"because atheism seems to be a more active form of nonbelief."
Not really accurate Joe - you can reject a belief in God(s) without actually doing anything about it.
The atheist organisations (very much a minuscule minority of atheists as a whole) are merely those who wish to give voice to their atheism
" I think that when any one way of thinking becomes the majority, it tends to become oppressive"
Pretty well the sate of things when religion held sway - let's hope atheists don't treat Christians the way Christians treated atheists, it would play hell with our natural ecology if atheists started cutting down all our trees to burn Christians.
Jim Carroll