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

[GooseyLoosey]

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?

IIRC Descartes came to the conclusion that it was likely there was something beyond the purely physical, i.e something spiritual, which could be called God. But he came to this conclusion over 200 years ago, before say Darwin and various other scientific paradigm shifts, I don't think we can assume that Descartes would have come to that conclusion if he lived today.

As Salome64 says Descartes didn't exactly come to the conclusion that God exists, but his reasoning process has often been taken to say that. Descartes was mostly interested in mind/body differentiation. Is all of what we consider (and this is "we" in the 18th century) as mind and spirit purely reducible to material substance?

Haven't had time to read the whole thread but this topic really interests me and I feel the need to put my oar in!

Goosey Loosey, I really feel for you. My DH and I are also committed atheists and my 6 year old DD is strongly heading that way with our support and encouragement but without pressure. Her school has no religious affiliations and we thought we were fortunate to be able to have this choice. I would have moved community rather than be forced to send her to a church school, but I can understand that you didn't want to.

In reality, however, there are numerous occasions when I have felt just like you - there are untold Christian charity fundraising events, assemblies etc that give me cause for concern in a state funded community primary school with mixed religious and non-religious population.

I have decided to let DD participate in the way she wants to. She normally chooses not to actively join in the religious bits while tolerating the event in a polite way and making sure she doesn't spoil it for those who want to join in.

For what it's worth, if my DD didn't want to make the reading in church, that's what I'd be guided by. However, I expect she'd be chuffed to be chosen and want to do it well to please her teacher and I wouldn't let her thing I thought this was wrong. It wouldn't mean that either of us would be any closer to believing in a god.

Hope you find a way forward that you and your son can be happy with.

brettgirl2 - I am not labelling my child as an atheist. So far he says that he does not believe in God but I fully accept that at 5, this is not exactly an informed opinion. However, equally he most emphatically not a christian and it is the fact that he would be required to declare the existence of God (on his own) that I have problems with.

Georgimama - I am genuinely interested in other people's views. I have over the years read lots of stuff and have never actually found any explanations for the trinity and the redemptive nature of the crucifixtion that I find plausible. As far as I can see most of it was cooked up at the council of Nicea to justify the fact that the church had decided that Christ himself was devine (which I believe niether he nor the apostles ever claimed) and had to reconcile this with a monotheist faith.

You don't want him do do it and he thinks its silly. The teacher can easily give the reading to another child who will be thrilled and probably will never forget that they were chosen to do a special reading in church.

When you asked "in what sense is Jesus God's son if they are in fact the same entity" I understandably assumed the idea of the Trinity was not known to you.

If you don't find it plausible, I very much doubt anything I could say on the subject is going to make it so. It's not a case of being interested in other people's views, I believe it, you don't.

salome64, maybe we're just not listening .....

I think you're right Georgimama - I lack the faith to make it understandable. I do find religion interesting though as it has been such a big part of European history.

My lack of understanding does mean that explaining things to ds is rather hard - he has specifically asked how God can be the father and the son and whether this means that there are 2 gods or just the one. I cannot say "some people believe..." as I really do not understand what people believe and it has been my experience that the majority of Christians do not really have a clear idea about the trinity either. But I digress.

but they have faith in it GL, hence no great need for 'a clear idea'

Goosey, this is what drives me mad about religion, that the socio-anthropological history that created christianity in its present form is totally ignored by christians. The churches pick and mix approach to what was gospel and what was not according to political infighting of the time just shows what shaky foundations the church is built on. Its all an intellectual construct created to make sense of a world that makes no sense. Forgivable perhaps 2000 years ago, but irrelevant and pernicious now.

