to be a bit bewildered by MIL's choice of birthday gift for DS?

[JoInScotland]

That's it really. Our son is 3 in January, and though my DP's Mum knows we are both atheist, she wants to give him a children's bible for his birthday. DP was a bit, "er.... okay". While we want him to be exposed to religion, we will be filing the book beside Mog and Hairy Maclary, et al.

She also gave DS a Noah's Ark, which I think he views as a floating version of his circus train with animals. Are these just standard children's toys, books? Or is there some sort of agenda? DS gets books all the time, I don't see that he will view the book any differently to any other story book.......

Are all these people saying they want to expose their children to religion going to buy korans? Teach their children about judaism too? I think its fine to expose your children to world religion but odd to then just pick one.

I am not Christian and though I would want to teach my kids about Christianity from a cultural perspective (since we are a Christian country) I wouldn't choose a Bible over any other religious text. All or none really.

What cahoots said

We are Christians, both our children have Bibles ........ and they are, indeed, kept on the bookcase alongside all Hairy Maclary et al. And yes, StuntGirl, they also have books which include stories and poems etc from other faiths. And DD1 is currently reading Philip Pullman.

Was a genuine question btw chicken, not an accusation!

Children's bible is a must have book on the bookshelf whether you believe or not.

Hope it has loads of the old testament stuff, and that it's not too babied in language. Just enjoy the stories.

But why is it a must have book? We never had Grimms Fairy Tales or lots of other popular books and the DDs have managed quite well without them.

Yup our children's bibles sat alongside tales fom other religions - though ( my kids are teens now) there weren't so many good other religion books - saw a great set in te charity shop of stories fom the life of Mohammed - they were great and actually pretty biblical in a way - Mohammed does good works (saved a goat I think in the one I looked at).

My parents are atheist but throughout school from 4 to 16 I learned about and read bible stories, went to church and attended prayers several times a week. It was mandatory for every child to have a bible. I sang in the church choir, holding candles and wearing a cassock and surplus.

I'm an atheist too.

In other words - I wouldn't worry about it.

We've got a Noah baby board book inherited with a bunch of nice books from relatives.

God sends a flood to kill all the people . The animals are a deflection for some really bad vibes.

Noah's ark toy sounds lovely. is the children's bible a book of stories or an actual bible just with pictures in? The first maybe is good because they are good stories and part of our shared culture (but might put your child off religion which they did for me - I mean, how is Jacob tricking Isaac fair?And yet this is totally endorsed by God ), the second is a bit weird if you are atheists but pretty unreadable for a child so you can store it somewhere out of the way and forget about it.

I think bringing your child up without a faith and bringing your child up without knowledge of bible stories are quite different. I think the stories are important culturally but I also think that about fairy stories and I have hundreds of fairy stories and only about six children's bibles. Our bibles aren't kept on a special bible shelf, they are just in with the other books and we do have stories from other faiths too, mainly Buddhist as we are a mixed family but other ones too. We probably have an excess of nativity stories also.

Coming from an atheist viewpoint I've yet to find a child's bible that is written in a way that I like, they tend to be written for Christians and have too much God stuff in it. I know that sounds daft but I don't find the same about translations of Greek or Norse myths. Someone needs to write a 'bible stories for the children of Atheists', preferably in a series of creation myths from all kinds of religions.

I'd not be happy about getting a child's bible chosen by a Christian, but I don't have a problem with a Noah's Ark. But either make sure your children are exposed to plenty of other myths or put the book on a high shelf and quietly dispose of it in a few months time.

If you were Muslim and bringing up your children as Muslim, would your MIL still buy you a bible? And would so many posters be so accepting of it? choosing to not have a religious belief does not imply a vacuum that needs to be filled by 'cultural' stories. There are a million other stories to share, that don't have religious content. And we are not a Christian country, at least those of us who have no religion or another religion wouldnt recognise that as a descriptor.

My mil is religious and has bought my children a childrens bible story book but it is balanced by the other books we have on religions if the world and one on pagan festivals etc. I am.happy for them.to read them all as religion and cultural stories are important and i interesting but as i say its balanced out by other books.

We have mythology and folk lore books etc as well.

Louisiana, that's probably because those are mostly dead religions and Christianity is not.

If you bought a book on Norse legends it would probably be written as stories/myths. If however, you bought a Pagan book which discussed Norse gods, it would be written from a religious viewpoint. Just like Bibles, being religious texts, are written from a religious viewpoint!

