In spite of having very bitter memories of a Catholic upbringing which included frequent beatings by Jesuit brothers at my Catholic Grammar School, I am inclined to agree with almost everything you say Joe.

It doesn't bother me that other people have different experience and different ideas.

I find myself in the exact centre of these arguments, being a believer in a deity, but not a believer in any religious organisation or cult.

I think the biggest stumbling blocks to discussion and tolerance are the oft repeated conflation of "Faith" with "Religion", which are IMO two entirely different things, and the fact that some of the debaters are so firmly entrenched at the extremes of the argument that they are not aware that a middle ground exists.

It's rather like two strangers shouting threats at each other across a wide gorge, not realising that if they take the bridge and meet in the middle they can discuss the situation quietly, or even shake hands.

It's the kind of thinking which leads to grown men terrifying primary school children in the street, because those children of a different faith have to cross their territory to get to school.

Don T.