He is setting up a charity that will subsidise books, pamphlets and DVDs attacking the “educational scandal” of theories such as creationism while promoting rational and scientific thought.

The foundation will also attempt to divert donations from the hands of “missionaries” and church-based charities.

His plans are sparking criticism from academics, religious leaders and fellow scientists. The Church of England described them as “disturbing”, while others complained that Dawkins’s foundation bore the “whiff of a campaigning organisation” rather than a charity.

John Hall, dean of Westminster and the Church of England’s chief education officer, said: “I would be very disturbed if this project was going to be widely supported because it’s not based on reasoned argument.”

Dawkins, Oxford’s professor of the public understanding of science, is the author of various bestsellers extolling evolution, such as The Selfish Gene. His latest book, The God Delusion, is a sustained polemic against religious faith.

He established his foundation in both Britain and America earlier this year and is now applying for charitable status. It was founded in response to what he calls the “organised ignorance” that is promoting creationism, the belief that the Old Testament account of the origins of man is true. Another challenge comes in the form of “intelligent design”, the suggestion that life is the result of a guiding force rather than pure evolutionary natural selection.

“The enlightenment is under threat,” Dawkins said. “So is reason. So is truth. We have to devote a significant proportion of our time and resources to defending it from deliberate attack from organised ignorance. We even have to go out on the attack ourselves, for the sake of reason and sanity.”

Creationism is less widespread in Britain than in the US, but there is a growing movement lobbying to have it introduced as part of the national curriculum.

The Emmanuel Schools Foundation, sponsored by Sir Peter Vardy, the Christian car dealer, has been criticised for featuring creationist theories in lessons in the three comprehensives it runs. A spokesman for the foundation denied the claims. However, Steve Layfield, head of science at Emmanuel College in Gateshead, is a director of Truth in Science, a Christian group campaigning to have “intelligent design” in science lessons.

Truth in Science has sent DVDs and educational materials to thousands of secondary schools to encourage them to debate intelligent design. Andy McIntosh, director at the organisation and professor of thermodynamics at Leeds University, said: “We are not flat-earthers. We’re just trying to encourage good scientific discussion.”

Dawkins, however, describes the theory as a “bronze-age myth” and plans to send his own material to schools to counter the “subversion of science”.

He also plans to campaign against children being labelled with the religion of their parents. “It is immoral to brand children with religion,” he said. “This is a Catholic child. That is a Muslim child. I want everyone to flinch when they hear such a phrase, just as they would if they heard that is a Marxist child.”

But Hall said: “The European convention on human rights is clear that parents have the right to bring up children within the faith they hold.”

Dawkins is also critical of donating money to religion-based charities, warning that pledges for disaster victims should not end up in the hands of “missionaries”. His foundation will maintain a database of charities free of “church contamination”.

Christian Aid, however, believes Dawkins is “tarring a lot of excellent charities with the same brush”. Dominic Nutt, a spokesman, said: “Many charities give aid only on the basis of need.”

Dawkins’s approach has also offended fellow scientists. Steven Rose, emeritus professor of biology at the Open University, said: “I worry that Richard’s view about belief is too simplistic, and so hostile that as a committed secularist myself I am uneasy about it. We need to recognise that our own science also depends on certain assumptions about the way the world is — assumptions that he and I of course share.”

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