Should Darwin be the icon of atheism?

Tomorrow, 150 years to the day, Darwin unveiled his theory of Evolution by Natural Selection.

In a nice bit of serendipity, since I am currently reading about The History of Atheism, a leader in the Telegraph says:

We should be careful about pigeon-holing the man who wouldn't pigeon-hole pigeons.
Wasn't Darwin also a man of God, who wrestled with some form of faith throughout his life? Was he not intensely respectful of the relationships between science and faith? Should atheists, such as Dawkins, really adopt Darwin as their champion?

Atheism, of course goes back at least to the 4th Century BC, and probably further.

One of the commenters on the article (Chris) noted:
"Of course Darwin isn't the father of atheism. Atheists have been around a lot longer that that - it just hasn't been terribly safe to admit to being one for most of history!"

So, in celebration of Darwin's work I give you the links to:
On the Origin of Species By Means of Natural Selection, or, the Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life
The Voyage of the Beagle
From The Gutenberg Project. You can download Darwin's work as text files and read at your leisure.

A History of Atheism

I borrowed this book from the library the other day. A History of Atheism by Georges Minois. It's in French (because it's a french library. In France)
My previous reading in french started with adventure stories for teens and has progressed to whodunnits and all the novels by Robert Crais.
So it's time to try something heavy.

The cover photo shows: Epicurus, Rabelais, Hobbes, marquis de Sade, Nietsche and Sartre. Who the hell are they? Well, OK, I've heard of them, and come across quotes, but I have no idea of how they fit in with each other.

The cover blurb talks about someone called Theodore l'Athée (Theodorus the Atheist) who declared in the 4th Century BC that God didn't exist.

That's just the back cover and I've learnt something new!

To keep myself motivated I'd like to blog my progress through the book.