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Pastimes : Let's Talk About Our Feelings!!!
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To: J. C. Dithers who wrote (90125)11/30/2004 10:57:31 AM
From: Rambi  Read Replies (2) of 108807
 
It seems to me that it's atheism that DOESN'T foist a belief system on a child.

If a child comes home and asks about this supernatural being other people mention and the parents are not believers, it seems reasonable for parents to explain that some people believe this, but they don't. The parents I know who are atheists merely didn't introduce religion into the home rituals at all. It wasn't an active indoctrination the way Christianity is.

I think your example is a poor one; it's extreme, and there are plenty of Christian extremists doing similar things. Certainly there are egotists acting with their own agenda, but I don't see that an atheist raising a child without a faith in God is any more ego-gratification than a Christian pressing his own faith on his children.

One of my sons, the extremely logical one, though raised a Lutheran and educated in an Episcopalian private school through 7th grade, decided on his own when he entered high school that he just didn't believe in religion. He is now an admitted atheist. (another answer to how do children become atheists)

The last thing I wanted to teach my children was to believe or be something because it is the NORM. And I don't believe my children made spectacles of themselves at all. They are respectful of believers and remain quiet when prayer is foisted upon them. On the contrary, watching an entire football team drop to its knees in the middle of a field after a game while the announcer asks for a moment of silence is real Spectacle.
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