The faithful must learn to respect those who question their beliefs

[muriel_volestrangler]

18. The problem I see is that the 'realm' of religion is strewn with conflicting beliefs

so that the claim of religion to be a guide to morals looks a failure. We have a few unifying concepts like "do as you would be done by", but when that comes to specifics such as "should we have the death penalty?", religion still can't answer the question consistently. Religion is also hopelessly conflicted over other claims, such as "do people have a continued existence as themselves after death, and if so, is it in the physical world?"

Science may be growing closer to this realm, with attempts to work out 'objective' morals, but mostly, science has just picked off the religious claims, one by one.

I do agree that religious traditions that have long embraced skepticism are also those which tend to be able to live with and adapt to scientific discovery. It's the sects that claim certainty of their dogma that are denying basic realities like evolution or a multi-billion year old earth.