I get very frustrated arguing with religious people because they seem to believe, genuinely believe, that atheists and other skeptics are emotionally cored. Standing there as a mourner an adult orphan, I have to wonder what world they live in.

We feel.

We are human and our emotions are complex and contradictory and profound. We gaze in awe at the miracle of childbirth — and I use those words purposefully. Because my perspective as an atheist is not that miracles are gifts from a supernatural deity somewhere, but are everyday occurrences of profound power. Childbirth is not a miracle because it is a rare phenomenon or because it is divinely inspired; it is a miracle because it happens at all, despite the odds, despite the blood and pain involved, despite all the dangers before and after childbirth to both mother and child.

Calling it a miracle is just another way of saying, “you beat the odds.” It’s a matter of perspective: one person’s divine intervention is a skeptic’s statistical analysis.

The mistake is thinking that this drives the heart and soul out of us.Quite the opposite: it actually makes important events even more profound because they are not magic, they are real.

Grief is not an impossible burden because we don’t believe in an afterlife; rather, our lack of belief in an afterlife reminds us how important our grief is, and how vital it is to remember those we have lost through our thoughts and actions.