I was in a personal conversation with people at work about dating and what minimum requirements were in selecting someone to date. One of my big requirements is that he is somewhere between agnostic to atheist. I don’t want to risk offending someone I’m in an intimate relationship with. I like to talk about my views, so I know it would come up. And I don’t need to be “saved” because I simply don’t believe that there is a god.
So I told these people from work that I’m an atheist and they were fine with it. One of them even brought up the fact that I wouldn’t want a date to try to save me.
One of the other women is in the dating game and we asked her how she finds dates if she’s not using a dating site. She says she finds them at her church.
I immediately wanted to tell her I’m sorry if I offended her by saying I’m an atheist. I’m sure she’s not offended because of it, so why did I feel like that?
I reasoned myself out of saying sorry, thankfully. I think that more people need to be openly atheist / agnostic so that it doesn’t feel offensive to say it out loud.
Randomness Expressed 
Is always interesting to see how people react when you tell them you are an atheist. I have good and bad experiences with this. I was once laughed at by a Christian, not very loving of them.
Ha! Laugh right back!
I think it’s a natural reaction to feel guilty. Not that we need to, it’s just common knowledge that atheism gets on the nerves of so many people for no reason. It makes me want to state it more… What’s the worst thing you can do as an atheist?
I used to worry about saying the wrong things and offending people when I talk about my atheism. But then I realized that some people are going to be offended no matter how polite or nice I try to be, even if all I say is “I’m an atheist.” So, I kind of stopped caring about offending people when talking about atheism (or at least, I try to–sometimes I still find myself holding back or worrying about offense). I do try to maintain respectful, civil discourse when talking about atheism, but if someone gets offended by my position, that’s on them.
You shouldn’t be worried about offending someone just because you mentioned you were an atheist.
I do have requirements for dating, but belief/non-belief in a deity is necessarily a requirement. If they believed in creationism, thought I was going to hell, etc, then it might be an issue. My fiance, for example has some belief in a deity, but he’s not religious. It isn’t a big deal. We are good about discussing are disagreements, and then moving on with out lives.