TO BRING UP A CHILD IN RELIGIOUS DOCTRINE OR NOT? Dogmatic Upbringing and Non-Dogmatic Upbringing Contrasted

Should the child of Christian parents or guardians be taught Christianity as in Christianity being the true faith?  Or should they be taught in such a way that there is no pressure to join or believe?

 Let us compare indoctrination and being neutral on religion. What is best for the child?

DOGMATIC UPBRINGING It is child abuse not to indoctrinate your child against the errors of non-Christians. We must prepare the child for a merciful judgment and saying nothing means the child could grow up to die estranged from God and sentenced to everlasting torment

NON-DOGMATIC UPBRINGING This is just hate speech.

Anybody can invent a religion that makes similar threats. Naturally the Christian has to teach that indoctrinating children is saving them from the everlasting torment of Hell. This definitely implies that raising a child as undecided or as an unbeliever is child abuse of the most horrific kind. Christianity slanders and rouses hatred against those who don't share its twisted views on raising children. Their doctrine of eternal torment in Hell certainly implies that the Law should not tolerate any indoctrination except their brand of religion.

DOGMATIC UPBRINGING False religion does harm to children by indoctrinating, the true religion does not. The true religion informs but does not indoctrinate. Error is always bad even when it does good. It can make you opposed to the disciples of truth even though you don't mean to be. It always harms truth and often leads to hurt and trouble.

NON-DOGMATIC UPBRINGING All forms of religious indoctrinating of the child are manipulative. The indoctrination is abusive in that sense. To tell a child that he must love God as much as Jesus said, that he has original sin, that people go to Hell at death if they don't believe or obey God, that God may hurt and kill people and that he must be very upset by any sin he sees is strong child abuse.

Any religion can say: False religion does harm to children by indoctrinating, the true religion does not. They mean that when a child is told its teaching is true that is informing but if any other religion does the same thing it is not informing but indoctrinating. They see indoctrinating as teaching false doctrine. It is not. People can be indoctrinated in TRUE doctrine too.

DOGMATIC UPBRINGING If children are not taught to believe what we believe, they will believe any rubbish. We abhor superstition.

NON-DOGMATIC UPBRINGING It is true that many people get alienated from their religion and soon start looking to mediums and tarot cards to find meaning in life. They are merely exchanging one superstition for another. To a Protestant, Catholic miracles are superstition. To Catholics Islamic miracles are superstition. Miracles are not really any different from magic. Christians say that Jesus rising from the dead by God's power is a miracle. If a witch did it, they would be saying it was magic. They are being arbitrary. They are being superstitious.

DOGMATIC UPBRINGING The child must be baptised and made a member of the Church without his or her consent

NON-DOGMATIC UPBRINGING Consent is all important. The child will not feel, "I am better than Zainab next door for she was never baptised to put God's spirit in her" if he or she is not baptised. Religion collects people into a community that separates from other communities in the name of dogma - in this sense it is worse than racism. The person who separates from members of his own race will find it easy to start discriminating against and distancing from people of other races!

Original sin says we are born with a sense of rejecting God and being rejected by him so we don't want him. This doctrine is used as a justification for infant baptism which allegedly cures it when clearly if the child is made anti-God only a personal free choice can reverse that. You have to presume consent not to be baptised.

DOGMATIC UPBRINGING Baptism turns the sinful child into a holy person. Being baptised is a great protection against the desire to do evil.

NON-DOGMATIC UPBRINGING The child doesn't have to pretend baptism made a difference. Catholicism should be sued for making claims about the supernatural power of baptism to make a person very good and holy and yet if you compare baptised and unbaptised people you see little difference. This is deliberate spiritual deception. The Church could be sued for the return of the baptismal fee or quackery.

DOGMATIC UPBRINGING The child is told that the Roman Catholic religion is the only right one, the only reliable one

NON-DOGMATIC UPBRINGING The child is taught about different religions and none. The child is encouraged to pick what he or she likes out of them provided it is helpful to her or him becoming a decent person. All pros and cons will be brought before the child. It should not be about making the child an atheist or anything. It should be about informing the child and supporting the child.

DOGMATIC UPBRINGING The child will be urged to thank God at meals and pray in accordance with the rules of the Church.

NON-DOGMATIC UPBRINGING There will be no pressure either way

DOGMATIC UPBRINGING The best child, at least potentially, is a Catholic child

NON-DOGMATIC UPBRINGING The best child is a child who is willing to learn and improve and to decide because he or she thinks about people before he or she thinks about God or religious rules or religious organisations

DOGMATIC UPBRINGING The child is taught that the rules of the Church and the commandments of God tell us how to behave

NON-DOGMATIC UPBRINGING The child is taught to understand why he or she must behave in a good way. If the child understands, the child will see guidance as loving and not as authoritarian and something to be rebelled against. If the child does wrong, he or she will feel that he or she can be a better person using his or her inner resources.

Experiencing the confidence that comes from learning for yourself instead of being dictated to, the child gets a boost in the motivation to do better. A child that finds wisdom instead of other people trying to manipulate the child to have their ideas of wisdom has the self-confidence to overcome the failure.



DOGMATIC UPBRINGING The child needs God

NON-DOGMATIC UPBRINGING The child does not - it does not have the fears than an adult has of suffering and death. A child can have fantasy friends if lonely. Nobody has the right to invent needs for other people. When the other people are children that is child abuse.

The child will be baptised and psychologically pressured into holy communion if necessary

The child is not to be initiated into any religion but encouraged to make her or his own decision later in life. Atheists should not force atheism on their children or indoctrinate them against religion either. The trouble is that whether reality or myth, God is important so neutrality can be difficult but atheism seems the best way for finding the important with difficulty is the only right way to find the important.

