AIBU to ask my in-laws not to take the children to church?

[Moocrewmummy]

me and my husband are going away for 2 nights soon & my in laws are watching our daughters. My in laws are very religious which I hold no qualms about but their church is very extreme and have in recent years had accusations of religious coercion amongst other unfavourable accusations in the uk press. I was raised catholic and my husband Protestant but neither of us practice and want to raise our children to be open to faith but we are not going to raise them as religious as such. The intend to take the girls to their church on the Sunday to which I am very apposed to and my husband seconds this as well. Are we being unreasonable to ask them not to take them to church? My mother in law frequently watches a live stream at home when she’s ill so they can still watch but doesn’t involve my children going in to the church. Any guidance on this would be appreciated!

Small children will most likely be doing age-appropriate activities with volunteers during Sunday worship - colouring in, making models, singing, listening to Bible stories. It could be a highlight of their weekend.

That’s a very toxic environment for young kids to be around. I wouldn’t allow it. I would ask that they don’t take them and only if they say no, would I rearrange the plan. I’d give them a chance to respect your wishes as parents before deciding against them babysitting. Their answer will be revealing.

This! Just take the kids to the running event.

Ah, so if grandpa normally plays darts at the men's club on a Sunday and grandma attends weight watchers the kids should be brought along and nobody should complain, obvs.

This idea that anyone's routine is too precious to be disrupted once when they look after their own grandchildren seems hilarious and unrealistic to me.

But would you trust them to listen? You dictate what happens with your children so maybe plan an activity you want them to attend which guarantees they cannot go to church.

But tbh, I wouldn't care if my kids went once in a while. They will be so bored and put off that they never want to go again anyway and will soon tell their grandparents!

Ps. I've been to a vineyard service out of interest. It was a happy singing affair with a creche.
And I'm an atheist

Yes, YABU to expect your PIL not to attend Church when looking after their grandchildren. When you mention the Catholic Baptism, was that your children?

Ok I have been to many Vineyard style churches, I know people who go to our local one. It is a mainstream charismatic evangelical church network.

A normal Sunday morning family service will not include anything extreme or strange. They are far more likely to have the chance to go to children's activities and play/do some colouring (PIL might have to accompany them).

What was in the news was a couple of their churches (one in. USA), not the whole movement.
I suggest you ask to watch the livestream or go along yourself one time then you can judge for yourself, it might put your mind at rest.

Op, there are many lovely vineyard churches. As far as I know, the accusations of religious coercion was against a particular pastor in N Ireland, who then moved to the USA. I too don't think that your children will be harmed by a one off visit aged 2 and 4.

Your in laws were clumsy in their comments about the Catholic christening, although certain aspects of it may well have been contrary to their beliefs, and they may well have been feeling uncomfortable.

It sounds as if you have avoided discussing their beliefs with them so far, but you will need to think ahead, as these differences won't go away. It's a good lesson for your kids to know that not everyone believes the same things, but we can still love each other . . .

It's a lot harder to catch religion than not these days. Churches are dying. That hasn't been without detriment, I believe the rise of other nonsense eg believing you can change sex is partially due to the lose of religion. Religion provides many positive things like community, identity, belonging etc. Things that aren't scientific "truths" but are guides to a happy life. I'm a lifelong atheist but I think religion has a place in this human world.

Dictate? 😂 Just imagining my children dictating to me in the future and this did make me laugh. Thank you.

I wouldn’t want them to go to the church either, and I think it is ok for your DH to ask, but your PIL presumably think this church is great and would ideally want their grandchildren to be part of it, so I would guess they’d say no. You can’t insist they don’t take them if they’re looking after them, so I guess you’d then have to decide whether to leave them with GP and have church visit, or not go away.

Ha ha.Bored? I think they'd like it, which is probably what OP is worried about. A lot of these types of churches are quite superficial and jolly people along. Not my style, but right up a 4 year old's street!

this is my in laws actual branch as I am in Northern Ireland. They cannot accept that any wrong doing was done. The church lost alot of people who accepted there was wrong done but my in laws still won’t accept anything wrong was done, which is my worry. I know religion isn’t contagious and one weekend won’t harm them while I waltz away for a kid free weekend. It’s the after I’m worried about, when they inevitably ask to take them again?
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-northern-ireland-67082853

People in this thread don't seem to be understanding that Vineyard is a cult. One that loudly preaches hate for gay people, no less.

I wouldn't be letting my children stay with these people full stop.

Sorry can't quite figure which way round it is - I meant it's hard to get into religion!!

The pastor that did wrong has left as the article says. Vineyard themselves as a group are very welcoming and not coercive (obviously I can’t speak for individual churches). If this church has had issues in the past, I’m sure they will be very careful to be a lot better now

Yep, people seem to be ignoring OP's actual posts and just focusing on the "religion" bit.

Sorry but you are being ridiculous.
There are crazies in any religious organization or society but this is just silly. The vast majority of churches are not ‘full on cults’ or anything near it.

If someone asked me not to attend church while I was providing free childcare I would suggest they find somebody else. You’re not unreasonable to ask, as they’re your children, but neither would your in-laws be unreasonable to say that doesn’t work for them.

Also just to add; a relative wanted to have one of my children for a weekend visit recently, but they attend a church I wouldn’t be comfortable with my daughter visiting without me, so I said no. Honestly asking them not to go never even crossed my mind.

You have chosen poor examples to make your perverse point. Two small children wouldn't be admitted to a WMC so grandpa wouldn't take them. Grandma would know that weight-watchers would be boring for small children so wouldn't take them. If you go to church every Sunday and have small children staying with you, the expectation/social norm would be that you would take them with you, knowing there would be other small children there.

That’s my reaction, exactly. There are some beliefs which we are right to oppose (according to our inner creed) and want to shield our kids from.

As a child at a pretty expensive Catholic primary school in England, a lot of my classmates were from ‘county’ families in nearby villages.
It was tough having to miss weekends at country gaffs with those girls as they went out to cheer on the local Hunt, for example (or once, even a Summer trip to Spain, on account of Franco).
Irrespective of the issues involved, we certainly learned quite early on that principles ought to guide our choices, even when it meant denying ourselves something we really fancied.
(Handy lesson in those earnest times of parental boycotts covering much of the globe!)

I’m a churchgoer in a mainstream Protestant denomination and my DC would not be going to one of these congregations - if they are as I understand them to be from friends who went once. Neither will I have anything to do with Operation Christmas Child shoeboxes for the same reason. Our church supports the rotary club shoebox appeal.

It would be the same about everything.

If the grand-parents were thinking about taking the kids somewhere as a treat and you thought they were too young, you could ask them not to.

If you strongly disagree with something, you don't send your children there full stop, or at least not without your supervision. You don't tell people to change their plans because you disagree with them. No one is forcing you to use them as free babysitters!