No need to sneer (From Daily Echo)

No need to sneer

4:29pm Friday 27th July 2012 in Readers' Letters

I AM responding at once to PeterYates’s letter “Faith is not a difficult concept just a faintly amusing fairy tale.”

As a Unitarian I share his views to an extent but would certainly not ask the Echo to print a disclaimer – that is not their role.

Nor do I fail to love and respect many of Christian and other faiths who have helped me through life. We all know of those who have used faith as an excuse for terrible behaviour.

Faith has also inspired men and women to do wonderful things – working for the sick and disadvantaged sometimes at the cost of their own lives.

So I do not sneer at the Christians or, for that matter, the Hindus or the Buddhists or the Muslims .

As Unitarians we hope to join them in searching for truth. We are a creedless church, a fellowship of like minded folk taking strength from each other in this bewildering world.

We do however have difficulty with those who preach damnation for nonbelievers.

This is where our much vaunted tolerance runs into trouble.

On the matter of God many of us are agnostic but we certainly do not believe in the fires of hell.

BRENDA KNOPF, Southampton .