Strongly Christian harvest festival in non-faith school

[Hooliesmoolies]

I am really annoyed about the Harvest festival at my child's school. The leadership of the school are strongly Christian and I am offended at the way they impose their own beliefs on my child's state school. I know that an act of worship is within the regulations, however the way it is implemented varies MASSIVELY across schools. And evidently, there is no choice because I live in London and so we are just lucky to have a good school at the end of the road. I'm not going to put my full rant here, but I am going to post this:

www.change.org/p/end-compulsory-worship-in-schools

For anyone who feels like me!!

mouse - ITA. The USA got one thing badly wrong, in that (AFAIK) they don't have religious education - comparitive religion, study of many worldviews - in public schools. That can't help at all if a kid is brought up in a fundamentalist family.

Comparative religion is incorporated to some extent in many history and social studies courses in US schools. It's pretty impossible to teach history without conveying some understanding of different religious beliefs. And a few schools do offer an elective course in comparative religion.

Errolthedragon check the law www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/281929/Collective_worship_in_schools.pdf

But I thought Harvest Festival is a Christian festival?

It's not remotely Christian. It's a pagan festival, co-opted, and much more obviously so than Yule and ?ostre. In the latter case, the Christians were too lazy to even change the name, and I suspect most people would know what you were talking about if you referred to Christmas as Yule or Yuletide, even though its pagan roots are clear in Odin also being jólfaðr, the Yule father.

You don't have to burn Edward Woodward in a large wicker effigy, tempting though it might be on a cold night, to see the purely pagan nature of harvest festival. It doesn't appear in any significant way in the bible or indeed in the canonical services of the major denominations, and the current form of it is 19th century and looks very much like the church co-opting various pagan survivals to try to get people into church instead.

Freyr fest / Lughnasa/Lammas all thank god for the harvest just not a Christian God

mrz - I've read the law several times before (and AFAIK it hasn't changed yet, unfortunately) - not sure why you're pointing me to it, did I get something wrong somewhere?

Yes ErrolTheDragon you said "I take it that all the assemblies are Christian? The law certainly doesn't say that they all must be!"
where in fact the law says "Collective worship in county schools and equivalent grant-maintained schools must be wholly or mainly of a broadly Christian character, though not distinctive of any particular Christian denomination."

How would you define 'broadly christian character'?

Seems as though it could cover pretty much anything.

I understand that religion is a very divisive issue but honestly if we started a list all the aspects of school you disagree with and would if you could change or pull your child out of I'm sure that list would be very long indeed.

I probably would say this as a Christian but the way Christianity is used / approached in most all state schools (excluding faith schools) is pretty underwhelming and I really don't think it has any negative effect on children and I very much doubt whether it has an impact on their religious views as an adult.

duhgldiuhfdsli I'm afraid that it definitely has Christian roots, even if other faiths etc had their own versions of harvest thanksgivings. Thanking God for the harvest became a Jewish festival when the Jews entered the promised land thousands of years ago. The early Christians were Jews and hence celebrated Jewish festivals. Obviously the way that harvest is celebrated has changed over the years, so has culture in general.

Leviticus 23:10–14
Speak to the Israelites and say to them: ‘When you enter the land I am going to give you and you reap its harvest, bring to the priest a sheaf of the first grain you harvest. He is to wave the sheaf before the Lord so it will be accepted on your behalf; the priest is to wave it on the day after the Sabbath. On the day you wave the sheaf, you must sacrifice as a burnt offering to the Lord a lamb a year olds without defect, together with its grain offering of two-tenths of an ephah of the finest flour mixed with olive oil—a food offering presented to the Lord, a pleasing aroma—and its drink offering of a quarter of a hinb of wine. You must not eat any bread, or roasted or new grain, until the very day you bring this offering to your God. This is to be a lasing ordinance for the generations to come, wherever you live.

"I probably would say this as a Christian but the way Christianity is used / approached in most all state schools (excluding faith schools) is pretty underwhelming and I really don't think it has any negative effect on children and I very much doubt whether it has an impact on their religious views as an adult."

Can I ask, newbie-if I said there was only an underwhelming bit of Satan worship in state schools, and that I very much doubted whether it had any negative effect on children or impact on their religious views.....how would you feel?

Oh golly Hakluyt .......Plenty of satan worship going on....I don't worry about though not in the slightest...children are very clever.

So you would be perfectly happy sending your children to school where they was compulsory Satan worship?

mrz - yep. I know. Wholly or mainly of a broadly Christian character - the 'mainly' means that they do not all have to be christian. Also, schools 'without a religious character' can apply for an exemption from the 'broadly christian' character (though they still have to provide some form of 'collective worship', some schools manage to be quite creative in defining that to be inclusive).

Hakluyt .....Yes....I sent my child to a non faith primary school...Lots of the science text ect for instance I consider satan worship. How about halloween which has become a massive part of primary school life, they bang on about it for about 3 weeks a year....No problem.

I stear my child in the direction I'd like him to go and give nim the tools to have free will.

Unless we are talking about hardcore radicalisation I have no problem with my child being exposed to things I disagree with.

Er-which bits of science are satan worship?????

Wow. Look forward to hearing the answer to Hak's question, newbieman.

OK. In a completely non judgemental, not going to argue way (which would be redundant as you are not preventing your child from learning these things in school) I have to know - which bit of primary school science is satan worship?

I'd quite like to know which bits of Halloween celebrations involve worship too....

The bit telling my child he evolved from a piece of bacteria ten thousand million years ago....or telling him he's just an evolved ape. To me that is the modern day talk of satan which children are asked to buy into ergo that is satan worship.

Halloween any thought?

I might have guessed it. You can always tell a creationist. Just not very much.

i don't like Halloween.

I don't either alemci....but I always open the door and give the children sweets....don't think there is anything wrong with it for others.... each to their own.

Thanks for replying - that is a whole other thread.

And people, newbie's child is going to the lessons.