DOGMATIC UPBRINGING Loving God comes first and love your neighbour as yourself is secondary - this is what Jesus taught

NON-DOGMATIC UPBRINGING In other words, religion and belief in God are more important than you! Somebody failing to believe in God is worse than a baby dying of cancer. The child must spurn such notions. The child must see himself or herself as a special person and honour himself or herself accordingly and because he or she sees himself or herself as a gift he or she is keen to help others. Start with proper self-love not the love of God. The child will believe that if he or she does wrong, nobody should say the worst thing in it was how he or she offended God! That attitude promotes a lack of sensitivity to human suffering.

Secular faith is based on what reasonable people agree with and not on what a God or Church or Bible says. Religious people only accept reasonable beliefs when those beliefs are taught by their God or Church or Bible - they accept them because of authority and not because they are reasonable.

Religion is harder to believe in than secularism. To encourage religion in a child is to oppress the child with a difficult faith.

Loving God comes first and love your neighbour as yourself is secondary - this is what Jesus taught

In other words, religion and belief in God are more important than you! The child must see himself or herself as a special person and honour himself or herself accordingly and because he or she sees himself or herself as a gift he or she is keen to help others. Start with proper self-love not the love of God. The child will believe that if he or she does wrong, nobody should say the worst thing in it was how he or she offended God! That attitude promotes a lack of sensitivity to human suffering.

DOGMATIC UPBRINGING The fool says in his heart, "There is no God", none of them have done good none at all must be believed for God said it in scripture

NON-DOGMATIC UPBRINGING Atheists are or may not be fools and many of them are upright people. The Bible is inciting to hatred and the Church should be sued for saying such things.

The Church is provoking believers to anger against unbelievers and Christians who become unbelievers. If they can't be angry with us then they can never be angry! Presumably if a Christian lashes out it is the atheists fault for human nature can only take so much provocation!

DOGMATIC UPBRINGING Even those who disbelieve in God and who say we must live as if there was only the natural and there was no supernatural are expressing their faith. They are making an act of faith and yet they condemn us for making acts of faith too. To say children should not be baptised and should not be raised in a particular religion is to say they should be raised in the faith of secularism. Our faith has at least much right to indoctrinate children as theirs if not more. The secularists don't like babies being baptised because they want to force initiation into the secular faith on them.

However, we should not hold that it takes as much faith to believe in no religion as in a religion. Religion commands faith. We command faith in our holy religion because we know that it is right and every right thinking person would embrace it.

NON-DOGMATIC UPBRINGING This pretence that secularism is faith like religion is a popular trick. Religious faith seeks to pretend that non-religious attitudes are like a secular religion. To trust yourself and your own judgement takes less faith than trusting that God has spoken to you. After all you have to trust yourself to judge if you should judge God trustworthy! Trust yourself like the secularists trust themselves - keep things simple. Secular faith in reason and in what the senses say and in how we think cannot be compared to religious faith. It is different.

DOGMATIC UPBRINGING IN THE LIGHT OF DOCTRINES OF DIVINE RETRIBUTION AND HELL

DOGMATIC UPBRINGING God is our friend and sends nobody to Hell and that there is no Hell for God is so forgiving will do no harm to the child.

NON-DOGMATIC UPBRINGING That is lying about God and Jesus supposedly saying in the Bible that Hell is a reality. It is counter-productive for what is a parent's opinion against a whole religion and tradition?

The harm of the doctrine is being evaded because the Christian is really being her or his own religion and not a true Christian. Real Christians harm.

DOGMATIC UPBRINGING The child may be tormented by thoughts of loved ones going to Hell to suffer forever at death. Religion is quite happy to teach the doctrine of Hell even to toddlers - Jesus said that everybody must be taught. His role and message are all about this Hell for he said he came to stop some people going to Hell. To not know it is to fail to understand him.

NON-DOGMATIC UPBRINGING It would be impossible to put a child through that torment.

DOGMATIC UPBRINGING If a child grows up to reject the faith, we don't try to compel her or him to return. Therefore our indoctrinating children isn't wrong.

NON-DOGMATIC UPBRINGING Yes but what about now? You still take and seek an unfair advantage. The child can suffer grave trauma later in life as he or she tries to extricate himself or herself from the faith especially if that faith claims to be essential to genuine goodness and if it says people go to Hell if they leave it. Are you saying it is okay to do wrong to a child now for later he or she can get over it?

DOGMATIC UPBRINGING You can commit a sin that deserves unending torment in Hell and this torment will start at death

NON-DOGMATIC UPBRINGING You can't be that bad. Religion slanders you. It accuses you without proof. Sue it! You need absolute proof before you can accuse anybody of being capable of wallowing in hate and sin and evil in Hell for all eternity.

If you are undecided about whether or not there is such a fate, then you can't choose it. It is safer not to be a Christian! If you believe that murder is sometimes right, that belief will make it worse for you in court not less when you are on trial for murder. But that is because the law is dealing with a difficult situation and can't encourage people to believe murder is right. The Law would agree that if you commit murder really and sincerely believing that it is right it still has to regard you as a criminal and subject to a life sentence. It agrees you haven't chosen jail but you still have to endure it. You are treated as if you have chosen it. If you don't believe in an eternal Hell you cannot choose it. God doesn't need to put you in Hell as if he were a Criminal Court trying to make the best of a bad situation in an imperfect and flawed world. All he needs to do is keep you away from his saints in Heaven. So if you sin grievously and die, you are not trying to abandon God forever unless you believe you are! If there is a Hell, then the message of Jesus Christ is putting people in it! Or trying to!

FINALLY

Taking advantage of a child and letting a religion use your child and claim your child is wrong.  The content of the religious faith is another equally appalling issue.  If you believe your child is good then don't impose or press a religion on her or him.



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