School residential is religious

[Stephthegreat]

Dcs school is CofE and as there are four faith schools closest to us we sent dcs to the nearest one. Neither me or dh are religious but we support the values of the faith and the school.

The school used to go to a really fab place for residential and it was full of activities, adventuring, just a really fun weekend. Ds is due to go on camp soon and the new residential the school have chosen looks extremely religious. Ds really doesn’t enjoy this side of school and has his own ideas about faith.

The programme involves daily bible study and ‘getting to know jesus’. There are bible related games and quizzes and prayer sessions. It looks like they do bushcraft and have a bonfire too which is up Ds street. He’s a bit put off by the whole idea and I also think it’s quite serious!

AIBU?

If people keep sending their kids to shitty creepy faith schools, then shitty creepy faith schools will continue to exist. You were all about that Godliness when it meant you could get your kid in with a letter from the local vicar about the 6 times you attended church, so it's churlish to back out now.

If you were really worried you'd be out here campaigning to remove religion in schools and abolish the discriminatory practises around them.

You've chosen to play their game so now your kid gets daily bible study. Your choice.

All the schools near me are faith schools. Thankfully they made it very clear my heathen children would be at the bottom of the admittance list and only those who pretended to be Christian would be valued. Our local church looks like a playgroup. And after the all-important priest's signature? They obviously never attend again.

This is your reward for playing the game.

@EdithRea

If people keep sending their kids to shitty creepy faith schools, then shitty creepy faith schools will continue to exist. You were all about that Godliness when it meant you could get your kid in with a letter from the local vicar about the 6 times you attended church, so it's churlish to back out now.

If you were really worried you'd be out here campaigning to remove religion in schools and abolish the discriminatory practises around them.

You've chosen to play their game so now your kid gets daily bible study. Your choice.

All the schools near me are faith schools. Thankfully they made it very clear my heathen children would be at the bottom of the admittance list and only those who pretended to be Christian would be valued. Our local church looks like a playgroup. And after the all-important priest's signature? They obviously never attend again.

This is your reward for playing the game.

Why does everyone miss the part where OP says she doesn't have any other option?

[quote Thesefeetaremadeforwalking]@Mischance

My DGC goes to the local village school, which is CofE. No other choice of school. Came home the other night with a piece of paper and was very proud that he had been chosen to read it out at the Easter service. I was appalled by it: crucifixion details with all the bells and whistles, crown of thorns with dripping blood, pierced side with blood and water pouring out.

How is this any worse than the violent video games that kids can play where they can kill and maim others?

And, if the Bible is a fairy story, as the atheists keep telling us and Jesus never existed IRL why does it matter what happened to this imaginary person?

Have you ever read Grimms Fairy Tales or other 'Classic' fairy stories for children such as Hans Christian Andersen? We have girls getting their feet cut off, going into graveyards at night to pick nettles to weave cloth, children caged to be fattened up for a witch to eat them?

[sceptical][/quote]
It is worse than violent video games:

1. children should not be watching them, if their parents have any consideration for their well-being.
2. I presume that violent video games are not being taught in school.
3. Children are not being asked to believe they are real/factual.

Seems silly to send your child to a faith school and to expect an absence of faith.

@EdithRea

If people keep sending their kids to shitty creepy faith schools, then shitty creepy faith schools will continue to exist. You were all about that Godliness when it meant you could get your kid in with a letter from the local vicar about the 6 times you attended church, so it's churlish to back out now.

If you were really worried you'd be out here campaigning to remove religion in schools and abolish the discriminatory practises around them.

You've chosen to play their game so now your kid gets daily bible study. Your choice.

All the schools near me are faith schools. Thankfully they made it very clear my heathen children would be at the bottom of the admittance list and only those who pretended to be Christian would be valued. Our local church looks like a playgroup. And after the all-important priest's signature? They obviously never attend again.

This is your reward for playing the game.

Oh my god. The kind of school the OP is at is just a local school that happens to be CoE. How is everyone failing to understand this? There are Faith Schools that require religious attendance to get into, if one of those did a religious camp that would be fair enough. Then there are CoE schools that are just your local school with a bit of prayer, that everyone local goes to and have no requirement of religious attendance to get in. They have no business making the school residential and evangelical camp.

If there's no other school and you're agnostic or atheist then that's unfortunate but it's hardly the end of the world.

