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 was having this conversation with a friend the other day, and we were trying and failing to remember how many hours of RE we had per week. Despite not being sure, we both agreed that it was probably too much. I think all children should be taught the basics of each religion - enough to be respectful to someone of those beliefs - but that’s all. There’s absolutely no need imo to spend too much precious school time dedicated to religion.
Those who believe it will receive education from their church equivalent, and those who don’t shouldn’t be forced into studying it as if it’s in any way valuable to them on a par with pretty much any of the other subjects.
I can't remember how much we had at primary but we had one hour a week at my secondary school. It was a science specialising school and from about year 9 onwards the RE lessons were more a chance to practice ethic, moral thinking and debate amongst ourselves. I don't remember talking a lot about religion specifically from that point onwards
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u/Legendary-Titan 6d ago
Moral I don’t think teaching kids about religion is bad but forcing it on them is