To continue to challenge the school on this? Religious observance

TBF as a Christian do you not recognize and accept that Christianity (and other religions) moved in on and converted many prior festivals into 'Christmas and Easter' and such things as decorated trees, gift giving, Easter eggs, chicks and bunnies, ect, have little to do with Christianity but are enjoyed by children as part of festivals that for many have nothing to do with a belief in Christ?

As a child it was 'Christian' teachers who didn't let me draw robins, make cotton wool covered post boxes, paper crackers, straw stars, wear paper hats, or make Christmas or Easter cards, because they wanted to ensure that my mothers demands would be felt miserably by me.
I would stand outside, or sit facing the wall so that Christians could be sure that I was not in any way benefiting. I litter picked the yard while others sang carols inside, often made to put a finger in one ear, lest I should enjoy something, and once notably was sent to stand at the back of the kitchens in the snow because a Salvation Army brass band was playing at the school Christmas concert.
I may be wrong but I've come to the conclusion that it was a poor representation of what being Christian is.

HOW DARE YOU EAT EGGS AT EASTER BECAUSE YOU DON'T THINK JESUS IS REAL 😂😂😂. Anyway, most of what is celebrated now has been appropriated by Christians from old pagan traditions. So why do you celebrate Jesus' birth at the winter solstice if you don't believe in pre-christian religion?

Yes, of course keep challenging them. You are within your rights to ask for this, and your wishes are just as important as theirs. It sounds like this is not your usual explaining what some people believe happened at Christmas and Easter, but talking about it like it's the only truth and scaring them into religion. This is not right and they should be made aware.

@Toomuchsuntoday @Lorelaigilmore88

being atheist isn’t about being cool, unless you think being religious is about being uncool?!

I am so with you. While watching the Christmas episode of All Creatures Great and Small last year, a character had been brought up in a non believing home. So he had never previously sung Christmas songs, ate Christmas food, had Christmas presents. It really stuck me that OK it was based in 1930s but that was true non belief of Christianity and it's festivals, not just picking the bits you like and find acceptable and fun and reject the religious aspects.

@PurpleBugz yes, well articulated. I think this is the right and best approach. Encourage your child to question every single thing and debate it.
We cannot single handedly change some of these systems no matter how hard we try.
I have a problem with the entire school curriculum. But what can I do. Home schooling will never be an option unfortunately so we sometimes just have to work with the systems we know we cannot overpower.

I would keep on at them.

I removed my son from mass and in England at least they do have to offer alternative provision

(as it happens I am a sahm so the head asked me very nicely and apologetically if I minded bringing him in after mass, which was fine with us- but she made it very clear that I was doing them a favour- it was a Catholic school and all the staff wanted to go to mass)

I think you can undo what you see as bad by having conversations at home about how people with a belief will often state it as a fact. That belief and opinion are not necessarily facts. Teach your child critical thinking rather than try to shield them from what you believe is incorrect teaching.

Different but similar. My child attends a school that teaches the belief people can change sex. I do not subscribe to this. I cannot pull my child from this teaching. I've spoken with my child and they understand I do not agree with what they are taught and that they need to make their own mind up on things like this. It's actually been really good I think their critical thinking skills have really benefited

sleepfortheweek I'm glad to hear it. IMO the less fuss is made of conflicting beliefs (within reason) the easier it is for children to get on with growing up.

BTW I spent a long time feeling strongly that regardless of God's existence or not, the creation stories held some major flaws, not least that you had to start from a point of accepting that: 'In the beginning, God was just there...'

Science and evolution was just obviously more sense.
However, I have come to realize that one slight problem, is one has to start from the acceptance point of 'In the beginning, whatever caused the Big Bang was just there...'
Dammed if you do, and dammed if you don't! 😂

So many cool parents on this thread seemingly congratulating themselves on 'saving' their children from so call indoctrination because they kick up a fuss about the occasion school church services.
Please do also confirm that you boycott anything related to Christmas and Easter that your children may enjoy.
As a Christian and a mother i find it so depressingly predictable.

You are risking your children feeling very 'other' especially if all the schools in the area meet together for the Christmas Service. You say you give your children the choice to attend but be honest with yourself, they know exactly which answer you want to hear. You are entitled to make your own decision but you are really refusing to allow your children to make a decision for themselves, evidenced by your ridiculing your daughter's claim to want to be Christian. If you just go along with the flow it will be a non issue. Your insistence on making such an issue is making it into a BIG issue. I'm with the school on this one.

I found some of my school's religious assemblies distressing. I remember crying once after a particularly supersessionist one where there was an undercurrent vibe of 'we are all Christians; Jews are no more'.

I envied the JW girl who got to sit it all out, because her parents excused her.

Slightly outing but hey ho.

