Atheist Foundation of Australia

  • To encourage and to provide a means of expression for informed free-thought on philosophical and social issues.
  • To advocate for and safeguard the rights of all non-religious people.
  • To serve as a focal point for the community of non-religious people.
  • To offer verifiable information in place of superstition and to promote logic and reason.
  • To promote atheism.
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A joint letter from pro-secular organisations

 A joint letter from pro-secular organisations  Friday 5 July 2024  Dear Member of Parliament,  Our organisations represent the worldviews of pro-secular and non-religious people across Victoria. We are writing to urge you to support modernising the parliamentary...

Submission to the Productivity Commission’s Draft Report on Philanthropy

Atheist Foundation of Australia Incorporated (AFA) Submission to the Productivity Commission’s Draft Report on Philanthropy February 2024   The Atheist Foundation of Australia Incorporated (AFA) was established in 1970 and has members in every State and Territory...

Atheists disturbed over religious discrimination by NSW Government

The NSW government has rejected the nomination of Sydney Atheists President, Steve Marton, to sit on its newly devised Faith Affairs Council.  According to the most recent Census, one third of the NSW population is non-religious.  But the views of this large...

What do “human rights” mean to you?

The Human Rights Commission has released a video marking 10th December as the 75th anniversary of the Declaration for Human Rights. The video features several people stating what human rights mean to them, including Steve Marton who currently serves on the Atheist...

Atheist applies for seat on new NSW Religious Affairs Council

President of Sydney Atheists and Committee Member of The Atheist Foundation of Australia, Steve Marton, has applied for nomination to the NSW Government’s inaugural Faith Affairs Council.  The Minns Government has called for a 16-member council to be set up to provide...
Secularism Australia Conference

Secularism Australia Conference

With guest speakers already sharing their excitement surrounding the Secularism Australia Conference, we would like to offer you the opportunity to purchase tickets at the discounted early-bird rate, which will conclude on Saturday 7 October. The early-bird rate of...
Religious Affiliation in Australia

See what we’ve been up to

The Atheist Foundation of Australia Committee would like to thank for your support. We also like to update you of two of our important and successful achievements in the last two years. In 2021, we took a leading role in association with six other free-thought...

Atheism is not a religion, mark “no religion”

As you know, the Australian Government is conducting a census of the population on the 10th August 2021. The census is an important snapshot of the country and informs government and businesses in their decision making. Census data is used to plan and deliver services...

Census21 No Religion Campaign Rejects Fake News and Fearmongering

The Census No Religion campaign is aware of a particularly hateful and misleading message circulating on social media, by email and SMS text message. The message suggests that non-religious people should incorrectly record that they are religious or face the...

Census No Religion Campaign

On the 10th of August, a census is being conducted to collect important data on the circumstances and attitudes of the Australian people. Your friends and family will be asked if they hold religious beliefs, and it’s an important...

Religious Discrimination Bill is resurrected

In a recent webinar with Family Voice Australia, Kevin Andrews (Liberal Party Back Bencher) indicated that "compromise had been reached" regarding the proposed Religious Discrimination Bill, and that it would be introduced into the Parliament "shortly". Mr. Andrews...

Religious Freedom Bill Submission

Religious Discrimination Bill – Second Exposure Draft Date: 19 January 2020 Submission type: Non-Profit – Atheist Foundation Of Australia and Sydney Atheists Email: [email protected] Confidentiality: For Public Release The Atheist Foundation of...

Submission to the Australian Bureau of Statistics – Review of 2021 Census Topics

The question on religion in the Australian Census contains an element which is problematical in obtaining accurate figures. The problem is that it asks “What is the person’s religion?” This is a leading question and can elicit a religion of baptism when the person may...

Campaigns

Census No Religion

The current census data does not accurately reflect our country’s religious views.

This is due to a large number of Australians marking that they belong to a religion in the census when in fact they no longer practise or hold those beliefs.

Census data is used by the government and many other organisations to inform a wide range of important decisions from the amount of public funding religious organisations receive, to the voice and influence religion is given in public affairs and media.

