Letting your children decide for themselves about religion (doctrine, Revelation, gnostic)
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My wife was not religious and neither am I. Both sets of grandparents were. My boys were exposed to church/religion via their grandparents and were supremely uninterested. ("I don't like that Jesus on the plus sign!")
I always encouraged thinking for themselves. Today, like perhaps most young adults, religion/God is at the bottom of their lists of things to contemplate. Yet both are fine, ethical, empathetic adults.
This is me exactly. My parents weren't religious in the slightest, but my grandparents went to church. I was extremely close with my grandparents and stayed with them on Saturdays all the time. We would always go to church on Sunday, and I would sit there quietly for an hour and play with little pads of paper and my grandma would slip me little candies or things every 10 minutes to keep me occupied. It was all very sweet and I felt very close to them. Once we left the church though I never once remember them talking about religion or God to me.
My parents had me go to bible school during the summer from around 4th through 6th grades. I actually remember it as one of the worst experiences of my young life. The kids were so mean and bullying. It was truly awful.
My parents did it though to at least give me a taste of religion and fully let me decide for myself if I wanted to pursue it, between going to church with my grandparents and then going to bible school. Even without the bullying and if the kids had been my best friends and I loved them - I instantly realized the actual content of the bible and the teachings were good for morals, but they are all entirely fiction. Following it in a literal sense was laughable. I understood the basis of inventing religions, to control groups of people, bind them together and to try and have a code of laws that people had to obey that they couldn't physically fight against. "Don't revolt against me, I didn't make the rules.....God did". It made sense back in the day.
I had absolutely no interest in any of it, I just liked hanging out with my grandparents. After I was in 7th grade or so I was given the choice and I've had nothing to do with religion since. I fully accept anyone else who believes in it, but don't get offended when I speak my OWN voice on the subject.
I grew up to be a very moral, understanding and caring adult. You certainly don't need religion to be a "good" person. If you think you do there's something flawed in your logic.
This is me exactly. My parents weren't religious in the slightest, but my grandparents went to church. I was extremely close with my grandparents and stayed with them on Saturdays all the time. We would always go to church on Sunday, and I would sit there quietly for an hour and play with little pads of paper and my grandma would slip me little candies or things every 10 minutes to keep me occupied. It was all very sweet and I felt very close to them. Once we left the church though I never once remember them talking about religion or God to me.
My parents had me go to bible school during the summer from around 4th through 6th grades. I actually remember it as one of the worst experiences of my young life. The kids were so mean and bullying. It was truly awful.
My parents did it though to at least give me a taste of religion and fully let me decide for myself if I wanted to pursue it, between going to church with my grandparents and then going to bible school. Even without the bullying and if the kids had been my best friends and I loved them - I instantly realized the actual content of the bible and the teachings were good for morals, but they are all entirely fiction. Following it in a literal sense was laughable. I understood the basis of inventing religions, to control groups of people, bind them together and to try and have a code of laws that people had to obey that they couldn't physically fight against. "Don't revolt against me, I didn't make the rules.....God did". It made sense back in the day.
I had absolutely no interest in any of it, I just liked hanging out with my grandparents. After I was in 7th grade or so I was given the choice and I've had nothing to do with religion since. I fully accept anyone else who believes in it, but don't get offended when I speak my OWN voice on the subject.
I grew up to be a very moral, understanding and caring adult. You certainly don't need religion to be a "good" person. If you think you do there's something flawed in your logic.
your kids don't listen to what you say, they do what you are. That's a professional opinion.
To let them make a choice you have to give them a choice. For us, my wife is catholic, we sent them to CCD. Both my boys asked me, "if you don't believe dad why do you make us go?" I tell them "If I hold out my hand and say chose a hand what choice did you make?" There are many other logical reason to let them learn both sides of a belief statement that sleepers can't understand. We tell them when they get older they can decide for themselves on what religion to follow.
The only thing we Both stress is 'never take a belief statement literally!". atheist or national.
It will never happen if the parents believe the Bible. Because the underlying message (and appeal) of the Bible is that the parents are actually God. Why would they just give that privilege away so freely?
They consider faith to be the biggest gift they have received, for having an ability to control anything in their life. It might even be one of the reasons they had children in the first place. Children are almost as good as having a pet. And you truly expect them to just give that up so easily?
