
There is no accounting for the things they hope you wont ask: Why do we have self-awareness? What makes us conscious?
Hardly. It does not take faith to know that we are self-aware, and the simple answer to those questions is that our brains are sufficiently complex to allow it. Beyond that, questions of "why" in this sense are philosophical in nature, not scientific.
From what source is there a universal sense of right and wrong?
Morality is far from universal among human beings.
