posted
My parents are atheists. At least, I'm pretty sure they are. They don't go to church, they don't pray, and they never talk about religion. When I was younger they told me about various faiths, and various beliefs that people have. Buddism, Islam, Christianity, Judaism etc. They never told me that any of them were wrong, or that one of them were better than the others. They left me to make up my own mind about religion, and what I wanted to believe.
At the moment I'm eighteen years old, and I don't really know what I believe. I have felt a certain affinity towards religion at various points in my life, there have been times when a religion might have comforted me, but I've never tried to seek out a religion. I've basically figured out that I'm an agnostic. I don't know, and I can't know. God might exist, or he might not. I can't say either way. And I'm happy with this. I try to be a decent person, and I try to live a good life. I'm happy about the way my parents taught me religion. They gave me the choice to find out for myself what I believe in. If they had taught me at an early age that God doesn't exist, I might not have studied religion in the same way. I might have been overly critical of the various bible stories I read, and I might have missed out on a lot of good that I found in them.
I started thinking about this recently, and I wondered, how many people give their kids that chance? Do the atheist parents here give their children the chance to decide for themselves if there's a god or not? What about the religious parents? Do you teach your kids that your religion is the ONE TRUE FAITH, and that God definitely exists?
Thank you for your time
edit: and for that matter, how did your parents approach the subject of religion with you?
[ April 29, 2005, 06:50 AM: Message edited by: St. Yogi ]
Posts: 739 | Registered: Dec 2003
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posted
My father is atheist, staunchly so, and my mother is baptized LDS (I word it that way because she's never lived the LDS life, and she goes to church something like maybe once or twice a year, or so I'm told.) Both were raised in a Mennonite household (somewhat close to Baptist in beliefs), but hated the religion they were raised with. We weren't taught anything at home about religion. We weren't taught anything about morals, ethics, or anything like that.
Unless you count their actions. Then we were taught that it's fine to steal, cheat, lie, murder, take advantage of people, kick them when they're down, and all the rest of that good stuff. Oh, there was some lip service to being honest, but no one was really serious about it.
As a child, teenager, and then adult, I made up my own mind what I was going to believe in, and while I can honestly say that my parents influenced me in what my beliefs would ultimately be, it isn't because it's what they wanted for me.
I wound up being LDS and very happy with it.
And now I'm married to an equally staunch Muslim, and it's working out fine. If we have kidlets, we'll raise them in both, and when they're old enough, they can make up their own mind. In reality, they're going to make their own decision anyway - we're just formally recognizing that fact. Posts: 8355 | Registered: Apr 2003
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posted
I was tought by my mother and her family fundamentalist Judaism the way it was taught in Europe before the war.
My father is a weird story, and I can't tell you myself what he was. He's now pretty atheistic - inclined by family norms to act Jewishly. He did watch the Rugby games on Saturdays, too. I just wandered off and read OSC after Ireland showd their bad defence.
So I'm in a pit of not knowing what to do, be, or act as.
posted
"we were taught that it's fine to steal, cheat, lie, murder, take advantage of people, kick them when they're down, and all the rest of that good stuff."
Your family taught you that murder was okay? *blink* If you don't mind, I'd love to hear this story.
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Like a lot of things, my parents just assumed I'd grow up believing and didn't raise the subject too much one way or the other.
I had a bout of criminal mischief early in life and my folks tried a crash course of divine intervention but that never really took either. If nothing else, it convinced me that of the three or four faiths I experienced, they were all more or less the same except with different window dressing.
Unfortunately, I also grew up with my nose in a book, so mix a historical perspective of mythology and a critical thinking class and it tends to go downhill from there.
posted
what a complete dichotomy from being raised a Cradle Catholic...
My mom was (is?) Catholic - she came to the us 35+ years ago and was a nun. Obviously, she's not anymore... (and that's not my fault, she quit before I was even an issue) but I was raised going to church weekly, and I went to Catholic school. I can't really say I'm a good Catholic now, but on some level I will always BE inherently Catholic. Religion was a standard part of my life - praying a rosary together with my mom & my sister, for instance. Now that I'm older, wiser, more cynical, I don't agree with some of what the Catholic church teaches, or some of what Christianity teaches, so I guess that makes me an "a-la-carte" Catholic. (A term from college.) I like to make my decisions based on lots and lots and LOTS of information, and that's how I treat religion. For me, it was a decent moral code learned early on, but it was compounded with the crummy side of humanity that shows itself when you're the kid of a not-rich single mom in a snooty Catholic school. I learned that some people do NOT practice what they preach, and that's why I quit going to church. I can't tolerate hypocrisy and most religions seem to be rife with it. I went to a Catholic Liberal Arts (haha, laugh with me) college and minored in Theology - because I wanted more information. To this day, if you ask, I'll say I'm Catholic, but I don't know that the Pope would agree...
