In his piece ‘Atheists and atheists’, your columnist Roamer (November 27) invites intellectually unsophisticated atheists “to peer in the minds of atheists of calibre... into those of Jurgen Habermas or Marcello Pera, who both found it civilised and civilising to exchange their thoughts with Pope Benedict XVI.”

William Flynn, a self-confessed atheist, in an online comment on the above, subjected both Roamer and Pera to the most vitriolic personal abuse.

Mr Flynn’s hostility towards anything religious not only blinds him to the good religion has done, or is doing, but also to the religious faith of scientists, artists, philosophers and literary figures who are very sincere, loving and service-oriented.

Equally, Mr Flynn is blind to a civilised breed of fellow atheists such as Pera who are cultured, urbane and intellectually sophisticated. These atheists are crystal-clear about their own exact standpoint and yet they are fair regarding the opinions of others that they find inadequate.

Like religious fanatics, atheist fanatics are driven by a massive dose of repression and denial to avoid inner conflict and doubt.

They are frequently out of touch with the reality around them and are exceedingly intolerant of those who do not share their point of view. Their irrationality knows no bounds.

Believers should take atheism espoused by level-headed atheists seriously, learn to know it with an open mind, give due weight to its concerns, causes and values, and must not shrink from admitting publicly that religion has more often than not come across as “opium of the people”.

There must be genuine dialogue with level-headed atheists, with all that true dialogue pre-supposes and entails, and to co-operate with atheists in shaping our common world.