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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

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Original poster

in telling DS that God didn't make him, actually, I did.

173 replies

bintofbohemia · 06/04/2011 17:44

(With some input from DH, obviously.) He's at a C of E school because we've recently moved and it was Hobsons Choice, C of E or Catholic. He's 4 and a half and started school at a really good, diverse, secular school, then we moved and he is now being taught that God is a man who made everything and he has to pray 3 times a day and is being taught god knows what else.

It just really irks me. What worries me the most is that yes, when he gets older he'll probably make his own mind up but that if he's being taught all this stuff as fact alongside his abc and numbers (which actually are real things) he's liable to find that he absorbs all this stuff and it becomes his default setting, IYSWIM. I'm not an atheist or anti Christian but I do have problems with faith schools and children being taught this stuff at such an impressionable age.

I'm tempted to pull him out of assemblies etc but I don't know if it's the right thing to do, and they'd still get him in classes anyway no doubt.

Anyone else have this?

OP posts:

GrimmaTheNome · 08/04/2011 20:42

To be honest I think most 4 and 5 year olds will believe in God if told about him because it helps them make sense of a world that is hard when you're too young to get science.

Since when are 4-5 year olds too young to 'get' science? Our DD has never had the slightest difficulty understanding factually-based answers to her questions. Maybe we're lucky that my DH is exceptionally good at explaining things to her at a comprehensible level for her age.

Gooseberrybushes · 08/04/2011 21:21

lol

seeker · 08/04/2011 21:48

I can't understand why people don't see that expecting small children to say the prayers of a religion that their family doesn't follow - and making it a condition of receiving a state education - is just wrong! It's not about whether it will turn them into Christians - it's a point of principal. If I want my child to pray, then I will teach him how do it at nome. And so should everyone else. That's not what school's for!

Gooseberrybushes · 08/04/2011 22:20

"principle"

seeker · 09/04/2011 00:07

Thank you. You are avoiding answering my substantive point by correcting my typos. I'll take that as meaning "wow, seeker, you're right. i had never thought of it like that before!"

seeker · 09/04/2011 00:09

Did you notice I wrote "nome" instead of "home"?

Gooseberrybushes · 09/04/2011 00:13

Yes, I am ignoring it aren't I? Like I said, have experience of what you describe and just thought of it as a culture tolerant thing. I kinda said it earlier and you kinda ignored that too.

Roseflower · 09/04/2011 00:15

wow, seeker, you're right. i had never thought of it like that before!"

Be impossible seeing how its a carbon copy of countless other posts

seeker · 09/04/2011 00:34

You still haven;t answered it, though!

Annpan88 · 09/04/2011 05:57

I've been in catholic education most of my life and when kids get a bit older they do question it. I think more so as their up against it most days.

Personally I wouldn't pull him out of assemblies, wouldn't want to segregate him from classmates.

I wouldn't worry! :)

Himalaya · 09/04/2011 07:53

I don't understand how you can say that teaching children to pretend to pray to a god they don't believe in comes under 'cultural tolerance'.

Its teaching them that hipocracy is OK, and that they should go through the motions for the sake of conformity.

It's like saying Sikhs should be culturally tolerant of British haircutting traditions, and realise that it is only hair, like everyone else.

Either religious practices are deeply meaningful rituals for their adherents (which deserve a certain ammount of protection in the name of respect for religious freedom) or they are arbitrary cultural traditions that can be expected of believers and non-believers alike. You can't have it both ways.

Either you can say that

Himalaya · 09/04/2011 07:55

I phone editing...

anyway BintOB - how did your parents evening go?

Gooseberrybushes · 09/04/2011 08:28

"hypocrisy"

actually Sikhs ought to be tolerant of Britain's knife carrying traditions

Gooseberrybushes · 09/04/2011 08:34

anyway it's not teaching them anything of the sort, you are reading way too much into it

my children have had to do all sorts, they're not hypocrites, they just have a lot of respect

"Either religious practices are deeply meaningful rituals for their adherents (which deserve a certain ammount of protection in the name of respect for religious freedom) or they are arbitrary cultural traditions that can be expected of believers and non-believers alike. You can't have it both ways."

Well of course you can it's obvious they are both. Have you nver been to a country where it's as much part of the culture as the spiritual life? I mean -- of COURSE you can! it's what they are, most of the time.

Thing is, people on these threads find all religions deserving of respect and time except Christianity. Honestly I think some people ought to have a bit more experience of other countries before making such limited judgments .

Himalaya · 09/04/2011 09:14

Gooseberrybushes -

I have been to plenty of other countries. I recognize that it is quite ok to join in eating mooncakes in China during the autumm festival. It is not OK join in taking the host in a church in Italy.

It is quite ok for children to learn Christmas carols and the words to the Lords Prayer etc...it is not ok for them have to pretend to be taking part in a deaply meaningful religious practice for the sake of conformity.

Respecting someone at prayer means not disturbing them, making fun of them etc... it doesn't mean pretending to join in.

hissymissy · 09/04/2011 09:42

YABU. You sent him to a C of E school, what did you expect? Either respect what they teach or change schools.

Secondly, you didn't make him. I'm not saying God did either. But saying you 'made' him implies you created him. You didn't design him or do anything except have sex, and have your DP inseminate you. Neither of you 'made' anyone.

seeker · 09/04/2011 10:03

Himalaya - thank you so much for saying what I want to say but sooooo much better!

seeker · 09/04/2011 10:05

"Thing is, people on these threads find all religions deserving of respect and time except Christianity."

ANd please can someone tell me where on this thread Christianity has not been respected?

There is one rather sweary poster who often get involved and who sometimes oversteps the mark (IMHO) but I don;t think she's been on this thread, has she?

3rdnparty · 09/04/2011 10:15

parma - where are you in london ? our local non religious v multi cultural school (20+ languages at last count) is certainly talking about the christian festivals and have had quite a lot of info from ds about jesus and easter.... and am having an interesting time explaining that not everyone beleives it and it is not fact.... well never mind vasakhi next ! don't get a holiday for that though..

SpringchickenGoldBrass · 09/04/2011 10:49

This reply has been deleted

Message deleted by Mumsnet.

Himalaya · 09/04/2011 11:20

Seeker - you're welcome!

seeker · 09/04/2011 23:57

Oh, SCGB - I'll neve know what you said!

SpringchickenGoldBrass · 10/04/2011 22:01

Seeker: Oh, the usual - that people are entitled to believe whatever they like, and there is a difference between respecting people's right to believe things and respecting whatever utter bullshit they believe.
Religions should be no more exempt from robust criticism than political beliefs or taste in music: think what you like but you don't get a free pass from being laughed at or disagreed with.

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