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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

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Original poster

DD doesn't want to go to church any more

603 replies

jessicabenomi · 04/02/2018 23:18

First-time poster here...

My three dd's have been coming to church with me every Sunday their entire lives (dh doesn't come).

It's increasingly being a struggle to get my eldest dd (aged 14) to come. She always says she has too much homework or she wants to meet her friends. Today after we got back she said that the youth Sunday school was so awful that she never wants to go again and she doesn't believe in God.

She's had one of these anti-church "episodes" (I know that's the wrong word I just can't think of another) every few years, but has always calmed down and come back to church before.

Am I being unreasonable to make her come with me? I don't want to force her if she truly doesn't believe, but my faith is so important to me and my church family have been so supportive at difficult times of my life. I just want her to have that support too.

OP posts:
Evelynismycatsformerspyname · 05/02/2018 06:37

Jessica is your daughter not entitled to follow her own belief or lack thereof, or is that privilege reserved exclusively for you?

I started fighting with my parents about church attendance at 13. They made me go. They did not take me seriously and chose to believe that I was being defiant, it was an episode or a phase, and I would grow out if it.

They are still waiting for me to grow out if it 30 years later, and will be waiting for eternity.

It's part of the reason I have no wish ever to spend Christmas with them, and my children never have.

You are beyond unreasonable, and will seriously damage your relationship with your daughter.

My parents finally stopped forcing me to attend church when I staged a silent sit down protest week after week and refused to sing/ mime/ speak responses, and refused to stand and kneel in the standard places and refused to go up for communion, and my siblings copied me. Their friends started asking questions. Can't have that Hmm

nolongersurprised · 05/02/2018 06:42

I once worked with a very academically smart man who was Jewish and who was very observant of his faith. He said he’d rejected it as a young man (his parents had also been observant) and come back to it on his own. He was talking about how he will encourage his own sons to do the same, because your adult beliefs can’t be said to be your own unless they’ve been challenged and re-claimed.

I’m not at all religious - my parents were - but I liked him even more for that.

RaindropsAndSparkles · 05/02/2018 06:46

DH and I are practicing Christians. The children were taken to church by me from babies until they didn't want to go anymore, about 10 for DS when cricket/rugby took over and 12ish for DD.

DH suffered enforced church until he went to uni. He then didn't attend again until he was about 40 and was tempted back by the choir and a particularly intellectual vicar.

Both DC presently are unsure of their beliefs. Both may return to them in their own time and of their own free will. God is a bit like foreign food. You have to try to see if you like it and even then you can have as much of it or as little as you want

NerrSnerr · 05/02/2018 06:51

I echo the people who say just to ask her if she wants to go to the adult service and listen to her. If she chooses to take time out that doesn't mean she won't go back in the future. I know many people who found their church at university.

The vocal atheists baffle me. I don't believe in god but I don't see how acting like an utter arse to anyone who believes is going to convert people, and why they want to convert people is baffling.

honeylulu · 05/02/2018 06:53

You can't make her go to church at that age. It's a bit different when your children are too young to be left home alone (and we even then you can't presume to tell them what they are allowed to believe!)

My parents forced us to go to church until we left home as adults. We then stopped going surprise surprise. I eventually went back to it (a different denomination and my beliefs are spiritual rather than fundamental). My sister has never been again.

My son chose to be confirmed a couple of years ago. He then entered full on adolescence and his attendance became sporadic but when he goes it's because he has chosen to. It would be meaningless otherwise, surely.

papayasareyum · 05/02/2018 06:53

You’re now lower to force faith on her. That’s tantamount to emotional abuse in my view. Why are you talking it personally that your daughter has turned away from the church? Have you felt like turning away too? Have you got doubts about it all? Let her find her own path. She is an autonomous person and is allowed to stay away from church. Her feelings are far far far more important than what the bloody vicar or the congregation think!

