This list of converts to nontheism includes individuals who formerly identified with a religious affiliation but have since then openly rejected their former religion and theism and became nontheist. The list is organised by former religious affiliation and theism.
Swiss lawyer and author of many books and articles on Arab and Islamic law born to a PalestinianChristian family; left Christianity and became a nontheist.[7]
Cuban communist revolutionary and politician; Prime Minister of Cuba (1959–1976), and President (1976–2008); baptized into the Roman Catholic Church at the age of eight; later became an atheist.[26]
British naturalist, geologist and biologist, best known for his contributions to the science of evolution; raised as a Unitarian, later became an agnostic.
British ethologist, evolutionary biologist and author; was brought up as an Anglican until ceasing to believe in a deity in his teens, concluding that the theory of evolution was a better explanation for life's complexity.
Former pastor of two evangelical churches; publicly converted to atheism in 2011 after twenty-five years of Christian ministry.[35] He has written a book based on his career and experiences entitled Hope After Faith.[36]
Public speaker, raised Southern Baptist, considered becoming a minister. His religious studies, instead of bolstering his faith as he intended, led him to no longer believe in Christianity and then all religions.
Former British triple jumper; former Olympic, Commonwealth, European and World champion; formerly a devout Christian, and even presented episodes of the BBC Christian worship programme Songs of Praise.
American physician-scientist and immunologist who served as the director of the U.S. National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) and the chief medical advisor to the president, grew up Catholic, but then considered himself a humanist
French president, was raised Catholic, but became an agnostic later in life.[46] He now considers himself to be an atheist,[47] but still professes respect for all religious practices.[48]
Ordained as "Father Antony", but left the Catholic priesthood and abandoned theism; then wrote The Totalitarian Church of Rome and stated that "Atheism will in this century be the common attitude of civilized people."
American singer-songwriter, filmmaker, and former actress; was raised in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, but left the religion in her early adulthood, citing fundamental disagreements with church doctrine.
President of France; his family was devoutly Catholic,[57] became agnostic following an observation of Nazi concentration camps at the end of World War II.[58]
American film critic, filmmaker and YouTuber; raised as a Jehovah's Witnesses, but abandoned the faith around 2011, due to the faith's authority have been suppressing his hobby on film reviewing. And since referring himself as a areligious.
Kamal Haasan – despite being born into a Hindu Brahmin family, declared himself an atheist[82]
Goparaju Ramachandra Rao – Indian activist for atheism; wrote in We Become Atheists, "I was conventionally orthodox and superstitious in the days of my boyhood. I believed in the claims of divine revelations by my parental aunt."[83]
Vinayak Damodar Savarkar – president of Hindu Mahasabha; founder of the Hindutva movement; atheist;[85] did not define "Hindutva" by religion, and used to publicly advertise lectures on atheism and the non-existence of God[86]
Reproductive biologist; worked with science fiction writers; co-wrote books including Evolving the Alien; his grandfather was a rabbi; he attended synagogue for cultural reasons, but was an atheist[89]
Sociologist descended from a long line of rabbis; had an interest in religion as a social phenomenon; wrote The Elementary Forms of the Religious Life; was an agnostic by adulthood;[90] besides an interest, he saw some value in religion, but stated, "We must discover the rational substitutes for these religious notions that for a long time have served as the vehicle for the most essential moral ideas."[91]
Novelist and professor of philosophy; born into an Orthodox Jewish family; has an older brother who is an Orthodox rabbi; in 2011 she was named AHA's Humanist of the Year,[93] and is an atheist[94]
Sarmad Kashani – 17th-century mystical poet and sufi saint; arrived from Persia to India; beheaded for assumed heresy by the Mughal emperor Aurangzeb; renounced Judaism, briefly converting to Islam and then Hinduism; later denounced all religions and rejected belief in God[130][131]
^E. Hales, "Napoleon and the Pope", (London:1962) pg 114
^ ab"Within the NSDAP (as in the German völkisch movement in general) there existed from the outset a group of old Hitler partisans who in contrast to the 'atheists' Alfred Rosenberg, Martin Bormann and others, believed in a union of National Socialism and Protestant Christianity." Martin Broszat, The Hitler State, p. 223
^"From 1938 Martin Bormann, head of the Party Chancellery and a prominent party atheist, took a leading role in trying to sever all state financial support for the churches, and to limit their legal status and activities, but the need to mobilize church support for the war effort from September 1939 led, as it did in the Soviet Union after 1941, to a limited political truce between Church and state." Richard Overy, The Dictators: Hitler's Germany, Stalin's Russia, p. 286
^"Bormann, an atheist, waged a particularly fanatical fight against the Christian Church." Karl Wilhelm Krause, Herbert Döhring, Anna Plaim, Kurt Kuch, Living with Hitler: Accounts of Hitler's Household Staff, p. 273
^"Bormann lost the belief in God that his pious, fat Lutheran mother had drummed into him throughout his youth; he started to hate the soft, easygoing 'mealymouthed' bourgeois world into which he had been born." Charles Whiting, The Hunt for Martin Bormann: The Truth, p. 45
^ abWired article Faces of the New Atheism: The Scribe published November 2006. Retrieved November 10, 2009.
