religion/evangelising in school - just don't read if you're an evangelist, please

[geekgrrl]

Hello all,

I've posted about this before - ages ago - I don't know what to do really but just need to get it off my chest.
I (mostly) love the community primary school my daughters go to. Dd2 has just started, she's got various SN and the school are getting it completely right with her. Dd1 is in yr2 and extremely happy and doing very well. It's a lovely school all-round.

However, there is a very very strong religious influence, probably from the head, though I am not sure. They have a local methodist preacher, who is extremely evangelical, taking assembly at least once a week. Dd2 always comes home singing hymns - lately it's the Lord's Prayer in musical form .

I stayed away from this year's harvest festival as last year's just made me so cross - the children were made to pray with their hands together and heads down, all the songs they sung were very religious in nature etc.

They pray so many times a day - it makes me so cross. In the morning at assembly, before lunch, and then again at the end of the school day. This is not even a church school FFS!!!!

I have complained to the head and was palmed off with daily worship being a legal requirement.

I don't know what to do, I don't want to start an argument because they really go out of their way with dd2 and do much more with her and for her than the average school would, but this religious business is bugging me so, so much.

I'm actually a school governor, but have only started recently and I don't want to bring my own personal grievances into the role, IYKWIM.

I guess the answer is to put up and shut up. I don't want to remove the dds from assemblies, as it wouldn't be fair on them and besides, there's lots of other stuff going on in assemblies. I draw the line at outings to church services and have withdrawn dd1 from this in the past.

There's no problem with RE, it's taught well and in a very open way that is respectful of diversity.

I am not so much an atheist, as an anti-theist, to tell the truth.

Are there any parents with non-christian religious beliefs out there to comment on this?

I find it utterly amazing that people cannot understand that some of us have strong moral objections to religion.
But I will start to get too annoyed and I really have to do some work and so will PARP myself now.

I'm always amazed how strongly people feel about this!

I have some sympathy with the militant atheists inasmuch as if you have signed up for a non-religious school, then it's reasonable to expect no more than the very wooliest "let's be thankful for the pretty flowers and be nice to one another" type of religion. So geekgrrl's objection is entirely reasonable.

But I think the strident atheists are outnumbered (maybe not on here, but in RL!) by the silent majority who put 'CofE' on forms, despite not actually practising it, or who have a vague spiritual belief while not subscribing to any organised religion. Clearly that isn't a very logically or politically satisfactory position to take, but I suspect it's very common nonetheless, and should be respected.

For these people woolly Christianity definitely has its place. In the end pretty much anything we tell our children about the big things in life death, love, time, nature, right and wrong is based on a belief system of some kind. How many of the atheists who tell their children there is definitely no god follow that through to its logical conclusions by telling them that our lives are just pointless biological episodes, and the love we feel for our children is just a function of our need to protect our genetic material? Not many, I suspect.

Because that may well not be what we believe! Christians certainly do not have a monopoly on understanding and practising love - far from it! And just because you don't believe you will go and live in Heaven after you did(where you can see all your friends and relatives burning in hell - some heaven!) it doesnt' mean that you think our lives here on earth are pointless. Actually, if this is it and there is no eternity of being nice to God (thank God!) then it makes our lives here more precious and important, not less.

And I'm certainly not saying that parents shouldn't be allowed to tell their kids anything or pracise any religion at home or at Church. It is imposing it on the rest of us via school I object to. Particularly when we have not even sent our kids to a religious school.

Because I don't think that is the logical conclusion frogs!

I don't think that telling a child there is no god is the same as telling them love is a genetic process. Sorry. Don't see the comparison. We are talking about whether we believe in a higher being here not spelling out the science of genetic material.

No, I never said Christians had a monopoly on love, and I'm agreeing that people who have chosen a non-religious school shouldn't have religion forced on their children.

My point was that pretty much anything we teach or do with our children other than basic physical care be nice to other people, don't be racist, it's not nice to swear, don't drop litter, don't hold your knife like a pen, etc etc. is based on a belief system of some kind. Some are more rational than others, but they're still belief systems.

But not a belief system that has to be based on a higher power.

A belief system based on respect, being caring and thoughtful and so on. You have pointed out the major difference.

Aloha.. what has superstition got to do with religion...??? It's not the same thing.. it may be as you see it.. but that is not necessarily fact.. any more than the what you are objecting about is..

You think religion is immoral, homophobic, mysoginistic, oppressive & opposed to many of the values you hold most dear. Ok, so that's what you think.. seems a bit extreme but that's your opinion. It, however, may not be your child's opinion when he/she is older.. Don't you think that attempting to ensure that children are not exposed to the beliefs of others is a form of extremism worse than letting them learn that different people believe different things..?? I know it is hard to see our children being taught something that is not in line with our own beliefs.. but it's part of life... this is HOW children learn to shape their beliefs surely. To not allow this 'exposure' is how some children grow up with the unfortunate idea that their parents cannot be wrong.. and whole new generation of Neo-Nazi's are born and thrive (for example.. please don't think I am suggesting that this is how you would influence your child's thinking.)