When my kids were at primary, one of the 7 governors was the madly happy clappy vicar.
I called him out for pretending to eat a daffodil in front of the kids "because god would save him"
they got me to update the RE policy as a baptised and confirmed atheist I was best informed.

During one RE week, they wanted all of the kids to come in with their favourite creation tales
I sent my kids in with a Viking and an Egyptian story.
That week never happened again.

Do not challenge head on, subvert and humour.
Your kids will thank you as will all the wavering parents.

(PS the vicars wife left him for the gravedigger)

She made some bad taste tweets about resurrection in Easter Day. Just snippy for the hell of it.

sorry - I do realise that I can’t assume everyone is like her.

I understand that you've got a principle to uphold but I don't think will this last for very long.

I was also educated in a pretty similar setup and, along with my peer group, completely lost any interest in religion by the time we hit secondary school.

If you can bear to, I'd just tolerate it for a little while.

I'm the child who's parent ensured 'The word of God' would not be in my ears through school and I would not be part of any collective worship or carol or hymn singing. I would not be indoctrinated by them, I would instead be indoctrinated by my parent and their demands.
I was excluded and punished and rejected again and again and again in so many different ways because my parent's views were so, so, much more important than me. I could not be trusted to think for myself, or have any believe but that, that one adult or another adult demanded of me.
My parent was more extreme than you admit to here, but tread carefully, the damage of my parent being prepared to go to major lengths to make me different, and ensure that only they had ultimate power, has outlasted them, and did no one any favors, least of all me.

TBH in the end my life was so shit I sought out God. The silence back was deafening and every bit as painful as my parent was. There is no place for me but inside my head. Everyone else and what they thought and believed always came first. If I believe, I have been brainwashed by the church, if I don't, I have been brainwashed by my parent. I have been robbed of true choice. My parent wouldn't have cared, the important thing to them was to impose their views.

I took my children to churches and sent them to church schools (our only decent ones) under the banner of curious agnostics interested in knowing and debating what was said in them. I didn't sign the church register and was open as to why. They have also been to Friends meetings, temples and to mosque, and we have debated God, God's, Higher powers, and human need for Deity, and comfort of ritual, happily, along with Jesus as a historical figure, the more likely reality of his birth, and death, how everything ties together historically, and the numbers required to support traveling Maggi etc. They grew up understanding and enjoying stained glass, that Santa came from the tradition of Saint Nicholas, but we don't seek to ruin others fun.

Where I have come across things I found to be concerning, I have taken the lesson and shown my children how it applies in real life and turned it towards personal responsibility and a moral and self preserving code. The church demonstrates the weight of sin and how it allegedly can so easily be lifted and made good, I demonstrate the actual weight of living with what you know to be serious wrongdoing, and how hard it would be to be lifted depending on it's seriousness. If you wish to believe in quick fixes that's your choice.

I have always pointed them towards the understanding that religion is what comes between man and 'God' however you view the existence of the later, and there is as much good and beauty to be found as there is bad and ugliness.
It doesn't have to be 'You will believe, or disbelieve, only what I/they tell you.'

For those who think this is harmless because the children won’t necessarily become religious from attending services I think this misses an important point.
Schools should be teaching facts not promoting an ideology based on their own beliefs. How can children trust teachers to give them accurate information in their education if what is taught in one area is actually turns out to be an entirely subjective view with no evidential basis?

This is a battle worth fighting. Endorsement of a religion by the education system is inherently unjust. You aren’t just fighting this battle for your children, you are fighting it for children who come next.

no, most children won’t adopt a religion by sitting through a few services, or even weekly services. That still doesn’t mean that they should be required to sit through the attempted indoctrination.

Alice Roberts? yes a sad disappointment on the bones front but I don't think I've heard her bad mouthing religion per se

Maybe it’s just the voice-pieces - the archaeologist one - who is giving them a bad name?

“Do you think it's also essential for the 'innate spiritual development' of children from Jewish/Muslim/Hindu families that they are forced to attend Christian services at school and taught Christianity as truth?”

They will need to have spiritual development opportunities too - it’s mandatory. And if those families send their child to a Christian school then they should expect a level of Christian practice that they will be allowed to opt out of. It doesn’t mean they might not like to look at the pretty coloured lights at Christmas in church, or to hear what a Christingle means, or light a candle and to know why the church is decorated in different colours at different times… and to maybe sit and reflect on the similarities and differences with their own religious practices.

It’s all good experiential stuff that children will benefit from - certainly more than being excluded and standing in a corridor with a text book while the other kids are joining in and getting on with it.

excuse me,@HoneyButterPopcorn
I am a humanist and I am an old school gender critical 2nd wave feminist who treats religions and especially religious people with respect
I just don't think christianity should have privileged access to young minds
religion doesn't have a monopoly on spirituality or deep questions