Apparently he is not comparing religion and atheism. He also mentioned money, beauty, etc. You seems miss the point of the quote as a whole. Even atheism is not worship. Atheists, as human, still need something to worship on, like everyone else. But again, the focus is really not atheists.

Getting downvoted. Worship here obviously means something other than religious. Worship money, wealth, power, etc. is commonly used in language. It's pointless to fixated on the narrow meaning of the word.