AIBU to think we need more ^inclusive^ education?

[LoveFoolMe]

AIBU to think we need more inclusive education? If children in a multicultural society such as the UK are educated together surely this promotes more tolerance and better mutual understanding.

So these proposals worry me:

Call to end limit on religious free schools

Considering how divisive and rigid religious attitudes can be, I think it's time to bring children from faith schools into mainstream schools and to encourage these children to mix with more diverse cultures.

Secular schools can still provide fact-based religious education in the classroom and would probably teach their students about a greater range of religions than a faith school would. Parents could, of course, provide a more personal approach to religion for their children outside of school hours if they wanted to.

Let's not further segregate our children by religion.

AIBU to think that reducing (rather than increasing) the number of faith schools in the UK would be far better for our children and far better for our society?

FWIW, IMO religions all teach the same values and serve the purpose of helping humans get along with each other peacefully, take our lives seriously and celebrate the very fact of life.

I'd imagine psychologists would agree that forgiveness and feeling grateful are psychologically beneficial. This can be couched in other terms - let it go, move on etc. The benefits extend beyond the forgiver or grateful person to everyone in contact with him/her.

Religious teachers understand the importance of peace, as well as justice.

Most religions, as far as I can see advocate a healthy lifestyle too - with various emphases - no religion recommends over indulgence in alcohol, food or drugs for example. The details are different but the main aim is the same.

I often think that the religious leaders such as Christ and the Buddha were excellent psychologists. Whether you agree with any exact teachings or not it seems to me we still have a lot to learn from them. Human nature doesn't change. Now that the world has become more competitive and fast-paced we need their teachings in one form or another as much as we ever have.

icebeing - ?

Just responding to the idea of it being hard to come by morals outside of religious teaching. Our secular laws and moral framework exceed that laid out in the majority of religious texts....I wonder how this came to pass if morals outside of religion are tricky, and also wonder what the defence of the omnipotent God might be for not spotting these things we humans have now come up with for ourselves.

The God of 2000 years ago found it moral to prevent adults of the same sex from expressing their love sexually. The God of 2000 years ago found sex with children to be fine as long as they had menstruated.

How come our present day morals exceed those of God? Or are we just wrong? Is sex with 8/9 year old girls okay after all?

Details.

Ooh posted too soon.

Many/most Christian churches have evolved in line with current thinking to accept and bless same sex marriages.

Perhaps the examples of dubious morality found in religious scriptures are balanced by other morality found in religious scripture that we have forgotten about. For example, I'm pretty sure that religious scriptures promote respecting and looking after our elderly. IMO present day attitudes to older people are dreadful. Look at all the awful mistreatment of elderly people in care homes and hospitals for example. And the attitudes that the opinions of old people don't count - because they're old and therefore don't know anything relevant.

rogue I am not slating the scriptures...or the religious institutions that ARE keeping up with societal change.

My point is they are KEEPING UP. They aren't trend setting....so the idea that religion provides our moral leadership is essentially proven false right there.

The issue about how an omnipotent god could ever have gotten it wrong is a separate issue. I don't know how people can believe in a God that ever thought child sex was fine...but as I say - maybe societal morals will change again and suddenly everything God said in the bible will be thought correct again.

The scriptures weren't written by 'God'.

Buddhism seems to have set a trend for mindfulness and meditating! But it is non-theistic. Does have many scriptures though.

Fasting has also become trendy.

And lent seems to have been taken up by many non-Christians.

Girls didn't usually menstruate until they were older than this generation of girls. I think I've read statistics estimating that about 25% of our young women voluntarily had sex for the first time before they were sixteen.

rogue I am not sure the majority would back you on the scriptures not being from God. I mean of course I don't think they are - because I don't believe in God at all....

but the idea that somewhere in the process God didn't happen to mention respecting children's right to grow up without adult husbands to the writers of said scriptures...or that God did mention this but they left it out because...well...it was inconvenient or something ...I mean any of this seems to fundamentally undermine the whole business doesn't it?

Either God didn't get that child sex was bad, or the people writing the scriptures didn't write down what God asked them too....either way around it doesn't look good for the scriptures being a moral guiding star.

Then there is the whole equality of women issue...the bible is riddled with 'oh just bin that wife and get a younger one' and 'beat your women' talk.

Again...probably not God's fault...but hardly providing the moral high point one might hope for.

The Bible was written over a long period of time by many writers a long time after the death of Jesus.

The Dharma (was originally oral) 500BC and written and added to over hundreds of years. Buddha was not a divine being.

Hinduism started as an oral tradition too - mantras, chanting etc

I don't know about other scriptures.

