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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

to not allow my child to do a reading in church?

934 replies

GooseyLoosey · 30/03/2009 08:45

Dh and I are atheists. The dcs attend the local school which is C of E (although wholly state funded). There are no alternative non-C of E schools locally.

The school tends towards being very religious and there is a special Easter service in church for the school this week. Ds (5) has been given a reading to do at this service. It includes many "Praise God" and "God is good" type statements.

I don't wish to over react but getting ds to actively participate in an act of worship may be a step too far for me. AIBU to object and to consider telling them to get someone else to do this?

OP posts:
Habbibu · 31/03/2009 11:45

nomore, I have to agree that that was below the belt and unjustified - goosey is having to make difficult decisions, and whether you agree with them or not, I really don't think such glib remarks are necessary or constructive.

nomoreamover · 31/03/2009 11:52

Whenever I have posted a carefully thought out response trying to explain my viewpoint the OP hasn't responded - any glib comments and you're all straight on my case

prettybird · 31/03/2009 11:53

How would I feel if ds "discovered" religion?

Well, I don't think it would change the way I feel about him. I might notunderstand that particular bit of his life - but I'd still love and respect him. Dh's family are all church-going Catholics - it doesn't affect my friendship with thme. it's just a apart of thier life that I can't relate to.

Ds supports sports that I know nothing about and have no interest in learning more about - it would just be a different facet of his life.

Now, if he tried to be evangelical and "convert" me, I might be more bothered at the thought! But that is a spearate issue: that of respect for others' beliefs.

CoteDAzur · 31/03/2009 11:53

Rhubarb - Please do me a personal favor and stop saying "athiest". It is ATHEIST.

My inner pedant can't take it anymore

GooseyLoosey · 31/03/2009 11:57

Nomore - I have tried to respond to as many comments as possible and to answer everyone's questions including yours and am sorry if you felt you were being ignored. I did not read your comment as being partcularly glib though.

OP posts:
Habbibu · 31/03/2009 11:58

well, nomore, it was glib and personal, and potentially hurtful. I get ignored on threads all the time. doesn't give me the right to be rude.

justaboutback · 31/03/2009 12:10

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debs40 · 31/03/2009 12:18

"There isn't a comfortable place between raising children to pray-worship-believe and raising them not to."

Sorry but that is ridiculous!The comfortable place is respecting children as individual human beings with a right to decide important questions for themselves and not as appendages to be force fed whatever beliefe system their parents have adopted.

You don't force children (or shouldn't) to be Tories or socialists from infancy. If someone did this to a child, people would think it abhorrent. Yet, in this country, we allow our taxes to spend on faith schools where one person's belief systems is foisted on them with unwavering acceptance.

Of course, christians, like other faiths like to catch children before their minds are developed enough to think for themselves. What chance does a faith have without functioning in this way? But I would ask in what way does unquestioning complaince to any particular creed help to create thinking, independent minded individuals?

That is what I want my children to be.

Faith, religious or politically, is a personal matter of choice and should be a matter for those who have the capacity to understand the implications of what they are advocating. To say, you either pray or don't pray, is missing the point - the point is to avoid indoctrination.

HOWEVER, if you send your child to a faith school, for whatever reason, then you get what comes with it.

Habbibu · 31/03/2009 12:21

"And I increasingly think I might send them to SGB for a weekend when they are old enough, so that they encounter some reasonable intelligent and forceful atheism. " You sure about this, justa? they may learn other things.

Like morris dancing...

justaboutback · 31/03/2009 12:22

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CoteDAzur · 31/03/2009 12:22

"Raising them in a sort of nebulous "non-faith" way is to raise them as atheists"

Why?

You seem to be saying that unless we are brainwashed into being religious from a very early age, we will all doubtless become atheists. Is atheism the rational choice of an open-minded, rational, and questioning young adult then? (trick question )

FWIW, I started out as atheist from the earliest age I can remember, and slowly turned into an agnostic when I realized that atheism is just as dogmatic a position because there is no proof that God doesn't exist, either.

