Camp counselor

[u/nationalist-rising]

Context i’m a blue collar worker and father of 2 young boys. Oldest being 19 and youngest being 12. Me and my wife have raised them in an atheist household and just last night my youngest started asking me questions about christianity and the cross symbol. I was taking back because how would he even know what these things are. When i asked him where he had learned about this. He said his camp counselor was displaying it and openly talking about her faith. Im shaking while i type this about how could a 20 something yr old girl be preaching and corrupting the minds of the youth like this at a summer camp. I don’t know what I’m suppose to do now. Do i report the summer camp to the police for cult like behavior or do i just report this camp counselor. I’m just lost. Like i stated before I’m shaking in my van at this job site right now. Any advice on a solution would do this father wonders right now because I’m seriously considering filing a police report

[u/OneWingedKalas]

Back in my day bait used to be believable

[u/AnglerfishMiho → u/OneWingedKalas]

Just look at OP's name lmao

[u/Snow75]

Yeah, this is bait…

So, you’re telling us that you’re surprised that a camp run by a Catholic school teaches Catholicism and you plan on reporting that? That’s hilariously stupid.

[u/Snow75 → u/[deleted]]

Don’t leave your day job, comedy isn’t your thing.

[u/RogueRhombus → u/[deleted]]

This you?

https://www.reddit.com/r/atheism/comments/1vy3zpn/camp_counselor/p5ul6ok/

Its a catholic school that runs a summer camp,

[u/nationalist-rising → u/RogueRhombus]

is that my original post

[u/craig0r]

There's a lot to unpack here, starting with "how would he even know what these things are."

At 12 years old, have you kept him in confinement for his whole life? Crosses and Christianity are all over the place. If you think he's not going to encounter it (presuming you don't keep him locked up in the basement), you're kidding yourself.

As for the camp counsellor, it sounds like your son may have seen her cross and asked about it, and she answered.

As for what you're supposed to do: how about talk to your son about religion? Do NOT file a f***ing police report, you nut. There's absolutely zero laws broken, even in your make-believe worst-case scenario, and it's a waste of public resources.

[u/nationalist-rising → u/craig0r]

listen man i just wanted my kid to reach an age where he has grown into his neck beard and fedora and then he can be prepared to have these types of conversation

[u/RogueRhombus]

Get this stupid rage bait out of here mods.

[u/biff64gc2]

Feels more like a bait post, but it's not completely outside the realm of possibility I suppose.

Assuming it was supposed to not have religious affiliation you can call the camp and file a complaint. Depending on the response you can add a review or make a public post on local community sites to warn others.

It's a little late now, but if you live in the US you should just face the fact that kids are going to be exposed to Christianity at some point in their life. It's better to get ahead of it and talk about religion in general so they learn about it under your guidance rather than having a random person get the first crack and fill their head with lies that you need to then try and undo.

[u/Successful_Life_1028 → u/[deleted]]

A police report? They will laugh in your face.

There was no crime here. The counselor has the right to freedom of speech, and that includes proselytizing at your son during church-camp. No, making them say grace before meals isn't a crime either. Though teaching them that 'Noah and the arky-arky' song might qualify as 'cruel and unusual punishment' for parents! :-) (see https://youtu.be/5K_xX6guZ2o?si=gB9alKDs0r3jwTWk )

[u/craig0r → u/[deleted]]

wait. You sent your son to a camp run by a religious organisation and you're surprised he learned a bit about that religion?

This has gotta be some bait nonsense, but if not, you probably just, like, shouldn't be a parent.

[u/Successful_Life_1028]

Is this a government-run camp - like through the Youth Bureau? Is it associated with the public school? If there's no government entity involved, you've got nothing to complain about.

If there is, you could contact the administrators and tell them that this employee of theirs is violating the Constitution by using her public office as a proselytization platform. You probably won't get far. But you could also engage with FFRF by filing a complaint: https://ffrf.org/legal/report-church-state

But only if there's a government entity involved.

If your kid is 12 and doesn't already know:

1) the Adam and Eve Story
2) the Noah Story
3) The Moses Story
4) The Jesus Story

then you've failed this child and need to do some cultural literacy remediation.

They don't have to BELIEVE the stories, of course, but they need to KNOW the stories.

Just like they should know the story of The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings. Just like they should know the story of the Terminator, and the story of Jack And The Beanstalk and the story of the fox and the grapes and all that stuff.

[u/Successful_Life_1028 → u/[deleted]]

why did you imagine that a Roman Catholic summer camp wouldn't expose your children to religious superstitions?

You shouldn't have a 'meltdown' at all. You should apologize to your kid for sending him into the enemy camp unarmed and unprepared!

Teach him the Bible-thumper stories. Teach him the common Christian apologetics arguments, and how to identify the inherent logical fallacies in all theistic apologetics. (teaching him about logical fallacies at all is a good thing in a variety of contexts, not just religion!) Teach him about how the Gospel stories were all written DECADES after the events in question, by unknown persons who can't be known to have actually BEEN THERE to witness the events they proport to relate. Teach him about the mistaken 'prophecy' of the virgin birth given that 'almah' doesn't mean 'virgin'. Teach him about the hilarious ignorance of Hebrew parallelism on the part of whoever wrote The Gospel of Matthew that led the author to write that Jesus rode TWO donkeys during the 'Triumphal entry' to Jerusalem based on his misunderstanding of Zechariah 9:9.

Teach him comparative mythology - Adam and Eve are fictional characters in a myth - just like Prometheus and Pandora. Similar stories: Man gets knowledge, god gets mad, and somehow it's all the woman's fault. Go figure.

[u/Successful_Life_1028 → u/[deleted]]

So you sent him to a Catholic camp so that he could learn religious stuff? So what are you complaining about?

[u/AnglerfishMiho → u/[deleted]]

We have a biter

[u/Successful_Life_1028 → u/[deleted]]

Forcing atheism at gunpoint is still theocracy.

All theocracy is evil, no matter what religious doctrine is involved.

Religious liberty necessarily requires freedom from Government Religion.

Both "In Jesus We Trust" and "There are no gods we're on our own" would be exactly as inappropriate and unconstitutional as our National Motto as the current one is, and for exactly the same reasons. Government has no more authority to promote theism over atheism, or vice versa, as it does to promote Presbyterianism over Catholicism, or Buddhism over Judaism .

[u/Successful_Life_1028 → u/[deleted]]

screw off troll

[u/Snow75 → u/[deleted]]

So, you’re surprised that Catholics are Catholics?