I think human beings should always at the very minimum endeavor to understand that which they do not like or agree with, one would be led to think that atheists are a bunch of arrogant intolerant chauvinists if @hamburglar's and others who concur with his views are anything to go by.
@humburglar's breed of atheism is aptly referred to as, 'combative atheism' where you will hear such slogans as, 'if there is a God why does he let us suffer' or 'you religious people are stupid because you worship God', this kind of atheism which was made popular by the likes of Dr Richard Dawkins is shallow,lacks legitimacy and generally gives atheism a bad name but i will say this obiter, its a free world and we are all free to pick our desired poison.
The kind of atheism i concur with is the atheism of tolerance and constructive critique of all religious texts and practices without being condescending made popular in part by my favorite scholars the late Dr D M Murdock and Prof. Fransesca stavrakopoulou who is a professor of hebrew bible and ancient religion at the university of Exeter who is also an atheist and i have had the opportunity to attend a number of her public lectures on religion and God.(you can google their scholarly works)
when all is said and done, there is nothing and nothing is ether
'One headache for famous medieval holy people was that someone might murder you to acquire your body parts for the relics trade'