We are living in exciting times. For the first time in their history, both New Zealand and the United Kingdom are now boasting a majority of non believers in their nations. This is a big deal.

Dr Lee said: “The UK is entering its first atheist age. Whilst atheism has been prominent in our culture for some time, be it through Karl Marx, George Eliot, or Ricky Gervais, it is only now that atheists have begun to outnumber theists for the first time in our history.”

It signals the growing trend in democratic countries of the fading power of religion. The fact that atheists still have a negative perception is baffling to me, given the fact that we now are beginning to outnumber religious folks. There’s going to need to be a major shift in this kind of attitude. In order for that to happen, we’ll have to stop being the most complacent group in history.

The bad news is also that religious organizations still hold a disproportionate amount of power, despite being outnumbered. They have had a long time to imbed themselves into the political life of nations, and untangling this mess is going to take work, especially when they are rich, influential, and still control a large segment of the population.

Never forget that it is when an animal is cornered that it becomes desperate, and dangerous. They can smell the writing on the wall, and they are not going to go down without a fight, I promise you.