1. In the UK, it’s compulsory for all state schools to teach “Religious Education” – but not compulsory for children to attend them; parents have the right to exempt their children from the lessons. The idea of this is to teach children ABOUT religions, plural – i.e. this is what Christians believe, this is what Muslims believe, etc. – rather than to indoctriniate them in any specific religion.
A friend of mine has a 12-year-old son, who is already a committed atheist. During an RE lesson, his teacher asked the class, “What could we do to make the world a better place?” My friend’s son replied, “Do away with all religions!”
The teacher then reprimanded him in front of the class, and gave him detention! This was completely out of order; it isn’t a teacher’s place to impose her own religious beliefs onto children, and what the lad said was a perfectly valid and reasonable point of view. Surely, any reasonable and impartial teacher would have asked him to explain his comment, and opened it to the class as a point of debate.

2. Many years ago, I had a friend, in his late 20’s at the time, who had been brought up as a Catholic, but had rejected it in his teens, and was, like me, a committed atheist.
We were both naval reservists at the time. Each weekly drill at our unit began with the ceremony of “Divisions” – attendance of which was compulsory – and this included the Chaplain saying prayers. ( This was something to which I strongly objected, as naval regulations specifically state that attendance of religious services is NOT compulsory – but they were effectively making it exactly that. Years later, at another unit which did the same thing, I was responsible for getting the practice changed, as I was simply the one person who thought to protest about it. )
Every time, when the Chaplain said the “Blessing”, my friend would “cross himself”, as Catholics do. Knowing that he was an atheist, I once asked him why; he said, “Every time, as soon as I’ve done it, I think, ‘WHY did I do that?’ – but I can’t help doing it!”
As a young child in the 1960’s, he had been sent to a strict Catholic school, where obedience was literally beaten into him. He had been so brainwashed into the practice of “crossing himself” when a priest said the “Blessing”, that it had become an involuntary reflex, and had left him psycholgically scarred for life.
They had, quite literally, turned him into a human Pavlov dog.

Michael R. Burkley was entirely reasonable in his comments that is why I said that the my next bit was a “Slightly OT rant”.
I consider myself fairly broadminded. I accept that people have beliefs that do not match mine and I have no problem with people holding those beliefs. I will not accept the imposition of those (religious) beliefs on secular laws and government.
I think we have separation laws to a large extent in spite of Christians. Perhaps a majority of christians are like a majority of people in general in their apathy to such matters and it is only the noisy minority that agitate for change? We have a church here in Oz, Hillsong, that has a political representation far in excess of their numbers for example. The church has a maybe 20000 members but the leaders of the political parties fall over themselves to speak to or gain favour from this church.

Congratulations on making a difference by standing up for yourself and others. I even expect that it helped some to appreciate their prayers more by taking them out of the realm of the routine and expected. Everyone got a bit more education out of it by listening to the other literature as well.

–Michael

Bzzzt – wrong move.

I replied that not only would I not stand for the Lord’s Prayer from that day forward, I felt that forcing students to stand for it was religious discrimination, so unless the administration was prepared to consider alternatives, they could expect a call from my lawyer. I didn’t have one – it was a complete bluff – but I knew a Muslim teenager had won a discrimination case in Toronto earlier that year for the same thing (not standing for the Lord’s Prayer), so my 16 year old brain figured I was in a great bargaining position.

I did get detention that day – the only hour of detention I ever spent in high school – but the next day, I was shuffled into the principal’s office, and it was crowded. The vice-principal, the principal, a guidance counsellor, and a guy in a suit who I assumed was a lawyer. Awesome – they were going to intimidate me into conceding. What they didn’t know was that I had gone to the library the previous evening, found the news article about the Muslim kid’s case on microfiche, got a copy of it, and had it nicely folded in my back pocket. They were still a bit off-balance, since I really was the last kid they ever expected to cause trouble. So I told them about the Muslim kid’s case, brought out the news article, and then told them what I wanted.

