Why do non religious schools sing about Jesus and God?

[DairyNips]

This is a genuine question. My ds1 has just started school in a lovely primary school. I went along to the welcome assembly today as the headmistress was talking about it being a lovely school full of love for each other and the love of God. When I have attended assembly's in the past (ds went to nursery there), the children have also been singing songs about Jesus and how great he is etc.
Now, it was the same when I was at school but I just wonder why it is this way? Why do non religious schools choose to sing about any particular belief system? Isn't it a bit biased? Also, doesn't it make an assumption on behalf of the children that they all believe in God/Jesus etc?
Personally, I went to Sunday school yet never actually chose to do that.. I now don't follow any religion, I have my own beliefs about certain things but that's as far as it goes.

I just think children should be allowed to make up their own minds without being made to sing about one religion in particular. Btw I'm totally up for children being taught about all religions and I think this is important.

Any thoughts on this?

I'm happy to see Christianity in the curriculum as part of religious education. Worship, and the assumption that Christianity is the Truth - which you get in assemblies - is something entirely different.

I agree. I am Christian but I am not happy with the homophobic and un-Chrust-like churches at the moment so I don't feel that any official Christian position is appropriate for my child to be taught from age four.

jabed, it's a 'debate for this place' if people want to debate it, tbh.

You have a right to withdraw yourself from the debate....

I'm a moral atheist, thank you very much. Second generation.

I think exoticfruits drew an important distinction. My ds is an atheist child - not as in 'child of an atheist', & in fact my dh is a Buddhist - if you asked ds whether he believes in a god he'll tell you confidently that he doesn't.

My dds haven't expressed an opinion as yet, so they are 'children of an atheist & a Buddhist', not 'atheist children' or 'Buddhist children'.

It does matter & I don't think it's nit-picking!

I don't think it is nitpicking. It is pot luck what a child gets when they are born, they might be born into a Hindu, Christian, atheist etc household. Some will be lucky, feel that it is right and it suits them, but some will be complete misfits.
They will all make up their own minds in time. The lucky ones will have complete freedom and the parents won't expect them to conform, the unlucky ones will have parents who can't accept the difference and they have the choice of paying lip service to it, while thinking something different, or severing the connection.

Well just look at the nut cases you get when you have a country where people have to salute a flag instead!

A bit of enforced hymn singing can really be quite grounding.

merrymouse the US is terrifyingly massively religious! Way more so than the UK.

The issue is that this can have a very strong impact on children (and perhaps not always the way you expect it).
I went to a religious school up to when I was about 10yo. I though their ideas were just bonkers and therefore thought for a very long time that religious people (ie true christian believers for example) were just stupid. I though that christina believed that God created the world in 7 days + Adam&Eve and refused to recognize the idea of evolution for example.
It tainted my views on people but also affected my ability to freely choose whether I wanted to be a christian or not.

Now I see my own dcs, my ds is coming home with very similar comments than I had ('Come on, Jesus multiplied the bread. Just like this. This is stupid') despite me explaining he couldn't judge people, these were only metaphors to explain something else (but I can't quite explain the something else because I don't know what all the metaphors actually means. It's not my religion) etc... But still he thinks that 'believing in God is bonkers' because the stories are at odd with science/what is possible in reality.
On the other side, his cousins go to a CoE school and ask their dad if you didn't put people in prison because they didn't believe in God. You can imagine the look on my BIL face!

And that's why I don't think it's suitable to do religion education/singing hymms in assembly etc... suitable at school.
I do think that explaining what the general idea of what some people believe, especially the Christian tradition is important, not the least because it is an explanation of what is going on in our life/our traditions etc... But not as 'The Truth'

Exactly aufaniae!

I think we have a much more balanced attitude towards religion in the UK because for most of us it was so thoroughly boring at school.

I'm not sure about the 'innoculating' effect of being force fed religion at school. It did have this effect on me (all the schools I went to were particularly 'into' it and I found it all too much), but I am surprised at how many of my old schoolfriends went on to embrace religion.

You could hypothesise that one of the reasons that religion is so deeply embedded in American culture is that it was a sort of tribal bonding identifier in a new land, where lots of people from lots of different places / races / nationalities / religions all ended up in a relatively short period of time. So religion was something to cling on to in a strange new world.

Wow, some interesting points have been made since I've been gone

I just hope that one day soon it will be realised this is a silly and outdated law and it gets changed. In the meantime I will teach ds there are several religions and faiths, not just the one he has to sing about in assembly.

He will get all that in RE, it is part of the curriculum - even in church schools.

Just bumping to say I have written to our Head (nice non-threatening "so glad term's started well, DC gets on really well with his teacher ... By The Way") asking what their take on "collective worship of a broadly Christian nature" is.