The thing is, you can't at present send your child to a bollocks-free school. Even state schools are legally obliged to peddle a certain amount of crap to the DC on a daily basis. I shall be explainign to DS as and when necessary that we all have to put up with a certain amount of boredom out of politeness, but if he starts to be irritated (as I was) at the sheer waste of time 'collective worship' is, I will happily write to the school and let him be excused.
Re the OP's dilemma, if your DS doesn't want to do the reading I would say to his teacher that he doesn't want to do it and could she choose someone else. A good lesson for DC: you don't have to do stuff you don't want to do if there is no good reason for it and someone else would enjoy doing it more than you would anyway.

Faith. Pah! I believe in Fairies. Respect me, dammit.

salome- that's thewhole point of freewill; if Godsat over uswatching then how would we have that? Or indeed faith?

The trinity is very hard to comprehend, and when you get an expert to analyse most peoples comprehension there's almost also some heresy that eliminates it. FWIW the chap next door- learned Theologian, Uni Lecturer, PhD etc in Christianity and Islam. Says thatevery time he gets to a stage where he thinks 'so that's it' he immediately finds his answer wrong. I think it comes down to an acceptance of the rinity that is not informed by total understanding in human terms: in many ways that is the definition of faith isn't it? Acceptance without absolute knowledge?

I think this has all gone totally off track - you are being unreasonable - your child cannot decide to be atheist until he hs learnt about what people believe 'god' is.

I'm catholic my dc are catholic my dh isnt- he doesnt follow any faith but he agreed that to make an 'informed' choice our dc needed to have the information - our children are ctholic through choice although they remain respectful of other religions.

When we lived in Lincs there was no catholic schooling available they attended a church of england school that used the local methodist church....had they gone to a school supported by the local mosque,synagogue or temple they would have respectfully followed the ways that school followed-I certainly wouldnt have beenb posting in aibu ......ds2 was actually used to demonstrate a baptist christening although later the teacher apologised having not realised he was Catholic- we werent upset it was all educational for ds.

Theres far worse in life to become so strung up on.

Salome- is it irrelevant? A lot of people, myself incouded geta lot of comfort and support from it. Lots of people deal with a shite lot in other ways, this is what it atkes to get me through ach day without screaming 'why me, why my boys?' and giving up. If I am wrong and it is a crutch that keeps me sane and motivated to e a good eprson then where's the harm? I'mm not and evangelical preaching Christian though: I preach tolerance and kindess yes but I think people have plenty of chance to make their own decisions without me trying to convert people to my own faith.

Tell him that then. That some people believe there is a GOd who made the world, and that he also has a son who died for our sins and there is something called the holy spirit. These people believe that these three separate elements are also part of the one thing - the trinity. Tell him that you don't believe this, and that the people who do believe it are ignoring the fact that this is not previously mentioned in their scriptures (according to you I disagree about that) and therefore you think the whole thing is nonsense.

You could also then tell him that people who (like me) do believe it aren't particularly bothered that it seems to be nonsense to some people, because they feel human understanding is not adequate to really understand or explain it properly anyway, and the suggestion that it is all nonsense made up to deal with infighting in the Church just shows that the people who originally tried to explain these concepts were also fallible and human, and just trying to do their best. None of that detracts from the nature of God.

Peachy - that's interesting.

It seems that the prevailing view is that it is correct to teach children to respect what other people believe and when they ask questions about religion to reply "some people belive xyz...". I have no idea what "xyz" is and so cannot honestly do this - perhaps I will refer ds to the vicar in future and eagerly anticipate his answers on the subject.

Well I will be telling DS that religions were initially made up to explain what people didn't understand, and were later developed as an excellent method of social control and oppression, which is why some people are so keen on forcefeeding them to DC even now. I will explain to him that much of the myhtology is just pretty stories, some even with psychologically sound simple lessons in them, but that some are reflections of particular political/historical trends and therefore irrelevant and maybe even toxic. I will let him know that some people believe all this old cock and it's polite to respect their right to believe it, but no need to pretend that you believe it as well.

nickschick - I have never said that my child is an atheist, of course he is too young. But he is most definitely not christian either. I am respectful and tolerant of religion but that is a long way from getting my son to participate in a ceremony and make statements that I do not believe in and he is too young to understand.

