As a matter of opinion

There is an ecard floating around facebook that sort of bothered me today.  It was something along the lines of "Bibles are given to inmates in jails, if they were given to children in schools they wouldn't end up in jails".  I didn't quote it perfectly, but you get the gist.  Cards and pictures like this always seem to get an unnatural amount of likes and shares, like people feel it is their Christian duty to pass it along.

Here's my problem, I don't agree.  Forgive me, I am going to be frank.  I am LDS, and so I do not want someone who is not LDS teaching my children religion.  That is my responsibility, and my husband's responsibility.  And our children can learn more and be supplemented at church, the LDS church we attend.

We live in a country that was founded on religious freedom.  All people who reside in the United States have the privilege of worshiping, or not worshiping, however they please.  And I agree with that.  Religion should be a freedom, people should be allowed to worship how they want, and religion should be shared in a nonthreatening, charitable way.  It should never be forced on anyone.

So many people are focused on the technicalities of religion, they forget what it's really all about.  Oh, those poor jail dwellers didn't have the Bible in their lives growing up, and so they have turned to sin and crime.  Uh, no.  Plenty of good Christian parents have children who stray and become criminals.  Just as people in other religions do.  Reading the Bible does not automatically make you a good person, or set you up for success.

And so people think religion should be taught in school.  Well, how do you accomplish that?  Let children read the Bible during class?  Have prayers?  Let's just stop and think for a moment.  This is a country of religious freedom, this is a country of different cultures, of immigrants.  Not everyone believes in the the Bible, or in God for that matter.  Sounds to me like we would be forcing religion on other people's children.  And that is completely inappropriate.  You can't expect a Jewish child to have to read the New Testament.  You can't expect a Hindu child to pray to Heavenly Father.  You can't teach religion in schools because there are so many different religious views, how would you decide which to teach?  It's not like math, where it's a universal thing.  Everyone's religious views are different, even within some denominations.

What could be done is to have an elective course offered about world religions.  Let children learn about different cultures and thought processes voluntarily.  That is appropriate.  You wouldn't want a pastor teaching passages from the Koran in a math class anymore than you would want an molecular biologist teaching about the nature of creation in a Sunday sermon.

Secular and religious learning need to be kept separate.  They have no business being taught together in the public education system.  If you are Catholic and desire your child to be schooled in a private school where your religion is a part of their education, great!  Go for it!  At least there you know what is being taught and you agree with it.  I myself attended a private LDS college where we had prayers before every class and we referred to our professors as Brother and Sister.  I do agree with religion being taught in private religious based schools.

It's like Edward Bloom from Big Fish says, "It's rude to talk about religion, you never know who you are going to offend".  And I realize I may have offended some people with this post, but this is my blog.  And like I said, I want Tristan to learn the principles of the Gospel from me and Nick, and from his teachers at church.  I don't want him to learn it in his elementary classes, because he wouldn't be taught what I want him to know.  I want that for my children, and I'm certain if you thought about it, you'd want the same for yours.