papayasareyum · 05/02/2018 06:54

not allowed to force faith on her.
I was typing too fast as am annoyed Angry

Quickerthanavicar · 05/02/2018 06:54

I know the feeling

Loonyluna16 · 05/02/2018 06:55

I was forced to be a Jehovah's witness until the age of 18.. Please do not "speak to the vicar to get his advice" you already know it will be to keep bringing her along and in the long run your daughter will resent you believe me. I resented my parents for a long time for forcing me into a religion. If your daughter wants to come back on her own leave her be. You can't force someone to think like you. Thankfully my parents also seen through that religion and broke away just about 3 years ago... your faith is yours not your daughters please listen to her before you regret it.

BuggerLumpsAnnoyed · 05/02/2018 06:56

Please just leave her alone and stop forcing her. It’s unspeakably wrong to make her go afte4 she’s expressed her views so clearly.

gabsdot · 05/02/2018 06:56

I'm going against the grain here but for what it's worth.
We are a religious family and we all go to church. I have a 14 year old and I would no more let him decide to leave the church as I would let him decide to leave school at his age.
We feel it is a very important aspect of our lives that brings us a lot of peace and joy and we want for our kids.
Just wanted OP to know there are other points of view

papayasareyum · 05/02/2018 06:58

Gab, you won’t be able to refuse to listen to his opinion for long, trust me. And when he leaves home and rarely returns because of the forceful indoctrination on offer at home, you’ll know why.

Pengggwn · 05/02/2018 07:00

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Message withdrawn at poster's request.

franzen · 05/02/2018 07:00

So everyone tells you YABU and you ignore. Your poor child.
I cannot believe that you care more about what the congregation and the vicar think than about what your daughter feels.
This is part of being a parent; if you love her set her free.

papayasareyum · 05/02/2018 07:02

this sort of thing makes is what leaves me utterly loathing organised religion and the people who actually believe it’s ok to inflict it on kids against their will. Absolutely irrational and insane to do that.

GoldenWondering · 05/02/2018 07:02

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Believeitornot · 05/02/2018 07:03

We feel it is a very important aspect of our lives that brings us a lot of peace and joy and we want for our kid

The OP’s DH doesn’t go which makes a difference IMO.

Also faith is a choice. Education before 16 isn’t.

Nquartz · 05/02/2018 07:04

Has your CD asked to go to coding club instead of church? Your responses on this thread sound very similar to the ones from the mum on there.

You need to listen to your DD, trying to force her will only end in tears.

KateAdiesEarrings · 05/02/2018 07:04

Not everyone has said OP is UR.

Pengggwn · 05/02/2018 07:07

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

GoldenWondering · 05/02/2018 07:09

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NicheArea · 05/02/2018 07:12

Do not force her. It's natural and v common at this age to turn away. Sometimes churches don't appeal to teens- although many do it successfully.
Don't push. She may well come back to the church of her own accord, in her own time. Or she may not. She may still come occasionally if you don't force her. ( How can you force someone to have faith???- you can force her to go to church but the resentment caused will probably strangle any faith left.) But it's her decision and she is old enough to make it.

PhoebefromFriends · 05/02/2018 07:13

Think about what you are teaching your daughter about peer pressure in your case the congregation, you seem more concerned with what they think than what your DD thinks, what message does this send your DD about peer pressure?

Needsleepnow87 · 05/02/2018 07:17

She 14. Let her make her own mind up. She needs to start making her own decisions, yours can’t be forced upon her for her whole life.

Mupflup · 05/02/2018 07:18

OP you sound very much like my mother. Our relationship was irrevocably damaged at a similar age by her trying to force me to go to church, ramming her beliefs down my throat at every opportunity, and being openly ashamed and embarrassed of me because I wasn't a good God fearing girl like her friends daughters (being told at 16 that I would go to hell because I hadn't 'seen the light'?! Fabulous parenting there) Please don't be like her. Not only has it damaged our relationship but it has given me an abhorrence of organised religion that I wouldn't have had otherwise. Let her find her own way.