Mother takes DD to church and teaches her religion against my wishes

[Andifnotnow]

My mother looks after DD a day / couple of afternoons a week. They seem to have a happy relationship and most of the time I'm happy with that arrangement. However, sometimes during that time my mother is wont to take her to church and teaches her about God.

I am completely non religious and find it disturbing when my 4 year old starts repeating things she has been told about God, death, heaven and hell. I appreciate that people have their beliefs and I am not against that in others. However it just deeply upsets me to have my DD taught about those things an if it weren't for my mother the word and concept of "god" would not be in her vocabulary or head. She is attending a non denominational school and I would like her to make up her own mind when she is old enough to understand, and not be indoctrinated by stealth when she is so little.

Both me and DH have repeatedly asked my mother not to do that, and she pretends to go along with our wishes, until the next time.... and next. To the extent that I feel I just cannot trust her with it at all.

I am now thinking of calling her church and telling them that my DD is being brought there without my consent, am I being unreasonable? Have I got any legal right to stop that?

Otherwise I don't know what else to do, cut off contact between my mother and DD?

no no no no - wrong interpretation entirely trying

To not practice faith, but accept others do, is one thing - to dismiss faith as mumbo jumbo, is intolerant.

I thought I was doing ever so well this morning, making sure what I was typing wasn't open to misinterpretation. back to the drawing board!

Jumping, just seen later post, I think that it explains more clearly. Thanks

But are these beliefs all equally valid? Sorry this is bveering off the point a little bit. I have been so far saying the DD that this is what granny believes and other people believe other things, and me and DH don;t believe in God. I've mentioned the Greek and Roman Gods so far as counterbalance. When explaining the world I talk about scientific causation to natural phenomena. However DD cannot fathom many points of view simultaneously. I mean even when adults are performing analytical reasoning functions they can only about manipulate well under 10 variables before they lose clarity. It's a lot to expect a small kid to take it all in.

So she is confused. Say e.g.: God created earth, or it came about through the Big Bang. So God created Big Bang, she will say. Or she will point out that God knows everything. sometimes just to be mischievous, because she can sense that it has a major effect, even though obviously I am not trying to show that to her explicitly. Or she will say mummy do you know everything? And I will say, nope, I know a lot but there is more I don;t know, and she will wisely nodd and tell me But God knows everything.
It makes me smile to think I heard similar reasoning in an undergraduate module at Uni! But whilst I congratulate myself on having a smart kid it still annoys me that we are talking about this now.

Have you asked your daughter how she feels about her afternoons in church with nanny?

Children are knowledge hoovers, the introduction to a new type of lifestyle is nothing but a good thing, she is gaining valuable experience in diversity, multiculturalism and having her mind opened to the possibilities of the world and it's people.

Encourage her to question what she is learning.
Personally i think your mother has given you a very useful doorway into educating your child further into belief, faith or non belief.

You didn't fall into your camp at her age, neither will she. Use this to open her eyes. Your child will thank you when she is older.

BTW just wanted to say thanks to everyone for the brilliant response. It's really really good for me to see all these different opinions, actually especially the ones that I disagree with, as well as messages of support by similarly afflicted. I don't want to be unreasonable and this will help me to decide the best course of action for sure.

kim Wow I didn't know that. That's very cool. Thanks :)

I'm confused. I thought Shinto did not focus on a specific God or Gods? It's not really a religion. It's a way of being, a bit like Buddhism. It's not a cult, either.

here you go

LulaPalooza its not Shinto, it's a new offshoot, I understand that there are many in Japan. Which is why I've been calling it a sect... I don't think it's officially recognized as a religion anywhere. Even if it were Shinto in it's purest form I would still be asking the same questions.

I think the biggest issue here is that adults are applying thought-process to children. The idea that there is a big, nice, kind man there who looks after you and all you need to pray and he will answer is AWESOME.

Let me tell you - a child will pray for help and wait for that answer. They will not understand why there isn't one. He replied to Moses - he spoke to people in the Bible. What was SO wrong with a child that he doesn't speak to them?

Oh so he doesn't actually speak? I can't see him? Oh and I can't feel him? Then where is he?

You cannot apply thought and procedure to a child. They believe what you say and I think it's highly unfair to teach them that their prayers will be answered when they won't.

