Today is the feast day of.................. .

But of course they didn't get the seven virgins – that's a different religion. Men are so stupid sometimes.

Who did the hammering? Members of the same religion who thought they were heretics, or members of another religion, or members of no religion? Somehow I don't think it'll have been the last option.

'ang on I'll have a look

"They were were exiled to Egypt after confessing their faith before the Proconsul Tertius. They were martyred at Diospolis in the Thebaid during the reign of Decius (Numerian?), under the governor Sabinus, for their Christian faith".

Ha! It was the anti's wot killed 'em!

The Roman governor then. So the hammerers were Romans, who had a perfectly good religion of their own.

So not atheists wot dunnit, just as I supposed.

By perfectly good, I don't mean perfectly good, of course. I just mean alternative. But the fact remains that religious people killed other religious people because one politico-religious group found another politico-religious group threatening.

Most of the martyr stories are similar, though sometimes it's the different factions within one religion that fight and kill each other.

Atheists (or the antis, as you call them) don't figure in these stories.

They don't figure in modern day martyrdoms either.

There probably weren't any atheists in those days. Too scared not to believe in something.

"By perfectly good, I don't mean perfectly good, of course. I just mean alternative." #gettingfunny

Very true Ana.

Yes, exactly, ana. Too scared because they probably would have been murdered if they'd spoken out. So glad it's different now.

I presume you mean something supernatural by your something. As an atheist I believe in lots of things, including many things religious people believe in, like kindness. Just nothing supernatural.