Alarmed by faiths power

Mrs Rosalie Watkins has produced the sort of intemperate and vituperative response I have come to expect from those who show hubristic indignation when anyone dares to voice disagreement with their own beliefs.

In the past, her particular religion would have had me burned at the stake for heresy but I suppose Rosalie Watkins would now say that her church, to use her own words, "was distorted by evil extremists for their own ends" when they indulged in such practices.

I made two points which Rosalie did not answer. Is she a politician by any chance?

Firstly, the world has many faiths teaching very strange and sometimes contradictory things. They survive mainly by indoctrinating young children, which often results in intolerance of other faiths and fanaticism when they are adults. There are endless examples of this throughout human history.

The second point is that I think it is quite wrong for any of the taxes I, and other like-minded taxpayers, pay to be given to any faith in which we do not believe. Of course, faith schools provide an education for children who would have to be educated in any case, but faith schools only exist to brainwash youngsters into a particular faith and, in the case of Roman Catholics, to put the fear of eternal damnation and the torture of hell into their vulnerable minds. However, as the Jesuits know, what you are taught at an early age sticks in the mind.

I think it is very alarming that the faiths still have such power in our country and enjoy a special protected status. If the government policy of increasing the number of faith schools carries on, then that power will increase.

Incidentally, I am not anti-religious. I think the faiths have their place in society, but not to inflict their own hang-ups, prejudices and intolerant beliefs on the rest of us.

G Hensman, Parkway Road, Dudley.