GL if you want links for any faith let me know ( I did an RE degree, hoping to do my PGCE next year, have lots of resources)

' it is correct to teach children to respect what other people believe and when they ask questions about religion to reply "some people belive xyz...". I would say that is absolutely right: when I teach, it will be in order to educate not convert. religion is perfectly teachable as a factual subject IMO. naturally it will be informed by the beleifs of the children in the class (mine will never come into it I hope) but the role is to enable that to be eduational rather than anything else IYSWIM.

Teaching religion properly breeds tolerance: education minimises fears,e specially when it comes down to differences between people. For example my boys never encountered anyone fro the Sikh commnity until we moved here and had they not been aware of the reason for carrying the Kirpan they may have been scared, as it was they viewed it with curiosity- a far healthier emotion in a small child.

ItsMargotBeauregarde, you say "to hear of a little five year old boy coming out with statements like "there is no God" strikes me as sad. That sounds like indoctrination to me"
So you advise against him doing the reading then since it would involve him coming out with statements about believing in god which would be indoctrination.

Also "Even somebody who has never seen the inside of a church could probably tell you what Easter and Christas came about"

Yes indeed. The easter eggs are to worship shtar and fertility. Christmas is the Saturnalia where people eat and drink and exchange gifts.

"I can't believe that parents teach their young children that "God doesn't exist""
As others have said that is the normal position of someone who has never been indoctrinated.

georgimama, I won't bother with all the daft statements about buying another house which have already been dismissed by others, but you mention the important life lesson that sometimes we have to do stuff we don't want to. Lets test this. Now imagine me getting your kids to stand up and say out loud "Allah is the one god and there is no other"
Not so keen on that I bet

salome64 you say "I think our kids are really lucky to have access to so many amazing views of the world" does that mean you are ok with atheists telling the kids that god doesn't exist? it's a view isn't it.
Can they come to the school once a week and explain how god is just made up?

SGB that's the message I was rasied with and I don't think it's aprticualrly harmful tbh. Mum reagrds jesus as having been a wise chap taken completely on to another level by needy people. What I would mention however is that of 3 of us, only one is still Atheist. Poor MOther - despairs of us now

'Can they come to the school once a week and explain how god is just made up? '

If they preceed it with I believe that God is made up, as I would ask anyone to do (I believe in Brahman / that Buddha was the ultinate human being / etc) then I wouldn't have any issues with it whatsoever. why on earth would I?

Peachy - any links you have for Christianity would be appreciated. So far ds has only evey asked questions about Christianity (I think that is down to the school's bias).

Ds is a "why, why, why" child and where possible, I like to give answers - although I can see that in this case it may just come down to saying that it is a matter of faith. I did once tell him to ask his Granny who is a devout catholic as I actually believed that she might have some answers I did not. However, she said that she preferred not to think too closely about her faith in case she came up with something she could not reconcile with it, so that did not really help that much.

Peachs, perhaps if the comfort of religion was kept a personal, private thing then I would say live and let live (because life is compromise after all, and I'm never going to get it all my own way!) BUT but but but as GM says, humans are extremely fallible, and coming from a N. Irish family (both Prot and Cath) and having done philosophy and theology, on balance, and after much thought, it just isn't worth it. I now gain greater comfort from the great adventure that life just is,and have greater respect for humanity for coping with it all without ascribing it to any higher power of whatever interpretation.

I think Grandma's answer was quite informative about many religious peole tbh.

Possibly including myself as I am well aware.

these are amazing start points for most beleif systems (note the first one is Atheism all you people who automatically assume us faith people do not include it as a valid belief ) LOL.

If you ever want a specific details such as a Bible quote so you can see it in context or whatever, this site includes just about everything you might want. And then quite a lot more!