Can't reply to your later response, so I'm replying here. I just wanted to note, in case you were unaware of this - that there are priests and other clergy who

Can't reply to your later response, so I'm replying here. I just wanted to note, in case you were unaware of this - that there are priests and other clergy who would self-identify as atheists, but choose not to "come out" for a variety of reasons, depending on their community, family, society, etc. Some can't or don't because they don't want to hurt their community or family, who see them as a leader, a friend, someone they can trust, etc. They stay in to preserve this foundation. Others don't because they don't have anything to fall back on for their livelyhood - no skills to provide for themselves and/or their family. Other stay in the position because they fear (or know) that the person coming after them (their replacement) may not have the best of intentions in regards to their community, their parishioners, the church organization, or whatnot. In other words, as an atheist with morals, they believe it is better for them to continue to guide their "people" as best as they can on whatever topics are out there being questioned, vs letting someone else come in who may do more damage (ie, "fleece the flock"). Any of these reasons or excuses - however you look at it - does have a moral dimension to it, and causes these people great anguish at times. For this reason, this was set up for these people - for those already "out", and for those "still in", but looking for a way out, or just to have a safe place to discuss things: https://foundationbeyondbelief.org/ https://foundationbeyondbelief.org/ It's not a perfect solution. There was a fairly recent event where a fairly well-known person was in the group as an "out atheist" for a few years, but then rediscovered her religion or something - don't ask me how that can happen, but I'm not one to say it can't - and there was a fear that because she had "insider information" about the group (their member list is kept very secret for good reasons, because some of the members could literally face a death sentence for apostasy); so far (as far as I am aware), nothing has occurred, but it is always a possibility that a "mole" could expose people to actual danger.