One of many offshoots of Oomotoko, if that helps.

stop using your poor mother for free child care then. If you cant be arsed to educate your child about other beliefs and choice to particiapte.

OP the religion thing is a red herring. The fact is your mum is deliberately going against your wishes, regardless of what those wishes are. You have to either accept it and deal with it or find alternative childcare.

Seems inocuous enough?

After World War II, the organization reappeared as Aizen?en, a movement dedicated to achieve world peace, and with that purpose it was registered in 1946 under the Religious Corporations Ordinance.
In 1949 Ōmoto joined the World Federalist Movement and the world peace campaign. In 1952 the group returned to its older name, becoming the religious corporation Ōmoto under the Religious Corporations Law.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oomoto

shrug I'm out of my depth with this one.

And going wildly off topic! An acquaintance was determined to 'find God' - tried every religion going and settled up on Mormonism. For the life of me, if you are picking and choose bits of a religion you like, why pick one that doesn't let you have a morning cup of coffee ???

this would really piss me off.

You need to find alternative childcare and tell your mother why.

I think it's quite awful that your daughter, who would otherwise have been raised with no religious indoctrination, is being taken to church. Your mother is not to be trusted, clearly.

if i told anybody there was somewhere that i didn't want them to bring my child, and they brought her there anyway, i would be furious. and i would not allow them to spend unsupervised time with her, if i couldn't trust them to look after her within the parameters which i had set.

Thanks, AndIf

I wasn't meaning to be contentious, am genuinely interested in religion and philosophy from an intellectual perspective. Sorry, I didn't mean to head this off topic in any way.

but surely NomNom, when it is you mother or a close family member, and this is a clearly a very important aspect of who they are and they wish to share this aspect with dc. Should it not be respected in the respect that, this is your grandmother and this is what is important to her and wether you believe or not this will provide some memories and understanding of who she is that could be cherished. If only the parents where able to educate the child about diversity and what they believed. Completely sheilding a child form all religiouse influences is fairly ignorant and sounds a bit scaremongering and almost just as bad as "indoctronating".

My dd is 6 years old and attends a catholic school, but she certainly does not believe i god and she 6 and has reached that desission all by her self with a healthy and balanced education regrding religion.

Troll, I disagree in this instance, for a number of reasons

1. Why should the OP respect her mothers wishes when she clearly is not respecting the OPs wishes and taking her to the church, when expressly asked to do not do this.

1. There isn't anything in the post to suggest that the child will be completely shielded from all religions, surely it is up to the OP to decide when and how she wishes to introduce this to her daughter.

1. I'm sure the GP can do other things with her GD to develop cherished memories.

Or if you were vegetarian for your family to feed your kids meat on the sly and take them on educational tours of battery farms?

Hell yes I'd be happy with that. I would never force my dc to be vegetarian just because I am. My parents would have already been told that they can, if they wish, introduce my dc to meat (dh is already planning on doing it).

A battery farm tour would be highly educational and help my dc choose to buy meat from high welfare farms.

OP research the religion in question and if it doesn't seem too bad then let your dc choose if they still want to go. There is also nothing to stop you sharing your beliefs with your DD and asking her about hers (they may change as she gets older).

"I would never force my dc to be vegetarian just because I am. "

it's too late for the OP's child now but what the OP's mother has done is indoctrinate a child who was completely without religion. This is terrible.

A knowledge of religion/belief in god/awareness of other people being religious is not a natural state - we are born into the world without religion. Many people want their kids to be free from all religious dogma for as many years as possible and I always think it's awful that parents who wish this to be the case are expected to accept that religion will get to them in the end so they may as well roll with it. Why should I accept the fact that my un-tainted son be fed a load of fables at some point. Many people would like all religious teachings taken completely out of schooling for example.

Taking the child to church is totally out of order given that the OP has requested they not be.

Jumping: "To not practice faith, but accept others do, is one thing - to dismiss faith as mumbo jumbo, is intolerant."

No. Expressing an opinion you personally happen to dislike is not intolerant. Here are some examples of intolerance: executing people who have beliefs you don't approve of; banning books expressing beliefs you don't approve of; isolating people whose beliefs you don't approve of into ghettos; throwing people whose beliefs you don't approve of into jail.

All these intolerant activities have been normal practice throughout history and are still current practice in many countries in the world today. Most of these countries, believe it or not, are run by religious groups.