^"Ten great investors". Incademy Investor Education. Harriman House Ltd. Archived from the original on November 20, 2015. Retrieved November 20, 2015.
^Farrington, Robert (April 22, 2011). "The top 10 investors of all time". The College Investor. The College Investor, LLC. Retrieved November 20, 2015.
^Hay, Malcolm (3 November 2006). "Pat Condell: interview". Time Out London. Archived from the original on 15 October 2012. Retrieved 20 August 2010. Condell's 56. He was born an Irish Catholic but educated in Church of England schools.
^Robert William Reid (1974). Marie Curie. New American Library. p. 6. ISBN978-0-00-211539-1. Retrieved 15 March 2016. Unusually at such an early age, she became what T.H. Huxley had just invented a word for: agnostic.
^Fauci, Anthony (January 8, 2015). "Q&A with Dr. Anthony Fauci". C-SPAN (Interview). Interviewed by Brian Lamb. Archived from the original on June 15, 2020. Retrieved May 11, 2020.
^Elkaïm, Olivia (5 April 2012). "François Hollande : des origines protestantes hollandaises". La Vie (in French). Retrieved 3 February 2013. ("En décembre dernier, François Hollande confiait à La Vie : 'Je n'ai aucune pratique religieuse. Mais je respecte toutes les confessions. La mienne est de ne pas en avoir.'")
^Leon Goldensohn, The Nuremberg Interviews: An American Psychiatrist's Conversations with the Defendants and Witnesses, p. 75
^"Apart from [Rosenberg] giving his name and replying 'No' to a question as to whether he had anything to say, this atheist did not utter a word. Despite his disbelief in God he was accompanied by a Protestant chaplain, who followed him to the gallows and stood beside him praying." Hitler's Third Reich: A Documentary History, p. 613
^Logan, Michael (April 11, 2014). "Morgan Spurlock is CNN's Inside Man, Tracking Kardashians, UFOs and More". TV Guide. Retrieved December 2, 2021. Spurlock: I was raised Methodist but as I grew up and traveled the world and met more and more people from various religions, I have become much more of an agnostic.
^Vladislav Zubok; Constantine Pleshakov. Inside the Kremlin's Cold War: From Stalin to Khrushchev. pp. 4. ISBN0674455312. Zubok and Pleshakov further state, "Many would later note, however, that his works were influenced by a distinctly Biblical style" and "his atheism remained rooted in some vague idea of a God of nature."
^Brown, Mick (December 4, 2008). "Meryl Streep: mother superior". The Week. London. Archived from the original on December 10, 2008. Retrieved December 4, 2008.
^ Leon Goldensohn, The Nuremberg Interviews: An American Psychiatrist's Conversations with the Defendants and Witnesses, p. 256
^Richard West, Tito and the Rise and Fall of Yugoslavia, p.211, Carroll & Graff, 1996 ISBN0-7867-0332-6 "In one of his talks with Church officials, Tito went so far as to speak of himself 'as a Croat and a Catholic', but this comment was cut out of the press reports on the orders of Kardelj."
^Nikolaos A. Stavrou (ed.), Mediterranean Security at the Crossroads: a Reader, p.193, Duke University Press, 1999 ISBN0-8223-2459-8
^Vjekoslav Perica, Balkan Idols: Religion and Nationalism in Yugoslav States, p.103, Oxford University Press US, 2004 ISBN0-19-517429-1
^Totten, Michael J. (April 6, 2004). "Fighting Dirty". World Affairs Journal. American Peace Society. Archived from the original on October 27, 2015. Retrieved October 27, 2015. I'm not a Christian anymore, but I know if I were I would think it a desecration.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: unfit URL (link)
^Kumar, Pramod (1992). Towards Understanding Communalism. Chandigarh: Centre for Research in Rural and Industrial Development. p. 348. ISBN978-81-85835-17-4. OCLC27810012. VD Savarkar was publicly an atheist. Even when he was the Hindu Mahasabha leader he used to publicly announce and advertise lectures on atheism, on why god is not there and why all religions are false. That is why when defining Hindutva, he said, Hindutva is not defined by religion and tried to define it in a non-religious term: Punyabhoomi.
^John Carlin (August 5, 2005). "Zackie's story: The man who took on Mbeki – and won". The Independent. London. Archived from the original on October 1, 2007. Retrieved August 27, 2007. A homosexual, an atheist, and a militant anti-apartheid campaigner whose political ideas were forged on an intense reading of Marx, Lenin, and Trotsky...
^Reşat Kasaba, "Atatürk", The Cambridge history of Turkey: Volume 4: Turkey in the Modern World, Cambridge University Press, 2008; ISBN978-0-521-62096-3p. 163; accessed 27 March 2015.
