How Ethical Is It To Teach Religion to Your Child?
Religious upbringing can be a source of life-long trauma
I used to believe in God as a kid.
I also believed in all sorts of different things.
After seeing my first ever Disney movie in the cinema — ‘The Little Mermaid’ — I was fully convinced that mermaids exist and fish and crab can talk.
Even though I asked my parents whether any of that was true, they didn’t give me a straight answer. The same happened when I wanted to know if Santa Claus was real. But when I’d ask them questions about religion and God, their attitude was different. They’d even get angry or annoyed with me when I asked too many questions.
How do we know God exists? Why do we have to follow these particular religious rules? Where is religion coming from? Are we sure it’s real?
‘We just do, “this is just the way things work,’ or ‘you just need to have faith,’ they’d tell me.
I wasn’t satisfied with their answers, but I believed them nonetheless. And I believed priests, nuns, and school teachers that taught me about religion. They were the figures of authority, after all. You had to believe them.
But that’s the thing. Kids, especially those raised in a very religious setting…
