A mother on Amy's parenting discussion board related a story about how her daughter's private Christian preschool sent her daughter home with a lifelike fetus doll after conducting a class session on embryotic development that was clearly aimed at indoctrinating the children in the school's anti-abortion ideology.
Again: that's a preschool class.
The mother was justifiably outraged by this and spoke to the school's director, who issued a generic "I'm sorry if you were offended" type of non-apology. She received a more sympathetic reception from the teacher, who had objected to the lesson but was overruled by her zealous boss. She was assured, however, that the material was presented in an "age-appropriate manner."
The mother reported that she intends to keep her daughter in the school despite this incident, and wrote at length about how she still considers a religious education to be important because of the positive aspects of it, the values it instills, etc.
To me, this story illustrates the conflicted nature of religion as it is practiced. This parent, who seemed to be a thoughtful and intelligent woman, essentially wants to be able to pick and choose which elements of religious doctrine she wants her daughter exposed to -- she wants a cafeteria-style Christianity.
This approach fails to appreciate that the nature of religious dogma is to not allow that level of flexibility. It is contradictory to the concept of "the gospel" that individuals are allowed to believe and practice certain parts of it and not others. If you want to be a Christian, you have to take all that comes along with it. It's like cable TV: you sign up with Comcast for ESPN and Comedy Central, and you get the Golf Channel and Home Shopping Network whether you want them or not. You might not watch them, but you pay for them every month anyway.
It always surprises me that people who find themselves in the midst of this type of moral conundrum don't realize that if they just dump religion in general they would gain the freedom to choose their own beliefs about issues based on their own merits and benefits. They would be open to question, explore, evaluate, investigate, learn, and change their minds about the opinions they form.
I agree with the mother in that many of the world's religions (not just Christianity) teach valuable and important moral lessons that can serve as positive pedagogy. But those lessons -- helping others, not killing people, etc. -- are valuable and important whether they are inside or outside a religious framework. And if they are within a religious framework, you have to be prepared to agree with all the other questionable and just plain wrong stuff that comes along with them. That's not an inconvenient side-effect you can try to ignore or complain about; it's part of the program.
Dump the program.