Will let you know if/when/how she replies.

Horatia - I think you will get a straighter answer in person. If you ask people to put it in writing they will tend to play safe with something approximating the legal requirements, but if you talk to them you get a better idea of how they interpret the rules.

Be interesting to hear what they say though.

I thought I would give her a chance to think "I dunno, what do we do? I guess we have the vicar in once a month" if she didn't immediately have the information to hand.

The response will be useful because it should show whether they are paying lip service to the law, or going out of their way to have a mini church service multiple times a month. It is not a church school but is between the church and the church hall, just yards from each...

She replied within two hours of the letter's being dropped off in the school office, which tells me she's answered this question before.

The school is non denominational, ie it does not have a faith or church link, and is therefore not subject to a diocesan inspection nor is it regulated by a diocesan body. As such we follow a broadly Christian calendar and we teach Religious Education as prescribed by the Local Authority. Our assemblies are an opportunity to consider moral and cultural values and behaviours more than collectively worship. We always sing, however we do not sing hymns, with the exception of Christmas Carols in our Christmas assembly or Carol service. We often have a thought for the day rather than a prayer. The exception to this is when [local vicar] visits to take assembly and the children say the Lord?s Prayer with him. I and my staff are very careful in the way that we present our RE curriculum so not to be biased or opinionated ? we tend to say ?Christians believe?? , ?Muslims believe?? etc, leaving the children to make their own decisions about world faiths later in life.

Which says to me that they are meeting their obligations as minimally as possible, given that the school is in a hugely culturally Christian area within the shadow of the church. I am vastly reassured!

Oh, and if anyone recognises the precise wording then you've either sent it or received it recently, so see you at school tomorrow

Horatia their approach sounds very sane indeed :)

It is quite a common response - but it does depend on the Head- they don't all follow that line.

Most people who sung hymns at school don't seem to have turned out as particularly fundamentalist Christians, or even be Christian or religious at all. I really don't think it does any harm, and it certainly doesn't indoctrinate anyone - otherwise there would be a lot more Christians than there are.

Jess, I don't particularly want my children taught anything as fact by school that isn't demonstrably, empirically true.

I don't believe the practice of religion (as distinct from teaching about religions) has any place in unaffiliated schools. I was taken aback when I found out that every school in England and Wales is effectively obliged to present a particular brand of religious adherence as correct.

How is singing a few hymns presenting anything as fact ( other than the fact a lot of hymns have been composed and are part of our culture)? I think your position is extreme and bigoted.

I'm really angry and upset. My little girl has said they are saying prayers, singing hymns and reading "how God made the world" in her supposedly Nondenominational school! I realise now it's the law but how outdated! We follow more of a pagan path. What do I do? Exclude her? I've spent an hour explaining the theory of revolution to her tonight! ( but mummy..we're not monkeys!) so cross!

Have new respect for our head. We are at the extreme non Jesus end. Thought of the day, lots of kindness/caring/ respect/environment/ humanity. Lots of singing. No hymns. RE about all faiths in class as per curriculum. He's a mini rebel. Assembles are either class (Show what you know type), singing (Beatles songs and current pop tunes) or merit where certificates get handed out. No praying. Inner London.

I've spent an hour explaining the theory of revolution to her tonight!

She will be taught evolution in school. It is part of the Y6 curriculum.

Our entire legal system, culture and social structure has been built upon the foundations of Christian belief. Once a foundational belief system is removed from a society, that society quickly loses its sense of identity and disintegrates.

The foundation of most societies is a consolidationg religious belief system. The Western foundational system has been shattered by a series of attacks - Darwinism, liberalism etc that have led to the secularisation of society. The hymnns sung in secular schools are the swansong of Christian civilisation. I wouldn't worry about them, as they won't be sung for much longer.

However, it will not mean the end of religion in Britain. The vacuum will be filled by another religion. Whether that religion will be as tolerant towards a remnant of Christians is another question.

I managed to go to Christian schools and still get to the age of 11 before finding out that real live believing Christians under the age of 70 actually existed. It never occurred to me that singing Jerusalem or Onward Christian Soldiers meant you believed the words were true, any more than I believed we actually live in a Yellow Submarine or that sick babies can be cured with Short'ning Bread. And most of the class thought there was a popular nonsense rhyme starting Arf Arthur.

So having confirmed with the local CofE school head that children would never be forced to put hands together or close eyes or recite prayers, I figured it would be a good way to teach my children an important part of English culture - being able to belt out hymns when required at weddings and funerals if nowhere else. Didn't get into that school, but kids are at least learning some traditional carols and doing nativities etc at theirs (they gloss over why Jesus was a 'very important baby').