How to Use atheist in a Sentence

atheist

noun
  • Tom’s late wife was an atheist.
    — Grace Byron, Vulture, 6 Oct. 2025
  • The claim that atheists were the cause of these holocausts is false.
    — Dp Opinion, The Denver Post, 8 Aug. 2019
  • Even those who are atheists need something to believe in.
    — Mariam Amini, Condé Nast Traveler, 4 June 2026
  • Just like people of faith, not all atheists believe the same things.
    — Harmeet Kaur, CNN, 10 Mar. 2024
  • Sami Al-Asady met an atheist for the first time in eighth grade.
    — AZCentral.com, 26 Sep. 2021
  • Savarkar was an atheist, but that was no obstacle to his mission.
    — Hartosh Singh Bal, Foreign Affairs, 12 Apr. 2024
  • Veena had been an atheist with dreams of becoming a physicist.
    — Rich Schapiro, NBC news, 20 June 2026
  • For starters, Luther was, of course, anything but a godless atheist.
    — Paul Kengor, National Review, 9 Sep. 2020
  • There is an adage that says there are no atheists in foxholes — even skeptics will pray when facing death.
    — Emma Goldberg Desiree Rios, New York Times, 21 Jan. 2024
  • That stigma is why there could be quite a few people out there who don’t identify as atheist.
    — Scott Canon, kansascity, 1 May 2017
  • This person, an atheist, was invited to a bar mitzvah and didn’t want to go.
    — Amy Dickinson, BostonGlobe.com, 13 Oct. 2022
  • There are as many of them as atheists and agnostics combined (7% each).
    — Peter Smith, Fortune, 5 Oct. 2023
  • What this means is people who are openly atheists and agnostics can't be scouts.
    — Lizzy Acker, OregonLive.com, 11 Oct. 2017
  • Mark and his twin brother are atheists like me, and their older brother is worried for our souls.
    — Sara Eckel, Longreads, 1 June 2018
  • Hesse, now an atheist, has few good things to say about the good many evangelical churches do.
    — Sandra Dallas, Denver Post, 1 Feb. 2026
  • This is even true of the cold, hard atheists—the effective altruists.
    — Jay Caspian Kang, New Yorker, 27 Jan. 2026
  • Think of it as scientific proof of the old saying that there are no atheists in the foxhole.
    — Bryan Walsh, Time, 7 Aug. 2017
  • As a 93-year-old atheist, Scalfari will find out soon enough if hell exists.
    — Judie Vegh, cleveland.com, 4 Apr. 2018
  • Kelson is a man of science and an atheist, but not without a touch of mysticism.
    — David Rooney, HollywoodReporter, 13 Jan. 2026
  • Some are religious, some atheist.
    — Madeline Mitchell, USA Today, 10 Mar. 2026
  • Emily, though at first more shy, ends up becoming more strident than her friend—and maybe even an atheist as well.
    — Jordan Hoffman, VanityFair.com, 12 Apr. 2017
  • Ms Lankesh was also an atheist and a staunch left-winger, whose views had earned her enemies far and wide.
    — The Economist, 23 Sep. 2017
  • Nathan Bigler of Salt Lake City is an atheist with teen children.
    — The Salt Lake Tribune, 19 Dec. 2021
  • The fire station itself was under threat, and people began to pray, even the atheists among them.
    — Washington Post, 8 Jan. 2020
  • Certified atheists will take care of your pets if you are swept away on Judgment Day.
    — Author: Shannyn Moore, Alaska Dispatch News, 10 Sep. 2017
  • Those findings have led some to conclude that, if religion is good for you, being an atheist will be bad for your health.
    — The Salt Lake Tribune, 4 Mar. 2021
  • Anyone with half of a brain knows there are far more atheists on death row than Lutherans or Baptists.
    — Wired Letters Department, WIRED, 30 Nov. 2006
  • Greg Lockwood, who presides over a church in Waldo, was a staunch atheist for much of his life.
    — Anne Kniggendorf, kansascity.com, 13 May 2017
  • Gervais, who is an atheist, appended to the tweet a photo of himself being licked by a dog.
    — Jon Brown, Washington Examiner, 10 Jan. 2020
  • Karen came from a big Catholic family; Greg was an atheist and, like many atheists, proud of it.
    — Alexandra Schwartz, New Yorker, 25 Aug. 2025

Some of these examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'atheist.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.

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