(sorry if that's too rambly)
Posts: 262 | Registered: Jun 2004
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posted
Absolutely I teach my children that my faith is the TRUE ONE, as you put it I consider that my responsibility as a Christian parent.
This is an interesting time because my daughter is 12, and old enough to understand more so we are very actively teaching her what we believe and why. We talk often of spiritual issues, and not the stuff that gets covered in Sunday School - or at least not in our current Sunday School, which is a major reason we are planning to change churches.
We are covering what some people would term "deep doctrine" with her and teaching her not just what we believe - but why. In other words, - we believe X, these are the verses that support that belief, we interpret them this way because of Y, and this is how it applies to your life.
I don't want her to be one of the millions of protestants who couldn't articulate their belief beyond "Yeah, I'm baptist and I believe Jesus died for me." (not picking on baptists - it's just the first denomination that came to mind)
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quote:If we have kidlets, we'll raise them in both, and when they're old enough, they can make up their own mind. In reality, they're going to make their own decision anyway - we're just formally recognizing that fact.
I'd suggest that you might end up teaching them that they don't actually have to make a decision.
Their temple undergarments might flash plumber-style while they bow to pray in the mosque, which might cause a bit of a stir, no?
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posted
I am gradually introducing the ideas that religion exists to my child. I explain about what the world is already beaming at him when he asks, interjecting my opinion as opinion.
He's tending toward agnosticism. I fear I may have failed as a parent.
But at least he's very scepticle. At least my ideas are having some effect. Posts: 410 | Registered: Apr 2005
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On another note. Temple garments wouldn't be flashing in a mosque if they were abiding by Islam. Muslims are required to be as covered up as LDS garments require.
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posted
When they're old enough to be baptized LDS, they'll have to decide. Muslims don't baptize. I won't force them, although we certainly would teach them about both our religions, as well as others.
On the other hand, since we don't have children at this point, it could all be irrelevant.
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posted
My mother is nominally Catholic, before she divorced my father we went to church every so often, but my father wouldn't let her baptize us as infants, which was important to me, because if I had been baptized Catholic I would have felt like I had a covenant to uphold. As it was I was freer to choose my own religion. Growing up she taught us the children's prayers. Before going to bed we said "now I lay me down to sleep I pray the Lord my soul to keep, the Love stay with me through night and wake me with the morning light," and before dinner we'd say "Blesses the Lord for these thy gifts of which we are about to recieve." Other than that though, I grew up with only vague ideas that Jesus was born at Christmas and died around Easter, and that there were guardian angels looking out for each one of us.
The rest of it was stuff I'd thought out on my, supposing a reasonable God. When I was twelve was the year my faith was really affirmed, though. It was a difficult year for me, and I finally decided that if God didn't exist and didn't have a plan for me, then I didn't want to live anymore. If there was no God, then I would kill myself. Furthermore, if there was no God, then nothing I did mattered, but if there were then there would be some sort of reward or punishment for my actions. So I decided given the choice, that I preferred to act as though there were a God, because if I were wrong, there would be no harm, but if I were right, then there could be great reward. To be honest though, when I was younger I had great faith in God despite my parents rather laissez-faire approach to it. Several times I prayed for something unlikely, and it came to me, and I accepted that as proof.
I later went on just a year ago to join the LDS church, and since I made my decision to believe in God, I don't falter in it, and I've never regretted my decision either. I know that a large reason why the church appeals to me is that I have trouble with ambiguity, and the clear code of conduct of the church fits the code I adhered to before joining it perfectly, that is the most important thing.
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posted
Sometimes I envy those whose faith is so strong. I wonder if I haven't learned *too* much - I tend to be more scientific than religious, and I have a healthy skepticism for those who profess faith but can't tell you why. I imagine it must be very comforting to be secure in your faith and believe that God (or whoever) is really there for you. I'm just not that trusting.
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quote: Unfortunately, I also grew up with my nose in a book, so mix a historical perspective of mythology and a critical thinking class and it tends to go downhill from there.
Tell me about it; I ditched religion after a single semester in religious philosophy. The teacher still inquires me - all the time - to what I feel about religion. He hasn't taught me for over 2 years.
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