- The requirement of all students being forced to stand for the Lord’s Prayer must end.

- Instead of having the Lord’s Prayer recited every morning, I suggested a rotating mix of various religious and philosophical writings. One day it could be a passage from the Koran; the next day it could be a poem by Thoreau; the next an excerpt from Plato’s Republic.

To my great surprise, I got what I wanted. I was really only expecting to be given permission to sit during the Lord’s Prayer, but I must have scared the bejesus out of them, because they implemented my suggestions the very next week. Shrewdly, they spun it to their advantage by telling the local paper it was their own idea – I didn’t care, they could take the credit if it meant keeping to their word.

I visited the school a decade later, and I found that what I had started was still going strong; in fact, it had expanded to include famous quotations and passages from favorite books. I learned that one person can make a difference, but it had to be the right person at the right time.

I’m getting lots of replies to my message. Thanks for taking the time to reply. Am I “implying that by reading the Xian Bible should have had some sort of moment that would illuminate god’s holy plan or something”? No, I’m not implying that you should but that it would give you information to make a reasoned decision. After all, I did start out with “If you’re content with that surface rejection , fine, but if you wish to dig deeper….” It’s all about the voluntary education journey we’re on. BTW, like the LOTR, too.

In regard to your self-recognized “Slightly OT rant” you do seem to be absolutizing here with a pretty wide brush. I think the fact that most “western democracies have some kind of separation laws in spite of the majority christian desires” shows that perhaps Christians don’t always force people to do it their way.

It seems to me that you also have a sense of “Truth.” Most people here (me included) think that it is not a wise decision to require officially sponsored prayer in public schools. That, I assume, is an outgrowth of the “live and let live” principle you seem to advocate. We think that is “True” and not just an opinion. If you thought your attitude about school prayer was just an opinion then why advocate for it? It’s just an opinion after all. But if you hold it as a truth based on the dignity of human beings and the importance of freedom without coercion (with limits like laws against murder, libel, stealing, etc. – to be decided in the marketplace of society) then you fight for it. Good! We agree. One test of our freedom is how we mediate those conflicting ideas of Truth. You and I both agree that the best way to achieve that mediation is not by dragging the opposition into our corner by force (overt or covert). That’s why I would oppose officially-led school prayer, mandatory or not.

Thanks for promoting the dialog,

–Michael

p.s.: Renée (#72) I’d love to talk more about “Truth” and personal validation of it, but it’s probably not on topic, so alas, I won’t. But thanks for responding to my comments. I was the one who brought it up in the first place! “Mea Culpa!”

p.p.s.: David D. (#73) Thanks for the complement!

As soon as they gain some political power they must enact laws based on their beliefs because they know The Truth(tm) and because we aren’t able to see The Truth we have to brought kicking and screaming into the fold for our own good. There is no compromise.”

Gosh–that kind of sounds like the Democratic Party and Obama!

I think you have stereotyped Christians with a very broad brush. Here you are responding to Mr. Burkley–where are you getting that “won’t allow live and let live” vibe? Granted, his reasonable comments may not represent what you may be familiar with in your interactions with other Christians, but I don’t see some rabid, intolerant follower of God at all. Perhaps you are not as broad minded as you think.

To answer question #1 I say yes, a positive reaction with ones faith does prove its truth. However I’m a philosopher and not a scientist so when I see truth I don’t assume it to be empirical truth.

The thing with personal validation is that its essentially what we all do. There are situations where no amount of logical discourse can really solve anything. The only option is to take a path that feels right because there are no objective means to classify the situation.

I don’t think this is anything too out there or crazy, this is essentially what Sartre talked about on occasion and he viewed Existentialism as the natural train of though for atheist thinking.

If a religion attempts to make claims that fall within empirical truth then yes science and logic prevail but aside from that I think its a matter of personal opinion as to the validity of it.