To be angry that MIL may have indoctrinated my child?

[FruitCider]

I've been away for just under a week volunteering abroad and got home this morning. My mother in law (reverend) has been to stay with my partner whilst I went away. I'm completely atheist, partner is agnostic. MIL tried to give me a nativity set at Christmas for DD and a book full of bible stories, I declined and said I didn't want my daughter exposed to religion by people with a bias to a particular religion until she was 7/8.

I've come home today and my 3.5yo DD is continuously talking about Jesus, how God made the planet and told me I should thank god that my journey was safe. My partner says MIL had not mentioned religion when he was at home but he had to leave DD with MIL on Tuesday and Thursday whilst he went to work.

I'm absolutely RAGING! AIBU to be this angry? I literally want to banish MIL from my house and tell her she is not allowed contact with my DD for the foreseeable future.

Also is my DD likely to forget about God as she grows up if it's not mentioned again? Or is she now indoctrinated forever?

Sorry to those who may find this post offensive, I just wanted my DD to make her own mind up when she was old enough to understand that religion is a belief and there is no firm evidence for a God. She could have decided herself to be a Christian and I would have accepted that.

Not read the thread but, of course it is your child and how you wish to raise them is to be respected.

I assume you aren't going to mention/use Santa, Tooth Fairy, Easter Bunny and Bogey man?

She is only 3, so of course will "parrot" what she is told, they don't have reasoning and decision making developed at that age.

She will in time, make up her own mind, NO-ONEs views should be pushed on her, whether that be MIL or yours.

Massive drip feed that she called you a whore. Not very appropriate language for a reverend! I'd be much more concerned about that than the mention of religion and wouldn't leave your DD alone with her in case she talks negatively about you, not in case she talks about religion. You can't edit your OP, precisely to prevent people from adding new information after being told they are BU.

Christmas is the celebration of the birth of Jesus Christ. Not everyone believes in it etc but it doesn't change what Christmas actually is

Christmas is the date of pre-existing pagan religious practices which were super-imposed upon by Christian churches, because it's easier to adjust existing religions festivals to be about christ than it is to make people stop celebrating on their pagen festival date all together

It is not, historically, christs birthday

However, it is offensive for the OP to claim the pre christianity festival as atheist/secular. It's not, its just as religious as the Christian bits that came later, just different religions

Have realised I typed too quickly. I said Jesus was not in the business of judging people. .. I think that is strictly accurate, as the idea is that God the Father (I know, I know. ...) has the sad responsibility of judging people that he loves. Jesus was sent to be one of us and not judge. There are a few stories of him being kind to prostitutes, and telling other folk they had no right to judge.

Sorry to derail. Just wanted to get that straight.

I was brought up in an evangelical Church. I have heard some right misogyny and ignorance preached on Sunday mornings and at house groups. Not all Christians believe this rubbish, some of us can think for ourselves. I'm so sorry about your MIL's comment, no doubt there has been more of this crapness over the years. Please don't judge all religion by this.

It was a massive drip feed. ... Most Christian/any kind of faith folk would struggle with not being able to share their beliefs with their grandchildren. I take on board a previous comment about scientology et al... In that situation, I would let the "indoctrination" happen, but be working pretty hard to encourage critical thinking at home.

My daughter goes to a secular nursery. She will be going to a secular school, and when I apply for a school I will be questioning how their collective act of daily worship is carried out

Non religious schools often dodge the daily act of worship. I have never experienced the daily act in the past decade working in various non religious schools. You won't find it a problem.

YANBU, IMO. Your mil has deliberately gone against what you want and to which you are entitled for your DD. I would be having very strong words with her.

I wouldn't be very willing to get past the whore comment- that concept encapsulates lots of ideas that I wouldn't be willing to expose a child to.

You can offer lots of evidence disagreeing with the bible for your child to weigh up. Your Mil's attitude to her own grandchild's parents is utterly unacceptable.

You can't totally isolate her from it. We explained to ours about people believing different things. We answer their questions and let them make their own minds up.

Schools teach religion and like it or not it's an important part of our society and culture. You can't hide from it so just talk to her about the other side.

I think leave it a few days and then your DP can remind her that you don't want her discussing religion with your DD. Yes, she will be exposed to religion in school (although you can opt out of assemblies and RE days) but all religions are discussed in a child-friendly way ("some people believe this etc.) Well done on volunteering too.

