Raising Kids without Religion
As a parent from a fundamentalist background where everything came to be centered around and explained by God, I am really looking forward to the release of Parenting Beyond Belief. It’s the first of it’s kind to specifically address us godfree parents and is a collection of essays from a variety of people.
I am especially looking forward to the essay by Rev. Dr. Roberta Nelson titled “On Being Religiously Literate” as I think she makes an excellent point when she states:
“Choosing not to affiliate or join a religious community does not shield a parent from these questions – you will still need to be able to answer some or all of them. If you do not provide the answers, someone else will  and you may be distressed by the answers they provide.”
I think this is something many of us overlook when it comes to our children. Those of us in America especially need to be literate when it comes to the beliefs of Christianity as it has us all surrounded and some forms of it are extremely hostile not only towards us atheists, but to other Christians as well as theists of different religions entirely. For example, how can explain what hell is and why Catholics are going there if you had no idea that some Christians teach this as fact, not unsupported (bigoted) beliefs the child is encouraged to think about themselves?
The book’s site is here and it contains a wealth of information, including further resources for the subjects of each chapter and a forum for discussion.
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