Richard Morris43 said:The whole mess boils down to this: if a kid isn't enrolled in those religious studies classes at school, they can't take communion, and eventually, they can't even graduate or move up the social ladder within the community.
So, effectively, the church uses these milestones to hold people's hands, right? Because let's face it, most families still give a damn about their kids hitting those traditional milestones and sacraments.
If you want a real fix, you have to get religious instruction out of the public school system entirely—that's the only way, but let's be real, that’s never going to happen in this country.
My kid started first grade this year, and right when I was filling out the enrollment paperwork, I checked the box for religious education.
Why? Honestly, because I didn't want him just wandering the hallways or stuck in some empty classroom while everyone else was busy.
Everything seemed fine until that first class actually happened. After he got home, he absolutely lost it, telling me he couldn't sit through that stuff and that we couldn't possibly wait until the end of the school year to pull him out.
He was genuinely distraught.
And look, it wasn't even the teacher's fault; it was the actual material being taught that just clashed so hard with how his little mind was starting to work.
To be totally honest, I had no clue it would hit him that hard.
I took him straight to the office to unenroll him immediately, even though it was the very beginning of the term. They told me normally you have to wait until the end of the year, but they made an exception for us.
In the end, it worked out fine; there are plenty of other kids who don't attend those classes, so the school has ways to keep them occupied during that period anyway.
And why on earth should the government care that the church thinks the state needs to step up and handle its business?
Church problems belong to the church. They created this mess themselves; they can fix it themselves.
What if the government passed a law saying the church had to organize all the driving lessons for getting a driver's license?
rowdypanther12 said:This keeps coming up, along with the follow-up question: why on earth would anyone want their child to participate in the graduation or communion if they aren't willing to attend the religious classes? 😁
In theory, separating the kids sounds bad, but from what I've seen with my own daughter and most people I know, it actually works out fine for the kids who skip those classes.
Because any unnecessary activity is just a waste of time. Besides, kids managed to hit those milestones perfectly fine long before religious education was baked into the public school system, so...