The Holy Quoran and the Bible mention Jesus/Issa. Hardly a fairy story.

The crucifixion is hardly a horror story. Yes, it's grim but by 10 children will have seen 100 murders on TV. Media is too violent but sadly we as a society ignore it.

We are rural and not CoE

Op if it doesn't sit well then don't let her go

@EdithRea

If people keep sending their kids to shitty creepy faith schools, then shitty creepy faith schools will continue to exist. You were all about that Godliness when it meant you could get your kid in with a letter from the local vicar about the 6 times you attended church, so it's churlish to back out now.

If you were really worried you'd be out here campaigning to remove religion in schools and abolish the discriminatory practises around them.

You've chosen to play their game so now your kid gets daily bible study. Your choice.

All the schools near me are faith schools. Thankfully they made it very clear my heathen children would be at the bottom of the admittance list and only those who pretended to be Christian would be valued. Our local church looks like a playgroup. And after the all-important priest's signature? They obviously never attend again.

This is your reward for playing the game.

I've reached the point where I want to hit my head on the desk. The C of E school that OP is referring to is not the kind of school that you have to play a game or be religious to get in to. It's just the local school. The kind that every kid in the village goes to add a matter of course.

It's not the RC high school that everyone wants their kids to go to because they live in a town that's a bit rough and it's the 'better' option, and OP was clearly never into the Godliness or fighting to get her kid into it.

Jeeeze (no pun intended) just read her posts and all the ones that have explained how most CofE schools are just 'the school that everyone goes to'.

@Daffodilz

We are rural and not CoE

Good for you?

Christianity is not benign. It teaches that the locus of morality is external not internal. It supports the concept of a being that is allowed to judge people for the quality of their worship, not just the quality of their actions. Messages of kindness, morality, and ethics can be taught without tying them to such a problematic dogma.

@Blossom64265,
"Christianity is not benign. It teaches that the locus of morality is external not internal. It supports the concept of a being that is allowed to judge people for the quality of their worship, not just the quality of their actions. Messages of kindness, morality, and ethics can be taught without tying them to such a problematic dogma."

This ^^ makes everything unnecessarily complicated.

Yes, Theology does promote an external focus of control (God) as a good idea and this is in contrast to Psychology that supports an internal locus of control (self).
However, nowhere does Theology say that God exists save us from all our problems or misfortunes.

And yes, some people seem to be too reliant on God.

However, empirically a collaborative approach to relating to God seems to have the best outcomes.

People have said to me "What doesn't God do something about the suffering in the world".
My response is "He already has done, he made you and me".

Then they stand open-mouthed as if I had just asked them to stick pins in their eyes.

These are people who don't believe in God yet expect him to solve all the problems of the world - most odd.

I would say lean on God, trust in God, rely on God, but when the ambulance comes - get in !

[quote Thesefeetaremadeforwalking]@Mischance

My DGC goes to the local village school, which is CofE. No other choice of school. Came home the other night with a piece of paper and was very proud that he had been chosen to read it out at the Easter service. I was appalled by it: crucifixion details with all the bells and whistles, crown of thorns with dripping blood, pierced side with blood and water pouring out.

How is this any worse than the violent video games that kids can play where they can kill and maim others?

And, if the Bible is a fairy story, as the atheists keep telling us and Jesus never existed IRL why does it matter what happened to this imaginary person?

Have you ever read Grimms Fairy Tales or other 'Classic' fairy stories for children such as Hans Christian Andersen? We have girls getting their feet cut off, going into graveyards at night to pick nettles to weave cloth, children caged to be fattened up for a witch to eat them?

[sceptical][/quote]
Classic "Look over there" argument which betrays a weak position. I doubt anyone condones children playing violent video games, and these days no-one encourages children to read the original versions of Andersen and Grimm. And none of it really makes it OK to upset children by going into the gory details of crucifixion, let alone making them read stuff about it out loud in public.

@EdithRea

If people keep sending their kids to shitty creepy faith schools, then shitty creepy faith schools will continue to exist. You were all about that Godliness when it meant you could get your kid in with a letter from the local vicar about the 6 times you attended church, so it's churlish to back out now.

If you were really worried you'd be out here campaigning to remove religion in schools and abolish the discriminatory practises around them.

You've chosen to play their game so now your kid gets daily bible study. Your choice.

