Religion is interesting for many reasons. One that really strikes me is that it makes people say and believe some truly questionable things. First, there are the people who say, “God works in mysterious ways” when presented with facts that don’t fit into their religious view of the world. Also, there are those who say that God answers prayers, but those answers only seem to come to people who were likely to get what they wanted without prayer. Then, there is the one thing I really hate to hear from the religious: praise for childhood indoctrination and its “proof” that God is real.
One of my Facebook friends wrote a status update the other day raving about how her daughter (who is about 2) offered a prayer thanking God for healing her daddy’s head (he apparently bumped his head, nothing serious). This friend was so proud of her daughter. It was like she had done something good.
It was thought of a good partly because the parents see this as something done of her own volition. Religious people believe that God must exist and be working in our lives if children can understand his message since they have no logical skills. If that were truly what was going on, I would be willing to admit that they had a point.
However, I hate to burst your bubble, but she did not choose to do this based on her own will. She did it because she has been taught that this action is good. She gets rewarded for it! This is seen simply in her parents actions (and decision to brag on social media) after the she did something that they value. This reinforces this behavior; in essence, she is being trained. It is merely parroting, and the act has no real meaning to her other than that it makes her feel good because she is pleasing her parents.
This action is important to her parents, and others who agree with them, because of their own beliefs and the value they assign to certain things in life. They are excited because this makes them think that this child will follow in their footsteps. This is very important because their religion teaches them that anyone who does not adhere to this belief system will face torture for all eternity. Since they love their child, they don’t want this to happen.
Most people have a “to each his own” view when it comes to things like this. However, I find a problem with childhood indoctrination and it is something I feel strongly about. By telling a child something is true that is unfounded, you set up the framework of faulty logic. It has been shown through psychology that if someone is taught to believe something in childhood that it is very hard for them to change that belief as an adult, even when faced with evidence to the contrary. This puts a favorite Bible verse of those who defend doing this in a new light:
“Train a child in the way he should go, and when he is old he will not turn from it” (Proverbs 22:6 NIV).
This verse is “true” because of psychology not because it is the inspired word of God. However, as psychology points out, this applies to all beliefs including those that are just simply false or those that are extremely destructive in nature (I’m going to shy away from using “evil” since this is a subjective description).
The former may have little effect other than that the person holding such beliefs will be ill-informed. For example, those who believe in Creationism. Most of the time, this belief hurts people on a personal level because they are limit in what they can learn because they are denying a scientific fact. (There are some exceptions to this but in general it is true.)
The latter can have extreme consequences. Beliefs that have to do with hatred fall into this category. Most of these beliefs are based on the idea that one group being better than another. They lead to the person holding these beliefs justifying all kinds of wrongs. Christians are taught that those who reject God are bad or evil. God says to resist evil at all costs and to fight against it. Therefore, it is perfectly justified to make your neighbor your enemy if you are saving your soul from hell. These beliefs are extremely dangerous, and we need to work to stop them when ever we can.
Starting a child down this road isn’t fair for the child. They have no choice, and they know no better. We should be encouraging children to develop the ability to discover what is right and wrong on their own. We should teach them how to question beliefs to see if they are founded on truths. In order to do this, we must set aside our beliefs, otherwise we still end up leading them down a path that may not be true. Some may say that if we don’t step in and tell children what is right and wrong they will never develop morals. This would happen if we let children get away with everything they did. However, if we teach children to reason about the outcome of an action, they will learn what is right and wrong and be better able to improve their own beliefs in the future. They may not come to the exact same conclusions as their parents, but shouldn’t a parent want their child to find the truth and not live a lie?
Some Things are Random 