Learning from religion in general is about much more than slavishly following the details of a scripture though. It's an intention to be 'moral' with a practice designed to support that intention and a supportive community.

Where does it say in the Bible ' just bin that wife and get a younger one'? Christianity advocates monogamy.

rogue you seem to be misunderstanding me. I am not sayign that there aren't good bits and bits we could think about more even now. I am saying that in lots of ways secular morality has surpassed religious morality and hence we should stop thinking that morals come from religion and realise that our society has been exporting morality to religious organisations for some time now.

Where does it say in the Bible ' just bin that wife and get a younger one'?

It does say that a woman who is found to not be a virgin at her wedding should be stoned. That to me is morally reprehensible. You can't say 'God didn't mean that' without undermining the whole Bible. Either you have a God who has changed his morality at a slightly slower pace than humanity or a god who thinks it is okay to order a whole town to throw rocks at a woman's head (where chances are one of the men killing her had had sex with her). I'm still waiting for an example of a choice you made that you would be unable to without referring to a god.

The church is dragged along by society not the other way.

Finding a basis for morality without faith is much, much harder.

Given the number of answers that faith gives are dead wrong, I don't think it is that hard.

Both the bible and koran fumble on the softball question on whether slavery is wrong. A 10 year old knows the answer to these questions, yet our most revered books don't.

FWIW, IMO religions all teach the same values and serve the purpose of helping humans get along with each other peacefully, take our lives seriously and celebrate the very fact of life.

no, they don't. They say different things and give different recommendations on how to live a proper life, and they mostly get fundamental questions wrong.

How on earth we got to the state where a small collection of books littered with poor recommendations on how to run society are thought to be divinely inspired is a strange state of affairs. It is comically easy to improve on divine inspiration, apparently.

So how do you make moral decisions then? Greatest good for the greatest number? By what leads to the making of a good person? Rules? Feelings?

And once more with feeling. The Bible is not a book of rules. It was not written by God. It was written over a long period of time.

As a Christian ethicist I can appeal to some arguments that non Christians can't. So they have to find other arguments. Go figure.

If you work from an evolutionary perspective, a sense of morality is a trait that has evolved in humans as a survival mechanism in large-brained animals that have a vastly superior chance of survival in a community - the cooperate or die principle, where groups with more altruistic behaviour had a greater chance of survival.

How moral codes and underlying values is a fascinating area of study, including the psychological basis of humans having an affinity to religion - since as you say, 'because God says' can provide an easier/more stable structure that shifting community values that underpin moral decisions.

Of course, as we've seen, those religious values have to shift and adapt to major changes in community values as a survival mechanism, so they are not as stable as they appear at first glance. What God said changes in the interpretation based on the underlying values of the community.

As a Christian ethicist I can appeal to some arguments that non Christians can't

Examples please?

Examples please?

'Because God said so'?

Where's the money going to come from though to buy out faith school's property?

Chances are, especially in London and other cities, the church will sell off the land to the highest bidder = luxury flats, not schools.

In our area the catholic school is the more multicultural and tolerant. There are children from all faiths and backgrounds, and all religions are taught. The community school is exclusively rich white people (who can afford property prices).

i'd rather my child went to the multicultural school and learned about all faiths than the community school where they're intolerant of religion altogether- all the parents I know there are of the "no god, no discussion" POV. Whatever your personal belief, I think children still need to learn about the various religions.

The Bible is not a book of rules. It was not written by God. It was written over a long period of time.

many christians disagree with you.

So how do you make moral decisions then?

reason, discourse. Promoting common goals.

As a Christian ethicist I can appeal to some arguments that non Christians can't.

yes, but that isn't usually very constructive. the only appeal you can make as a christian ethicist that I can't make is that a particular idea that comes from "christian principles" (that may or may not mean the bible) is good because it's a christian principle. The trouble is you are going to get nowhere with anyone who puts little stock into christian principles. I couldn't care less if an idea comes from the bible. I want good ideas.

As an atheist, I can easily point to christian principles or parts of the bible and say those are good ideas and we ought to follow, but I decide independently whether those ideas are good. What happens is, in principle, this is what christians do when they "cherry pick". Nowadays, no one will use the bible to justify slavery. Those parts are explained away in various ways.

Whatever your personal belief, I think children still need to learn about the various religions.

my guess is that you will get no disagreement from a secularist or atheist on that. you clearly don't understand the secularist position if you think that is incompatible with secularism. For that you need a good RE programme, not faith schools.

My guess is your school is tolerant in a narrow band of "tolerance".