All the schools near me are faith schools. Thankfully they made it very clear my heathen children would be at the bottom of the admittance list and only those who pretended to be Christian would be valued. Our local church looks like a playgroup. And after the all-important priest's signature? They obviously never attend again.

This is your reward for playing the game.

Any danger of actually reading the OP's posts? If you had bothered, you would know that there was no element of choice for OP, and she certainly didn't play any games to get her child into one.

People have said to me "What doesn't God do something about the suffering in the world". My response is "He already has done, he made you and me"

I'm not surprised people don't know how to respond to you, @Thesefeetaremadeforwalking, because your own response doesn't answer the question. Would you give that answer to, for instance, someone who had been born with something like epidermolysis bullosa? The issue, of course, is that if there is a God and he is omnipotent, why doesn't he stop innocent children from suffering things like that, why does he allow things like tsunamis, earthquakes etc?

And I strongly suspect the actual question you are asked is If God exists, why does he do nothing about suffering?" So people who ask this are not expecting any deity to end suffering, they are just pointing out some of the problems with common notions of the deity.

@EthelTheAardvark,

My response does answer the question.

God made humans and gave them free will.

We have a choice about how we treat our world. We can sit on our backsides and do nothing or we can try and make it better.

Epidermolysis bullosa is a rare inherited disease . It can be inherited from one parent or both. There is no cure. The only way to prevent it is for those who carry the gene not to have children. That means genetic testing and raises ethical issues about 'designer babies'.

We live in an imperfect world. The natural laws that operate are both a blessing and a curse. Tectonic plate activity renews the surface of the earth with minerals, yet wreaks havoc when humans choose to build cities on the fault lines.
Cell replication allows our bodies to grow and develop, yet can result in cancer when natural processes misfire.

Genesis, the first book of the Bible, tells of God’s original creation: a perfect world, free of suffering, in which people had a direct relationship with God. God made a good world, but He allowed people to make choices, and the choices they made ultimately ruined it.
Until the end of time, the world will remain in its imperfect state. Our choice is whether to experience life in an imperfect world in relationship with a perfect God or without Him.

What human choice resulted in epidermolysis bullosa?

@ClumpingBambooIsALie

Please read my last paragraph.

As this seems an issue for you and you want a Theological explanation I why not have a chat with your own spiritual advisor.

If you don't have one then I would suggest you make an appointment with your local Parish Priest who can deal with your questions better than I can.

This brings back memories of RE at my local comprehensive. Our worship was generally limited to hymns at assemblies. Until our RE teacher invited people from the local Assemblies of God church where they went straight off the deep end with an anti-evolution assembly about who would want to be decended from a slime slug than be one of God's children. Definately Yikes! Material.
RE lessons in yr 7 and 8 were JUST about Christanity as he was a massive Billy Graham fanboy. Was a relief in Yr 9 when RE was replaced by PSE which was actually useful some of the time.

Thing is, choice is an illusion both for parents and definately for children. It's just the illusion of choice that you can choose a school for faith or no faith all the time or if you have the money, social engineering. Still a heap of garbage. Why can't schools focus on evidence-based education and not forcing children to have 'who has the best imaginary friend' contest?

Assemblies of God - eeek ! - that's hard-core Pentecostal.

I'm surprised it was allowed to creep in unchallenged ?

🙄🙄🙄

[quote Thesefeetaremadeforwalking]@ClumpingBambooIsALie

The violent video games that are designed for adults and have an age rating system to prevent young children being inadvertently exposed?

Yes in an ideal world they do. But children still access them, in the same way the they access on-line porn.

The simple answer is for parents to write to the school and request thattheir child not participate in these religious activities.[/quote]
You are comparing the bible to violent adult rated video games and online porn and suggesting it isn't problematic that it's a part of the curriculum because parents can just write to the school and request their children don't participate?

I don't think that's a strong case for allowing it to continue, especially given it's supported by taxes.

For a God who gave humans free will, God certainly got angry and vengeful when humans did what they wanted to and exercised free will.
I guess that was angry Old Testament God. Not luvvy New Testament God.

DS should go on that camp. He'd argue with the evangelicals and maybe get some of them to think about their faith.

I and others did have a WTF face after that assembly!
There were a few who did go to the AoG church for a bit but I don't think it lasted.
It's more the RE that was Bible Bible and more Bible and ABSOLUTELY NOTHING about any other faith (or none) that was more of a concern.