Unless they are being taught something downright damaging or dangerous then I think it does more harm than good to muscle in and say 'I do not want my child being told this!' Surely this gives them an entriely wrong message in itself.. if only about how to be intolerent. Life is about relating to each other.. personally I think that's what we are here for.. that's our 'true religion' if you like. This doesn't mean agreeing with and taking on board the beliefs of all others (impossible and impractical) but being open to considering why they believe what they do. And if necessary explaining to our children why we, personally, don't believe that.

Yes, but not a supernatural belief system.
I am perfectly happy about people being religious, going to church etc (I don't understand it, but hey) just not in favour of my children being taught religion as fact, and to worship something that I think a/doesn't exist and b/is unpleasant (and yes, something that doesn't exist can still be unpleasant. Don't believe in the devil either and would be pretty peeved about state-sponsored devil worship too ).

Religion is superstition.
What else can it be?
Why should my children be taught superstition as fact? I am entirely happy that they know about religion but not at all happy that they are taught that it is true.
I would feel very disappointed if they turned out to be religious. I'd feel I had in some way failed them, just as if they turned out to vote Conservative. But I'd still love them.

What you believe / practise at home is one thing, but gg is paying her taxes to send her child to a non-church community school, and her dds are being involved in actual worship (not education ABOUT)in the Christian faith.

I was brought up in Christian household, am now athiest, but my(humanist) values are very much Christian values. In some ways i converge with Frogs' wooly ctaegory (but wouldn't put CoE on a form). However, in terms of praying and woship, something like a visiting tutor "says a few prayers with the kids thanking god for their success, help with any troubles they may have etc." is actually a part of teaching religion to kids that i don't agree with. I think success or failure comes fro m the efforts of human beings, not God, and although I know that Christian families of course stress personal responsibility, this sort of message delivered outside that context reads very close to 'fate' 'out of our hands' 'all in God's hands', in the simplistic way it is taught to children.

I say to DS that many people do believe in God, I don't, and he can make up his own mind. I talked to him about my view of death, he was happy, understood, and then the whole thing was made ridiculously complicated because he came home from nursery with a vision of heaven as an actual geographical place in the sky. I don't think even Christians believe heaven to be like that, but now DS is worried about dead people hovvering about amongst the planes.

I can complain about this as I am paying directly for this non-statutory nursery provision, but it's much harder when it is slipped into the state system.

uhm, sleepyjess - for me christianity is completely on par with superstition, the idea that praying helps sick people is - to me -the same as not walking under a ladder because it's bad luck.
To be honest - I would be quite sad if my dd lived her life by horoscopes when she is older, and I would be equally sad if she believed in god. There you go. She's my child, and surprisingly enough I would like her to grow up with the same beliefs the rest of her family have, and not what 'Roger the preacher' from the local methodist chapel believes in.

Yes, nothing wrong with being taught about religion but not necessarily particpating.

As I mentioned earlier, would Christians want their children reading the Koran, and by that I mean praying from it or similar? Most would not and nobody would ask why.

What a shame to feel disappointment in your child over their personal preferences relating to faith... at least showing the disappointment. A parent's disappointment in their own child is always going to be far more damaging to the child.. even an adult child.. than any religious teaching could be.

snort Aloha, methinks we have very similar hopes and dreams for our children.

I just can't agree there sleepyjess.

weesadie, that point about the Koran came up a while back on a different thread, and I have been thinking about it - then it was within the context of a Church School, which I think is different. But, as a Christian family, both dh and I thought that if we lived in Muslim country, then we wouldn't have a problem with the schools reading and praying from the Koran, as we would explain our own beliefs at home.

Some Christians seem to equate children being taught about religion with children being compelled to worship their God. I think the two are quite different. Very happy for the children to know about religion.

But geekgirl.. Aloha, don't you see? Your insistance that 'things are the way they are because we say so!' (ie that religion is fallacy).. is just another form of instilling 'a belief' on your child.. no correspondance entered into!

You obviously have reasons for not wanting to believe that the power of prayer could possibly have any bearing on 'what is'.. but, again, that doesn't make it so! It would be quite possible for me to Google merrily away for half an hour and cite evidence of the effect of prayer power.. but you would never see it as evidence because of what you, personally, have deicded to believe. It really is far healthier to be openminded. This does not mean you should fall on your knees and start saying Hail Marys.. quite the opposite in fact!

I would also be disappointed if the children grew up to hate books, be racist, become criminals or take hard drugs. I think post people would feel the same.

yes, absolutely - dd did a very pretty model of a torah scroll which is proudly displayed in the bookcase. I hate how RE and indoctrination get
lumped together by some people. i'm all for discovering diversity and learning about world faiths.

Well I just wouldn't like that either and am surprised Christians would be happy about it.

But then we are talking about non-faith schools so surely that is different. I know technically we are a mainly Christian country but not nearly as much as we were,far more secular now. And religion can be practiced at home.

Sorry, but I think that to believe something for which there is absolutely no evidence is ridiculous. Do you believe in fairies?
I think if people want to have an 'imaginary friend' as John Peel once so blissfully put it, then that is fine. But I don't want or need one. And why is it OK to tell my ds that there is no such things as ghosts, but not to say there is no such things as gods?