CHILDREN AND RELIGION AND THE CENSUS

The state should not recognise religious affiliation. It should see its citizens as its citizens and not as Catholics or Protestants or anything. The religion is an irrelevant label. Thus just as the state does not ask you what Tennis Club you are in on census forms so it should not be interested in what religion you claim to be. Besides, if somebody who was baptised a Catholic and who does not believe in that faith or attend its worship ticks the Catholic box that person is lying.
 
If the state has resolved to separate itself from all religious influence then it does not need to know what labels the people put on themselves.
 
The labelling of children on census forms as Roman Catholic or whatever is deceitful and disgraceful. It could be the Nazi party the child is being declared a part of for all the child knows.
 
Teaching children that there is a God is intrinsically treasonous. It denies the validity of the state. The law of the land demands that it be respected and kept for its own sake which is the sake of the public good. But if you believe in God you are saying he is the only real ruler and you will only respect the law in so far as it fits what you have been told God has revealed. In other words, you are saying that if God wanted the legal system torn down you would help or believe you should help this to happen. When belief in God downgrades the law of the land it follows that when your faith weakens, which it will at times, that your suspicion of the law will remain. Teaching the existence of God is harmful to public order and the belief certainly tries to be.
 
Believers in God do not obey the law of the land even when they keep it because they are keeping it not because it is the law of the land but because God’s wishes happen to coincide with the law.