You also seem incredulous that a complete set of fossilized examples of every species ever to have existed has not been found, rather than marvelling at the fact that fossilization is a very unlikely process and that it’s a ‘miracle’ that so many fossils *have* been found.

Evolution by natural selection is an observable –and observed–fact, as much a fact as gravitation. Human “belief” in it is irrelevant. It has nothing whatever to do with either atheism nor religion. The one neither proves nor disproves, nor conflicts with, the other–except of course for the funamentalists, the literal 6,000-year old earth crowd. But those types are immune to reason anyway.

Yeah, the “gardener” theory is as plausible as any other.