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Indeed. I think the problem is that people are confusing assumptions with faith. Everyone makes assumptions, and it's impossible to avoid making them. But faith seems to me to be a different thing altogether. People can have faith in God (clearly), faith in public leaders (as in "I have faith in Martin Luther King" which means about the same as "I believe in Martin Luther King") or in their friends and family ("I have faith my wife won't cheat on me"). Faith is being used in all of these cases in a roughly similar way. But saying "I don't believe that there is a God" is something different. Of course it's based on assumptions, some of which you undoubtedly share with Christians (such as the belief in the general reliability of science). But that doesn't mean it's a faith, or faith-based, or however you want to put it.
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"Die Deutschen meinen, daß die Kraft sich in Härte und Grausamkeit offenbaren müsse, sie unterwerfen sich dann gerne und mit Bewunderung:[...]. Daß es Kraft giebt in der Milde und Stille, das glauben sie nicht leicht."
"The Germans believe that power must reveal itself in hardness and cruelty and then submit themselves gladly and with admiration[...]. They do not believe readily that there is power in meekness and calm."
-- Friedrich Nietzsche
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