As my husband and I had very bad experiences of having the Christian religion, of the fundamentalist/Biblical literalist dogma, forced down our throats as children, we were determined our own kids would not be subjected to any pressure. As there is no evidence to support any religion it is up to the individual to decide for themselves. Our girls are Christians, one an Anglican Priest, fortunately they are not fundies/Biblical literalists which would be hard to take, but up to them of course.
Do other posters let their children decide for themselves?
My instinctive and initial reaction to your post is "What's with the 'let'?"
Having had several biological children, as well as having raised a few more, my experience has taught me that kids are going to decide for themselves anyway. Perhaps they won't do it while under your roof (mine didn't), but as soon as they get out into the 'world,' they'll go their own way.
It doesn't matter what we teach them, nor what we do (as in by example), grown children will choose their own path(s), and there's nothing we can do about it.
I'm uncertain how much a Biblical foundation shapes the heart, mind, brain, and spirit, but I know that it does to some degree. I'm appalled by the choices my children have made, and continue to make in life, and I doubt I'll ever understand those choices, given their upbringing, but ultimately those choices are theirs to make. We all have to choose which path we will tread. The Bible is full of admonitions telling us to choose wisely, so obviously choice is a factor for each of us.
Personally, I believe we are given only two choices, when we boil down the mix, and that is whether to choose God's Way or another way -- it doesn't matter which path we take if it isn't God's path.
Yes, we get it. Your kids wolfed down their brussels sprouts at an early age, rose every Saturday morning at 6 to mow the lawn and take breakfast to shut-ins, and deflected a massive, incoming meteor with nothing more than Duplo blocks, a pencil, some #94 rubber bands, and an empty SpaghettiOs can. Let us know when their Nobel acceptance speech is so we can all tune in. That's coming up, right?
But, in truth, if you're getting ready for church on Sunday morning and you cave to your six- or ten-year-old who doesn't want to go, then what I describe is precisely what's happening. You are having to lay aside your own spiritual impulses in order to appease the child's whim du jour. There's really no way around it, no matter how much passive-aggressive nonsense you offer up. We don't allow minors to sign legal contracts or buy vodka for much the same reason, namely that their decision making isn't all that great at that age. I mean, maybe you let your kids smoke Marlboros at a tender age because they were such fully-empowered old souls, but ordinary parents with ordinary kids have to nudge their children down the right path all the time.
And let's be clear, just in case you want to be lazy and play the 'dictatorial parent' card: My children have enjoyed all kinds of autonomy in their decisions, autonomy that increased as they grew older. But they are a part of our family, and our family goes to church together. They did not complain about it that much, chiefly because our church is a loving and embracing place where they have made friends. And they also knew it was part of being a member of the family. I mean, hell, two of my kids also put up a fight the first time I took them to summer camp. But when camp was over, you practically had to drag them back to the car for the return trip home because they enjoyed it so much, counting the days until the next year. Had I listened to them and not taken them to summer camp in the first place, they would have been much poorer for the experience.
What's more, if your daughter truly is an Anglican priest, I would bet my eyeteeth that she would have enjoyed being exposed to the richness and fullness of that tradition in her salad days, rather than stumbling upon it later in life. So let's not spin hanging out at home with the Sunday newspaper into some kind of virtuous activity, okay? It's not necessarily bad, but it's not exactly a sign of enlightened behavior in your child's best interests, either, no matter how much self-congratulation you offer up.
When they hit 18, my children were free to make whatever decisions they wanted regarding their faith. And I'm glad to say that those decisions have included continuing their spiritual life in the fold of a church. For, as Proverbs states, "Start children off on the way they should go, and even when they are old they will not turn from it."
No sprouts. No one is an Anglican priest. No smoking. No drinking. Hanging out on Sunday morning is a perfect family morning.
Hanging out with the Sunday paper is rather enlightened. They learned and read about the world, once they moved beyond the comics.
No lawn mowing. They were started off in exactly the right way. They went to camp that suited their interests, not mine, so there was never any fighting with them to go. They did not have to go to camp if they did not want to go.
If you needed Church in your life, good for you. You spent a lot of time fighting with your children. It is precious time wasted.
I would not be surprised if one of them won a Nobel Peace Prize. It is hardly passive-aggressive to raise children without the narrow confines of a church. I enjoyed every moment with my children. I enjoy every moment with them as adults, too. No Church needed. Although the bells on Sunday are lovely.
Correct, but you do NEED Jesus and Eternal Life.
Not recognizing that or accepting that results in not having it.
End of story!
Without the experience of consciousness, you would feel and know nothing.
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