5. Isn’t the gbs basically just as missionary as the religions? Doesn’t the book "Which way leads to God?" clearly show that the gbs wants to indoctrinate children too?

The gbs naturally has the aim of reaching people. It wants to convince them that it makes sense to strengthen the values of humanism and enlightenment in society. However, unlike the Pope (for example), the foundation does not claim to be in possession of the "one and only divine truth". Rather, it relies on the principle of critical examination, which demands that false convictions be given up, as soon as better arguments are available. The children’s book "Which is the way to God, please?, asked the little piglet" was conceived as an antidote to the existing and very real religious indoctrination (for example in Catholic nursery schools) and is intended to bring some pluralism into the nursery. In numerous interviews, the authors made very clear that they would take the book off the market if the same were done with children’s bibles, in which horror stories such as the Great Flood are told with all their gruesome details. However, the religious fraction felt unable to agree to this step. Consequently, the little piglet is still on its travels, to free children light-heartedly from the fear of divine retribution.

6. Shouldn’t we respect the religious convictions of others?

As humanists we naturally respect every human being as a human being. But some convictions and actions simply don’t deserve to be respected. We must not overlook the fact that the religious convictions of many deeply religious people legitimize abuses of human rights (such as discrimination against women and homosexuals), and/or explain the world on the basis of nonsensical, totally out- dated assumptions (such as the idea that humanity is the crowning glory of divine creation, which is diametrically opposed to the findings of evolutionary biology). To respect such inhuman or irrational beliefs would be a betrayal of the values of humanism and enlightenment.

7. Surely religions are necessary for us to form moral values?

It is a historically irrefutable fact that the fundamental rights we enjoy in modern democratic societies very largely did not come from religions; on the contrary, they had to be fought for in bitter emancipation struggles against the religions. Many values that we today take for granted, such as rationality, democracy or the right to self-determination, were developed as far back as the time of ancient Rome or Greece, but with the rise of Christianity disappeared for almost a millennium. It was not until the Renaissance, the time when the ancient scripts were re-discovered, that Europe finally began to develop ideas of individual liberty again.

In modern times too, it has largely been individuals with a critical attitude to religion who have promoted the development of values such as the equality of the sexes, ideas of social justice, freedom of speech and of the media and the right to sexual self-determination. For example, the subject of human rights was pushed forward by Thomas Paine, a critic of religion, whilst a whole string of Popes condemned it as "insufferable presumption". Not until 1961 was the Pope of the time, Johannes XXIII, able to bring himself to issue a convoluted recognition of human rights. The Vatican remains, however, the only state in Europe not to have ratified the European Human Rights Convention. This is one example of many which show that a closer inspection of "Christian values" reveals them to be much less than the name suggests.