I'm an atheist from a religious family (we have two ministers in my immediate family) and would be similarly pissed off. The OP has obviously been worried about the MILs attitude for a while and to come home and discover that she'd been given free access to her small dd and had obviously been preaching to her was a big lapse by her dh. I hope that he'd just not thought things through.

As to whether or not any of the message will stick with dd that's difficult to judge. My dd was massively influenced by a visiting vicar at her infant school, but ds didn't even really notice him. We did all the some people believe stuff, but dd just told us that we were wrong and that Father X was right. Which was pretty bloody annoying! Still all gone now, so no long term harm done.

Oh and there really isn't anything wrong with celebrating Christmas as an atheist. European people's have been partying in midwinter for a very very long time. The church chose to hijack that festival (and Easter too as new life has been celebrated in spring for equally long) as a part of replacing the old beliefs with the new (it's also one of the reasons for so many saints as many were absorbed from pre-Christian tradition). Christianity isn't alone in co-opting pre-existing beliefs when converting peoples either. It's a pretty effective strategy.

The problem is my MIL doesn't see it as belief. She says its factual. She says there is proof that the world is only 6000 years old and that everything was created by intelligent design.

Very unusual belief for a Methodist. Clearly MIL must be an absolute nut-job to teach things that even in the US church of that denomination are heavily frowned upon.

I'd keep her well away from my children!

www.umc.org/what-we-believe/what-is-the-united-methodist-churchs-position-on-evolution

There have always been midwinter celebrations; they have always been religious as I don't think we know of historic cultures that didn't have an organised religion of some description, and cultures do tend to incorporate their religion into their feast days. Though I have to admit I don't know enough about paganism to know if it's even theist. Christianity blatantly nicked the date of the celebration, but the name Christmas is now traditional in our culture so I have no compunction about coopting it. As Christianity did the name of Eostre I understand?

OP I totally get where you're coming from. There's a big difference between incidental mention of Christianity and setting out to teach it to a child. And it very much sounds like MIL did the latter. My SIL is a vicar, and MIL very religious, both manage to rub along perfectly well with us and our kids without talking about Jesus every 5 minutes. Any religious leader who ever works in schools will have learned how to speak about their religion while still being respectful of the fact that others hold different beliefs.

But it sounds like you have sown seeds already for your DD to understand that Christianity is just one option. One thing we make an effort to do is to attach the label Christianity to things Christian. I find it really helps them to understand what's what. "Ah yes, Christians believe xyz, remember I told you about MIL being a Christian minister? And what do you think DD?" Have you talked to DD about MIL's job? If not this is an excellent opportunity to do so.

Your MIL should be able to spend time with her GD without the need to go into detail about religion. Unfortunately, from what you have said, she is purposely not doing so.
You also need to relax a bit. I chose not to send my DD to the very close by Catholic primary. I went to one and quite frankly couldn't be arsed with all the prayers/mass/communion etc. I decided around the age of 7 that religion wasn't for me. Teacher that year was a particularly devout Irish Catholic who basically told us we would all rot in hell if we misbehaved.😈😇

DD's school doesn't have any daily worship but they did the nativity/easter but presented them to the children as stories.
If she asked questions I answered them and let her know people believe different things.
Your child is 3 ffs. As long as you bring her up to be open minded and be able to form her own opinions she will be fine, whatever she chooses to/not to believe.

OP is not quite right about Christmas.

Saturnalia was the Roman festival celebration the god Saturn. The purpose of the festival was of gambling, drinking, sex, eating too much...generally having a splendid time. It was traditionally celebrated on the 17th December. Jesus started a then cult, or following, and so after he died, the Christian faith grew and grew, and they wanted to celebrate Jesus's birth. The "old religion" was still hanging on so for some reason (I couldn't find out why) the new rising religion celebrated their festival around the same time.

Yule is from Northern Europe, a pagan festival celebrating the Winter Solstice, the shortest day of the year. Again, with the spread of Christianity in Europe, it was incorporated into what we now regard to be Christmas.

Christmas trees came to this country with Prince Albert.

I am atheist and we like the Saturnalia idea of having a splendid time, so we pick those bits and run with it. I have read plenty online about pre-Christian Europe, it's very interesting what traditions we have retained from those times.

