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Well i mean more like they have no interest in going to your church/temple/circle anymore and want to start doing their own thing. But i have known parents who will confiscat any material in regards to another belief system their kids follow or want to because of the ideal that "In this house you follow our belief system".
I think it is natural for parents to guide a child in their belief system and have practices they follow as a family (ie, if we go to church, whomever is home is expected to attend, it is something we choose to do as a family). That said, my DH and I are different denominations (within the same religion) and the church we attend is neither of those denominations...so...I have no problem with anyone questioning, researching or choosing a different path. As long as they are good people and lead a healthy life, how (or if) they choose to express themselves spiritually really is up to them as they get older. When we are at my parent's homes or my husband's parent's home, we respectfully attend the services they do. I would expect the same from my kids as they get older, whatever they choose for themselves.
But i have known parents who will confiscat any material in regards to another belief system their kids follow or want to because of the ideal that "In this house you follow our belief system".
Which will generally backfire. I know in my case it did.
I have no problem with my son looking into whatever he wants to look into. I wouldn't want him to just follow what we do (or in our case, don't do) just because that's what we do. Right now (at 17) he has no interest. We have in fact encouraged him to read about different beliefs/religions, if for nothing else, to be able to understand where others are coming from.
Which will generally backfire. I know in my case it did.
I have no problem with my son looking into whatever he wants to look into. I wouldn't want him to just follow what we do (or in our case, don't do) just because that's what we do. Right now (at 17) he has no interest. We have in fact encouraged him to read about different beliefs/religions, if for nothing else, to be able to understand where others are coming from.
The same went for my grandmother trying to keep my mother as catholic as possible.
YES, We teach out children what was taught to us. If they want to explore other options, thats a part of growing up and developing. I have no problem with it.
But in reality, we are really being brainwashed about religion, as our parents were, as their parents were and so on and so on...
I am getting to the point in life that I think religion has been a problem for mankind since day one. I also think it is un-necessary. It seems to be the biggest problem on Earth...
I believe in God, that's enough for me.
We brought ours up as Christians. But as a family we had friends who were/are athiests, Mormons, Hindus, Jews, Buddhists, Quakers, Sikhs... whatever. (It's L.A. People worship asteroids in L.A.) If they wanted to go with a friend to a service we never had a problem with it. (We did steer them away from a few "religions/belief systems" that we were very uncomfortable with. And which shall remain nameless because that's for another thread.)
My best friend is a pagan and they knew that from the time they were little. She has no children so she is the "favorite aunt" and they always knew her faith was different. No biggee. We never "allowed" them to look into other religions. It was a given that they could if they wanted to. But we did establish a very strong belief in the Christian religion. We went to church as a family and prayed at home as a family. There was always a Bible or two or six to pick up and read and Christian books/magazines. Each of them attend Christian churches today.
Last edited by DewDropInn; 12-02-2010 at 02:18 PM..
I'm atheist but I do not want to deny my son the right to follow a faith if he so chooses. Whenever he starts to show an interest in exploring a religion I have no issues in allowing him to explore the religion; depending on his age and the religion he is interested in I will either find a family member or friend to take him to services and explore, attend with him or allow him to attend alone. If he wants to explore anything remotely off the beaten path I will 100% be in attendance with him since I would hate to discover too late that it's a cult. I make an effort not make any skeptical remarks to him or around him but he's only 4 and religion and related items come up very rarely; we'll see how long I can bite my tongue.
However I do have one rule and it goes for all people I interact with NO PROSELYTIZING, I have zero tolerance for that. So if he chooses to follow a different belief system he is welcome to and even welcome to talk about what he is learning but no encouraging (harrassing) others especially myself to join.
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