^On 1 November 1937, his speech in parliament he said:
It is known by the world that, in our state administration, our main program is the Republican People's Party program. The principles it covers are the main lines that illuminate us in management and politics. But these principles must never be equated with the dogmas of books supposed to have come down from heaven. We derive our inspiration, not from heaven, or from an unseen world, but directly from life. Our path is guided by the homeland we live in, the Turkish nation of which we are members, and the conclusions we have drawn from the history of nations, which records a thousand and one disasters and sufferings. (Atatürk'ün Türkiye Büyük Millet Meclisi'nin V. Dönem 3. Yasama Yılını Açış Konuşmaları, in Turkish)
Even before accepting the religion of the Arabs, the Turks were a great nation. After accepting the religion of the Arabs, this religion, didn't effect to combine the Arabs, the Persians and Egyptians with the Turks to constitute a nation. (This religion) rather, loosened the national nexus of Turkish nation, got national excitement numb. This was very natural. Because the purpose of the religion founded by Muhammad, over all nations, was to drag to an including Arab national politics. (Afet İnan, Medenî Bilgiler ve M. Kemal Atatürk'ün El Yazıları, Türk Tarih Kurumu, 1998, p. 364.)
^Kranenberg, Annieke (August 11, 2007). "Als dit niet werkt, beledig ik Wilders wel" (in Dutch). De Volkskrant. Retrieved May 9, 2008. Quote: (Translation) "In interviews he calls himself an atheist, but until now 'I have been left alone by the beardmonkeys (referring to Muslim fundamentalists). Perhaps I have to make myself heard just a little bit better, I should be more explicit in my aversion to Islam and religion in general." (Dutch) "In interviews noemt hij zichzelf atheïst, maar tot nog toe 'ben ik ongemoeid gelaten door de baardapen. Misschien moet ik een hardere toon aanslaan en wat explicieter zijn in mijn afkeer van de islam en religies in het algemeen.'"
^Humanistische Omroep, Link to video interview with Hafid Bouazza Quote: (Translation) "Believers live behind a fence, and non-believers live in a pasture and they know there are believers out there behind the fence." "It [religion] is a matter of conditioning, of brainwashing." "I know that when I die, it's over with me." (Dutch) "Gelovigen leven achter een hek, en ongelovigen in een weiland, waarin ze weten dat er gelovigen zijn die achter hekken wonen." "Het [religie] is een kwestie van conditionering, van hersenspoeling" "Ik weet dat het moment dat ik ter aarde word besteld, dat het afgelopen is met mij."
^Verdonschot, Leon (May 8, 2008). ""Ik kan niet leven zonder roes." Interview met Hafid Baouzza, gepubliceerd in Dif nr.1" (in Dutch). Leonverdonschot.nl. Archived from the original on June 30, 2018. Retrieved May 9, 2008. Quote: (Translation) "Look, I'm an atheist. I believe God does not exist, I do not believe in an afterlife. How terrible it may be: Hitler isn't in hell getting pinched in his ass with a trident. I'm fine with the fact there are people who do believe that and get comfort from it, like my mother. I just hope the influence of religion on policy makers will diminish, because my freedom is precious to me." (Dutch) "Kijk, ik ben atheïst. Ik geloof niet dat God bestaat, ik geloof niet dat er een hiernamaals is. Hoe gruwelijk ook: Hitler wordt op dit moment niet in de hel met een drietand in zijn reet geprikt. Dat er mensen zijn die dat wél geloven en daar troost uit putten, mensen als mijn moeder: prima. Als de invloed van religies op beleidsmakers maar steeds kleiner wordt, want mijn vrijheid is me dierbaar."
^Kamm, Henry (1993, June 10). 'Hallelujah' is heard in the arch-atheist's temple. The New York Times (Late Edition (East Coast)), p. A4. Retrieved August 27, 2007, from National Newspaper Abstracts
^"I was born in a Muslim family, but I became an atheist." For freedom of expression, Taslima Nasreen, November 12, 1999 – Taslima Nasreen took the floor during Commission V of UNESCO's General Conference, as a delegate of the NGO International Humanist and Ethical Union (Accessed December 23, 2006).
^Obama, Barack (October 16, 2006). "My Spiritual Journey". TIME. Archived from the original on January 22, 2013. Retrieved September 26, 2008. My father was almost entirely absent from my childhood, having been divorced from my mother when I was 2 years old; in any event, although my father had been raised a Muslim, by the time he met my mother he was a confirmed atheist, thinking religion to be so much superstition.
^"Warraq, 60, describes himself now as an agnostic..." Dissident voices, World Magazine, June 16, 2007, Vol. 22, No. 22.
^"Tojo had entered 'Shinto' as his religion, but he had probably done so because he thought an entry of some kind was expected, and, anyway, Shinto was more a national feeling than a religion." Walt Sheldon, The Honorable Conquerors: The Occupation in Japan, 1945-1952, pp. 167-168