Atheist sending kids to a church school?

Janepig

Yolina wrote: »

Things might be different in the UK, but *many* years ago, I went to Catholic school in France, neither of my parents were religious or baptised. I was also the only pupil there who wasn't baptised and it was absolutely fine. There was no pressure on me because of this, didn't turn me into some kind of zealot or anything and what I remember now most from the "bible class" was that we were doing a lot of colouring in :rotfl: It also taught me to respect other people and their beliefs, though my parents and grandparents had already been drumming that into me from an early age

The reason my parents sent me there is that other than the primary school itself being good, it fed into the best secondary school in the area. By the time you got into 6th grade (I think - not too sure about the equivalence - whatever is at around 11 years old?) there was zero mention of religion. Their main thing was discipline rather than religion really.

AFAIK, the school system in France is, or was, more or less secular.

Jx

Yolina

Janepig wrote: »

AFAIK, the school system in France is, or was, more or less secular.

Jx

State schools are totally secular - to the extent, particularly in more recent years, that displaying outwards signs of whatever religion you may be are not allowed.

However private schools, which by definition are not provided by the State, can be religious. So private Catholic school is where I went.

one-non-blonde

valk_scot wrote: »

I really dislike the whole concept of education being bound up with religion, just on principle. How can they teach a balanced view of the world in general? And I'm a Christian and member of my local church, you understand. But I think religion should be taught at church and home and schools should stick to a straight forwards unbiased education. I also firmly belive that access to a good quality education should be a level playing field, irrespective of income and social class, but I realise I'm on a hiding to nothing here!

Completely agree. However, despite being completely agnostic and entirely disagreeing with religious teaching in schools I ended up sending my kids to Catholic primary and secondary schools. They started off at a so-called 'non-denominational' small village primary where they had Church of Scotland indoctrination shoved down their throats. Apparently it's a legal requirement. :cool:

When we had to move house I followed a brilliant headteacher who had seconded at our local school back to her normal school which just happened to be Catholic. It had a fantastic reputation and a brilliant atmosphere and she welcomed us with open arms, never expecting us to 'convert' in any way. My kids were old enough at 8 and 9 to take everything with a pinch of salt while respecting the beliefs of those around them and were far less indoctrinated than at their previous 'non-denominational' school. It is wholly possible to mitigate indoctrination with mature discussion at home (which is where religion belongs IMHO). The secondary school also has a great reputation in the area and has very high standards in every area of life. My only bugbear is the out of touch and very limited sex-ed but I suppose the school's hands are tied on that front so the slack has to be taken up at home.

Joining both of these schools only involved making a placing request with the local council. The baptism certificate didn't matter unless there was a waiting list or we needed free school transport.

So yeah, my two have survived and will be coming out in a year or two as well-balanced, mature, decent citizens. :j

steve-L

Yolina wrote: »

Things might be different in the UK, but *many* years ago, I went to Catholic school in France, neither of my parents were religious or baptised. I was also the only pupil there who wasn't baptised and it was absolutely fine. There was no pressure on me because of this, didn't turn me into some kind of zealot or anything and what I remember now most from the "bible class" was that we were doing a lot of colouring in :rotfl: It also taught me to respect other people and their beliefs, though my parents and grandparents had already been drumming that into me from an early age

The reason my parents sent me there is that other than the primary school itself being good, it fed into the best secondary school in the area. By the time you got into 6th grade (I think - not too sure about the equivalence - whatever is at around 11 years old?) there was zero mention of religion. Their main thing was discipline rather than religion really.

That's because we don't have a concept of laïcit!.... in the same way the French do. I doubt we can even translate what it means in reality!

steve-L

seven-day-weekend wrote: »

Why should it? They don't believe it is a story. The children are taught that there is some truth in all world religions and they should all be treated with respect.

Well two questions...
If they should be allowed to teach unsubstantiated belief as fact is a different issue (or a much longer post)....

The real point is that they are taught a specific religion as FACT but other religions as what is best described as 'misguided' (as in Santa and the tooth fairy).
We also teach our children to 'respect' santa and tooth fairy beliefs in younger children.....

Science taught properly is not about fact, it's about observation and conclusions.....

As an example, we teach about photosynthesis based on the observation that plants grow better with more sun and die without any.

Most of science is about what we 'believe' at the moment based on what we observe but MUST be taught that it may change... it is not laid down in a holy book.

Of course there is what Terry Pratchett refers to as 'lies for children'. That is we can't explain everything until the child has developed a certain level of background understanding, theory and language capability.

Lord Kelvin said in 1900 to an assemblage of physicists at the British Association for the Advancement of Science that

"there is nothing new to be discovered in physics now. All that remains is more and more precise measurement."

At this time science was in it's infancy and Lord Kelvin was proven incorrect within his lifetime.
Unfortunately, some science teachers were incapable of understanding this and continue to teach science badly as FACT not observations. Indeed, there have been generations of bad scientists since 1900 that teach early years science and produce a set of people incapable of real science who then end up teaching....

Religion has been doing the same for thousands of years....
Most serious Jewish scholars of the Torah believe Leviticus to have been written by several people.... but still many Jewish and Christian teachers don't teach this but that Moses wrote it all....along with the other four first books.....

Most serious bible scholars question the translations of Josephus and his ties to Titus... however it is rare that a school teaches children to question the bible as a translated work or its accuracy and inconsistencies.

Science SHOULD be taught to question and challenge EVERYTHING.