The 2010 Global Atheist Convention starts in Melbourne next Friday.

Tickets to the three day event have been sold out for months.

It will feature well known public atheists including Professor Richard Dawkins, Phillip Adams and Peter Singer.

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24 Melbourne buses currently display the words, “Atheism – celebrate reason”, and will do so until March 29.

In Britain and Europe, both religions and non-religions have been buying up space on public vehicles for a while. British double-deckers have carried the slogan, “There is probably no God. Now stop worrying and enjoy your life”.

But don’t atheists spend just as much time, probably more, worrying about it all, than believers? Look at their countless books, countless websites — and now countless expensive public hoardings.

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Atheism, no less than religion, is a kind of a faith. It goes beyond what can be scientifically demonstrated.

It gleefully mocks the rest of us for our inability to “prove” God’s existence.

Can they prove God’s non-existence?

Oh, no, they say, the onus of proof lies with believers, not with us.

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Let people who pray, pray for those who have no faith — that they may discover the joy of knowing that God exists, and of knowing God himself.

Let us pray, also, for believers — that they may live faithfully by the Faith they profess.

Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners, now, and at the hour of our death.  Amen.