Perhaps you could suggest that she get him a book about various faiths/creation myths. I was raised agnostic, and one of my favourite books as a child was a book (maybe Usborne?) about children of different faiths. We also had some published by Barefoot Books, I think, one with various stories/myths and another with poems and prayers from lots of different faiths. I loved them, and they really inspired me to understand theology from an agnostic viewpoint. It's really nice to understand the stories behind different faiths, it sort of gives one a starting point for learning about other cultures and religions.

Why don't you buy her a copy of the Koran? When she asks you why you say 'well if you are buying bibles for atheists then Christians may as well have Korans'.

Unless she is really pushy on the religious side I'd not really object to this, although 3 is probably a bit too young to really want to listen to Bible stories, so you could just say that you think he'd be likely to get more out of it in a few years time (which would almost certainly be true).

dh and I are atheists but he read most of his Children's Bible to our children when they were sixish I'd guess. We also read them lots of other stories and mythologies, partly for balance and partly because they were interesting stories.

We have four or five Bibles and a Koran in our house. I think that it's good to have an understanding of Christianity because it underpins a lot of Western thinking. I find it a bit odd that my children who are now in a completely secular education system have really little to no religious knowledge. Seems like a bit of a significant gap to me. On the other hand I find it irritating when my mother talks to my children about her faith, assuming that they share it.

The Greek myths are a great read as well.

I think these stories are important for children to know - my parents were atheists (except for weddings & funerals!) and I learned a bit at school but this basically covered the nativity and not much more. I had to read up on some of the most basic stuff when I got to studying subjects such as History and English later on.

We are o atheist that it is one of the reasons we have started home ed. we still have bibles (king james as well as a couple f childrens versions) as well as having greek myths, childrens shakesphere, aesops fables, just so stories and so on.

I defy anyone to find a broadsheet newspaper without a reference to one of the above, much less a novel, play or poem more than about 50 years old.

I'm not religious, I wouldn't term myself as atheist just "can't be arsed", I did the Sunday School thing as a kid (my parent's friend took me and my sister whilst my parents got a lie in, I think they saw it more like a 50p youth club for Sundays). My partner is a very lapsed Catholic who also went to Catholic School.

We are of the opinion that the kids should chose, but our local catchment school is originally a CofE, however they take in any faith or ethnic group as long as your address meets their boundaries (more power to them for that, the Catholic school said no as I'm not a catholic )

My DD asked me where food comes from over the weekend, she's at that "wants to know everything" 5 and a half year old stage, so I asked her where she thinks its from. "God" was her answer as God makes everything.

Did I go on a mad rant to my DP, or worry? No. They will find out about many different religions now, that's the way it is, and I don't personally view the Bible as anything different to Aesops Fables or Grimms Fairy Tales.

I don't think you should be concerned, my DD got given a bible when she was born which sits (gathering dust) on her bookcase. I don't see the harm in that or the Noah's Ark, they sell them in WHSmith not just religious shops.

Wouldn't bother me at all, might bother DH though, we are both atheist.

I just couldn't get worked up about it. No harm in knowing bible stories - or indeed stories from other religions whether current or long dead. But we are still a Christian country aren't we? So bible stories are more culturally relevant, and more available. (Whether that is right or not is the subject of a whole other thread)

I loved my book of bible stories as a child - they were just that. Stories. I remember being aware that "some people believe this is true" - just like with Greek myths, I knew that people in ancient Greece believed they were true - but it didn't brainwash me.

StuntGirl - it's OK - I thought it was a very valid question and it made me think about what was on their bookshelves. To be fair, we don't have the actual scriptures of other faiths. Christianity is the one that is meaningful to us as a family and, for the time being at least, our children are as much part of the church as we are. (Also, the Bible is a hard enough read without adding several other very long books!)

But we definitely value myths, poems and stories from other traditions. And if they wanted to read Dawkins et al when they're old enough, I'd be perfectly happy to get them a copy and possibly read it alongside them, so as to be able to talk about what they made of it. I'm kind of hopeful that an atheist might approach the Bible in the same way.

"If you are an atheist you don't need to know your bible stories . "

Really? So if you're an atheist you will never want to visit an art gallery or understand history or read any older literature- even a lot of modern literature is based on allusions to a shared heritage. Even if you aren't interested in these things, how do you know your dc won't be? Children who are not brought up with a general knowledge about cultural traditions are often at a disadvantage in HE.

Though I can see louisiana's pov, that one would need a "cultural" children's bible.

I just get this feeling that a children's illustrated Koran wouldn't be easy to find.