Don't get me started on Easter, or Eostre!

Bloody Norah, don't worry about the MIL. I am an agnostic but allowed my 3 kids to form their own opinions about faith. As a result they are all very open minded and accepting - don't make a big deal of it all. She is your daughter's grandma first and foremost - live and let live because eventually your daughter will form her own opinions on it all one way or the other. In the mean time just let it ride - life is too short.

Christmas is a British celebration at the end of December where families come together to share yummy food, sing songs, drink drink and be merry. And give the little children presents.

It's only to do with Jesus if that's what happens in your family. For some families it's about Santa. In others, like mine, it's a tasty winter meal and some uplifting songs.

Just because it's still called Christmas, that doesn't mean it has to have anything to do with Christianity, it's just another tradition- to call the celebration Christmas.

In the OP's shoes, I would try to minimise the MIL's time alone with DD, especially whilst at an impressionable age and whilst the MIL had so little respect for me and how I wanted my child raised. Little children don't like to hear criticisms of people they love though, so if your MIL were to be critical of you to your DD it would likely backfire and make her defensive. In the same vein, if your DD is close to your MIL, she won't find it pleasant hearing criticisms of her so better to remain calm and non judgemental when you explain "Granny believes... and other people believe..."

I would have been disappointed if my DD had grown up to be religious but as a small child I let her go off with granny to church and sunday school when she wanted to. My mother presented her views as fact, as did all of that side of my child's family, and her CofE primary school. At home though, I would stick to "they believe... and other beliefs around the world include..." and now as a mid-teen DD is not respectful of religious views, but sensitive and refrains from criticisms that would be unnecessarily hurtful, whilst believing that none of the religious explanations for god(s) are true.

Obviously individuals will differ (esp the kind who call the son's partner a whore) but it would not be the norm for a Methodist to believe the earth is 6000 years old. They are also not "less moderate" as a pp suggested imo - for example they have been ordaining women since the 1970s.

There are a few stories of him being kind to prostitutes, and telling other folk they had no right to judge.

Sorry to derail. Just wanted to get that straight.

I was brought up in an evangelical Church. I have heard some right misogyny and ignorance preached on Sunday mornings and at house groups. Not all Christians believe this rubbish, some of us can think for ourselves.

Even that presentation of Jesus comes across as misogynistic, and judgey - why is the example of someone to not judge, which demonstrates where the edge of 'redeemable' lies, a prostitute? Wouldn't the story work better if Jesus were able to touch the hand of a user of a prostitute and offer them forgiveness instead, otherwise you are just perpetuating the idea that the prostitute is a low example of a person?

For all those who say it's not a big deal, and OP should get a grip, I assume you would be equally happy for an atheist person to take the opportunity of spending some time with the children of a very Christian/Muslin/Jewish family and spend the whole time telling them that God does not exist, that it's just a fantasy that some deluded people believe in, that when you die you just disappear, that bad things happen to good people and that praying is useless. I am sure any religious family would be completely fine with this.

Because that is exactly what the OP's MIL did. She did not say to the child "I believe God exists" or "some people believe this", no, she presented it as fact to a 3-year-old child.

The "user of the prostitute" wasn't the one about to be stoned though.

How absolutely terrible, God has been talked about to your daughter. This will surely scar her for life......For goodness sake, get a grip. You'd consider barring her from seeing her grandchild because your Mil has dared to speak of God? Your daughter is very fortunate to have her as her grandmother.

Christmas is a British celebration.....really? you mean like, other countries don't celebrate it?

aurynne that is how imagine many atheists do talk to their children.

Explain "that's just what grandma believes" and get yourself a big old grip OP.

dancetilldawn MIL was not talking to her child here. The point of the thread is how people who are not the child's parents should talk to them about matters of belief/religion, especially when they are very different from the belief/education the child's parents wish to give them.

Would you be happy for me to talk to your child like that?

He forgave us all wholesale. Users of prostitutes included. I only used the (rather emotive) example of Jesus being kind to prostitutes because the MIL had, completely horribly, called the Op a whore.

Do you know, I've just spent ages trying to make my kindle accept the word "whore"? It's true, selling sex for a living is just unmentionable! But Jesus made a point of being kind to people trapped in prostitution - and let's not forget that his own mother faced accusations of this nature, because a virgin birth is not particularly credible, is it?