The idea that God could only forgive our sins by having his son tortured to death as a scapegoat is surely, from an objective point of view, a deeply unpleasant idea. If God wanted to forgive us our sins, why didn't he just forgive them? Why did he have to have his son tortured?

Do you advocate the Ten Commandments as a guide to the good life? Then I can only presume that you don't know the Ten Commandments.

Pope Francis seems to be a much nicer man than Pope Benedict, but I'm not sure that his views on things that really matter are all that different. Whereas Benedict was perhaps a wolf in wolf's clothing, Francis is perhaps a wolf in sheep's clothing.

Life results from the non-random survival of randomly varying replicators. The watchmaker is blind

Let children learn about different faiths, let them notice their incompatibility, and let them draw their own conclusions about the consequences of that incompatibility. As for whether they are ‘valid,’ let them make up their own minds when they are old enough to do so.

God is an idea that people believe in and I spend time arguing with people that subscribe to that idea(man made idea).

I am agnostic only to the extent that I am agnostic about fairies at the bottom of the garden