The next Australian Census will be held in August 2026 and we need it to accurately reflect what Australians truly believe.

So, when you’re filling in the census and you come to the question of religion, this is your chance to think carefully and decide whether you still see yourself as religious.

If you don’t see yourself as religious anymore, this census, mark ‘No Religion’.

Visit the Campaign Web Site

Our Philosophy

The Atheist Foundation of Australia recognises the scientific method as the only rational means toward understanding reality. To question and critically examine all ideas, testing them in the light of experiment, leads to the discovery of facts.

As there seems to be no scientific evidence for supernatural phenomena, atheists reject belief in ‘God’, gods, and other supernatural beings. The universe, the world in which we live, and the evolution of life seem to be entirely natural occurrences.

No personality or mind can exist without the process of living matter to sustain it. We have only one life – here and now. All that remains after a person dies is the memory of their life and deeds in the minds of those who remain.

Atheists reject superstition and prejudice along with the irrational fears they cause. We recognise the complexity and interdependence of life on this planet. As rational and ethical beings we accept the challenge of making a creative and responsible contribution to life.

Past AFA Members

I condemn false prophets, I condemn the effort to take away the power of rational decision, to drain people of their free will – and a hell of a lot of money in the bargain. Religions vary in their degree of idiocy, but I reject them all. For most people, religion is nothing more than a substitute for a malfunctioning brain.

Gene Roddenberry 
Gene Roddenberry

I cannot be angry at God, in whom I do not believe.

Simone de Beauvoir 
Simone de Beauvoir

Suppose we’ve chosen the wrong god. Every time we go to church we’re just making him madder and madder.

Homer Simpson 
Homer Simpson

If God has spoken, why is the world not convinced.

Percy Bysshe Shelley 
Percy Bysshe Shelley

I am an atheist, out and out. It took me a long time to say it. I’ve been an atheist for years and years, but somehow I felt it was intellectually unrespectable to say that one is an atheist, because it assumed knowledge that one didn’t have. Somehow it was better to say one was a humanist or agnostic. I don’t have the evidence to prove that God doesn’t exist, but I so strongly suspect that he doesn’t that I don’t want to waste my time.

Isaac Asimov 
Isaac Asimov

The invisible and the non-existent look very much alike.

Delo McKown 
Delo McKown

I do not believe in the creed professed by the Jewish Church, by the Roman Church, by the Greek Church, by the Turkish (Muslim) Church, by the Protestant Church, nor by any Church that I know of. My own mind is my own Church.

Thomas Paine 
Thomas Paine

My neurologist once told me that people with temporal lobe epilepsy are very often intensely religious. Certainly just before I have a grand mal fit I have a ‘vision’ of such peace, joy and significance that I can only call it God. What does this say about the whole nature of religious vision? Certain episodes in the lives of the saints have acquired a new meaning for me. When Theresa of Avila had her three-day vision of hell, was she simply having a temporal lobe attack? The horrors she saw are similar to those I have experienced, but in her case informed by the religious imagery of her time. Like other saints who have ‘seen’ hell she describes an appalling stench, which is part of an epileptic aura. Is it possible that the feeling I have had all my life that something – God, perhaps? – is just over the horizon, something unimaginable but almost tangibly present, is simply the result of an electrical irregularity in my brain? It is a question that can’t yet be answered, unless it be that God, if He exists, could have created us with that capacity for Him, glimpsed at only when the brain is convulsed. What I can say, however, is that if my ‘visions’ have sometimes let me into ‘Hell’ they have also given me possible intimations of a Heaven which I would not have been without.

Karen Armstrong 
Karen Armstrong

A man’s ethical behavior should be based effectually on sympathy, education, and social ties and needs; no religious basis is necessary. Man would indeed be in a poor way if he had to be restrained by fear of punishment and hope of reward after death.

Albert Einstein 
Albert Einstein

Religion is against women’s rights and women’s freedom. In all societies women are oppressed by all religions.

Taslima Nasrin 
Taslima Nasrin