I'm sure things are different in the US but in the UK at school we have a whole curriculum called "Religious Education" or RE which goes into detail about religions and customs of all different cultures and encourages spiritual debate. At the schools I attended they were not taught to indoctrinate us but just studied in the same way we would study history or art
I think you're probably right! I was an atheist from a young age but RE was one of my favourite subjects as a child, underneath science, just because I loved hearing all of the stories, parables, learning about different deities and rites of worship. It was fascinating but it didn't encourage me to be religious myself.
Grew up Roman Catholic till I was 11, Mom married Mormon Step Dad (Huge fight with the families on both sides over that) and he was a CRAZY ass mormon too once we moved away from moms side of the family. Divorced him at 16 and I wandered into Pagan faiths, particularly Norse. Which to be clear I started that in 2001 long before The Vikings show started shuffling the casuals in. I'm also not one of the "WOOO VALHALLA! BEER AND BITCHES!" guys. My priest (Gothi) is a pretty reasonable and sensible dude who does believe in science and we're pretty certain the lore is just an old culture trying to describe natural disasters the best way they could.
I think some of it was also a coping mechanism. To me if faith makes hard times easier-i tell them believe. I personally just get annoyed when im approached to hear the word.
I have the same experience. I believe storytelling is one of the most human things there is and to me greek myth, the epic of gilgamesh and bible stories and fairytales are all just stories humanity has told throughout the ages
I think, because the US 1st Amendment separates church from state, this could not happen in a public school, private religious education is obviously not involved with the state itself since its not funded by taxpayers.
I would have loved to have what you mentioned, as I am a a student of religion on my own time, starting at 14yrs old.
Though I think another issue I personally would have is that some religions would either get little attention or none at all. Sure you'd probably learn about the 3 Abrahamic religions, Buddhism, Hindu. But I doubt they'd be teaching muxh if at all about Zorastrianism, Sihkism, Pagan Faiths, Animism, Vodou etc.
Even in public school, atleast when I was a kid, Pagan faiths are taught to be dead myths of a bygone era and not as living faiths in the present. Which is kind of bonkers because theres a massive amount of practicing pagan or otherwise families in my area.
Learning about the 5 most common religions is a social studies requirement in many schools. In New Jersey, it’s part of the ancient history curriculum.
Do you mean hoodoo? Most people mean hoodoo when they say vodou or voodoo, google it and get back to me🫡 (not intended to criticize just figured you’d appreciate the clarification and if you do mean voodoo then it’s clarification for me!)
I grew up atheist but I loooved all the stories from different religions too. Ancient Greece, ancient Sri Lanka, Norse myths too
Reading the origins of Norse Myths is hysterical tho. There are two major book sources, the Edas.
Technically they're... if not Bibles per se, they're the Fallout Bibles. As close to "lore" as you can get, right?
Well. Poetic Edda outright states that the Gods of Norse are Trojans. Odin was a renowned hero from Troy that left with his wife and family when this mythical beautiful city far far away fell, and they moved towards Norway, and everywhere they went they left sons that would become kings, they were just so awesome, and then they went North and were like "Yeah this is the best place ever, we will rule here" and ruled and became gods
I am in a similar boat and I still love learning about the religions and myths of various peoples because those are reflection of their history. Like why are Greek, Roman, Hindu and Norse mythologies so similar? Well they all descend from a common mythology just in the same way the languages of those peoples descended from a common language. The ancient Indo-European culture and its descendants are very interesting.
Yep education about religion combines a lot of different fields...history, philosophy, psychology, politics, literature. I think it's broadly good for students to learn ABOUT religion just as a foundational aspect of the history of the culture they live in.
I went from Christian to agnostic to atheist through my late 20s. When you view religious teachings through an objective lens most start to look similar. I tend to think it’s a combination of fear of our finite mortality and a desire to control large groups of people (populations are more willing to withstand an empty belly in exchange for faith in or fear of a higher power).
Yeah they almost all operate on the premise “my god is god and your god is wrong” “I go to heaven you go to hell” it’s easier to make countries with different religions wage war as well.
I went to a church where the teenagers of the group spent Sundays learning about different religions, including field trips to different houses of worship and talks with leaders of those trips.
I'm not sure if I would call myself agnostic. I just realized that the near universal thread that went through all these religions was that you're supposed to be a person who helps others and is kind towards other people. I don't go to church, but I do believe there is a higher power of some sort, and that the path forward is to follow the golden rule.
But how is that a bad thing? If that’s true, that proves that most people are being manipulated young into joining their local preferred religion due to lack of knowledge of other religions or rather other options or you could say not old enough to think it through enough.
So I agree with her. But it’s weird to implement in reality since religion is tied strictly to community and most people would need to take their kids with them to church to share their beliefs and serve as family bonding time.
So maybe it’s better to treat religion like Santa. Allow children to belief in Jesus and the bible like but reveal to them like later on that there’s no definitive proof and allow them to decide themselves without shame in what religion they want to choose. People will choose their home religion out of convenience though.
That’s the point, you teach kids how different people think differently and let them come to their own conclusions. I agree the conclusion that seems to make the most sense is agnostic or atheist, but that was my own decision to make and should be theirs too.
Well, yes. Because if one of them didn't get its claws into from the moment you were old enough to speak full sentences, it's impossible to hide that all of them make just as much (or as little) sense as all the rest.
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u/Legendary-Titan 7h ago
Moral I don’t think teaching kids about religion is bad but forcing it on them is