I know quite a few people who were raised without religion and turned religious in their 20s. I also know several people who were raised religious and turned atheist/agnostic as adults. I even know a man who was born Muslim, in a Muslim country, and now is a proud Catholic. These things are not set in stone, and how you raise a child is only one (albeit important) part of how he will turn out to be re religion.

DD hasn't even heard the words God, Jesus, faith, prayer, etc yet. She is 3.7. I see absolutely no reason to introduce her to the subject, given that she doesn't have the mental capacity to question it and come to her own conclusions.

How exactly is that "raising her as an atheist"?

justaboutback · 31/03/2009 12:23

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georgimama · 31/03/2009 12:25

Particularly if she had read the thread about Mners having crushes on UQD...

justaboutback · 31/03/2009 12:26

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CoteDAzur · 31/03/2009 12:27

I'm not entirely sure what you mean by "the lore and tradition of Christianity", but having read the Bible, the Torah, and the Quran, I suspect it is pretty much the same thing as any other major religion - ways to be a good person, respectful, with honor, etc.

As others have said on this thread, Christianity, or even religion in general, doesn't have a monopoly on these values and it is perfectly possible to raise your children thus without having to instill the love/fear of God in them.

TheFallenMadonna · 31/03/2009 12:27

"You don't force children (or shouldn't) to be Tories or socialists from infancy"

See, I think we do. Not in a party political sense of course, but we share and teach our principles and values with and to our children from the outset surely? It isn't possible to live according to them, and not pass them on in some way.

CoteDAzur · 31/03/2009 12:30

Why can't you teach DC your principles and values without involving belief in a higher power?

justaboutback · 31/03/2009 12:31

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TheFallenMadonna · 31/03/2009 12:31

I didn't say you couldn't. I was responding to debs' point, the one I quoted.

Peachy · 31/03/2009 12:32

If you're sendingt hem to SGB make sure its before they're 16, othrwise they may well come back very informed indeed LOL

I think there are alternative ways to teach your children: mine are raised I suppose as Christians but if they raise questions I answer 'I beleive but not everyone agrees with me'- and the have loads of books on alternative faith systems. When DS1 decided it was all crap I sat on my hands and refused to argue, just saying that whilt I didnt agree it as his choice. DS1 is more like me and sometimes we have been to Church together for me time but equally sometimes we go and buy indulgent cakes and ice cream floats instead LOL as I want him to see it as his time not faith time.

Its hard to balance though, but I guess most of all I want tem to think that theirspiritual lide is their choice and feel empowered to choose their own way

justaboutback · 31/03/2009 12:32

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nomoreamover · 31/03/2009 12:33

debs40 - your last comment is precisely what i have been trying to say but keep getting shot down for it

OP I never suggested you were a bad mother - only that you were confusing your child by not making a decision on your faith and sticking wiht it

If this thread had been entitled "AIBU to expect a non faith school within my area" - I would have wholeheartedly said YANBU and would have a signed a petition etc etc

But thats not the title of the thread...hence why I have repsonded the way i have

My children attend fath school because we are RC - and it annoys the hell out of me people who try to "water us down" because they aren't RC - but then they have a choice - they can go to the non-denominational school that is 2 min walk away from ours....although admitedly not as high in the league tables...... - OP you do not have that chjoice and agree - that is the injustice here.

But you cannot complain about your child standing up in church with others to read from the bible or similar if you haven't withdrawn them from RE or religious practice. Thats why I said you were sitting on the fence - I don't see why thats rude. Its just not telling you what you want to hear

justaboutback · 31/03/2009 12:34

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IorekByrnison · 31/03/2009 12:36

V interesting posts, justa.

Very much agree fallen madonna. I have a lot of trouble with the idea that there is some sort of ideal neutral ground in which we might raise our children without any kind of indoctrination.

justaboutback · 31/03/2009 12:37

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