Comparitive religion education

[LadyShea]

So, we decided to start his comparative religious education much sooner than originally planned due to a series of unfortunate events. Coincidentally lisarea recently wrote

Also, they should have some familiarity with major world religions and their origins--not just Christianity.

We bought The Complete Idiots Guide to World Religions(which, ) and will just use it as a jumping off point for discussion and try to find stories from different faith traditions, nothing too formal or heavy, but more than just a passing "people believe different things" as well.

How have others addressed this? Any favorite materials?

I probably asked this before, but way too early and now I need to approach it anew, so forgive me my redundancy, I am not doddering.

[One for Sorrow]

This is going to seem weird and possibly stalker-ish (sorry!), but when you first mentioned wanting to homeschool kiddo, I knew next to nothing about homeschooling. But, you are clearly meticulous with planning everything related to kiddo and raising him into an intelligent and upstanding human being, and if it was something you'd consider, I thought I'd look into it a bit.

Long story short, I got addicted to some homeschooling blogs and decided that if I ever have kids, I would seriously consider homeschooling. And then I decided I probably won't have any kids and I'm not sure why I still read the blogs. I justify it by looking for resources for my much younger siblings, because homeschoolers seem to find the coolest things for their kids.

Anyway, I really like how this mother approaches the subject by studying one religion a month with her daughter. She seems to have found some great resources, too.

[Dragar]

This is what British religious education is. You might be able to find some guidance online from British RE websites, but I'm not sure.

I loved it as a kid. New perspectives were (still are) intriguing, even if they are all in gross conflict with limited support.

[Watser?]

We were taught about Buddhism and Hinduism in high school. Weirdly though we never learned about Islam (2nd most popular religion here, after Christianity) and Judaism (in 3d place now but was no.2 untill WWII).

[LadyShea]

OFS, that's not stalkerish or anything to apologize for, lol. My own consideration of homeschooling was prompted by an acquaintance mentioning it. Thanks for the blog, homeschool moms do seem to find cool resources, and I still read them for that purpose as well.

Dragar, thanks! I'd no idea religious education was formal and mandatory there, that's awesome. I often consider moving to the UK, and would have a difficult time turning down an opportunity to do so...except for the weather.

[livius drusus]

I like the one religion a month plan. Do you having reading time, bedtime stories, that sort of thing? Because one of the ways I learned about other religions (and lots of other things too) was from a big ol' book we had of folklore from different countries. It was arranged by country/culture, and was full of foundational myths, just so stories, parables, fables, legends, etc. That could be a good jumping off point for larger discussions.

[LadyShea]

We read from novels at bedtime, usually. We've read 3 Harry Potter books and have now moved on to Feists Magician's Apprentice to take a break from that world. I have also read him some myths and fables from around the world, while he is in the bath, as that was my original idea...to ease into contemporary belief systems from past ones.

Due to the ugly and sordid nature of the current circumstances, I have to go a bit more structured and formal now.

[thedoc]

As far as teaching religion I would strongly recomend that you include Mythology in those studies, and Joseph Campbell is an excelent source of theory, the book "Thou Art That" has some interesting intrepretation of Judeo/Christian Mythology.

In homeschooling My youngest daughter was homeschooled her last year (creative differences between her and the public school), and we used 'American Schools' where she received a diploma, not a certificate. The school was more of a corospondence type of program, and she did it herself, rather than haveing me give her lessons and tests.

[lisarea]

You know, on that ugly and sordid thing, I'd probably take the gloves off as well now too, and tell him what I told TLM when he was little: Those stories are just the same as fairy tales. They're stories that are made up to try to show people how to behave the way the author thinks people should behave. Some are supposed to encourage you to do things the author thinks people should do; and others, like stories about evil stepmothers and stories about hell, are supposed to scare you out of acting in ways the author thinks are wrong. Some people's feelings get hurt when you tell them that those stories are made up, though, so you should be polite about it if they are also being polite.

Your social situation is trickier, of course, but I don't think you are under any moral obligation to continue playing by the rules. It is extremely uncool what they did. That is some scary shit to say to a little kid. Showing him similar story lines from other cultures can be a good way to illustrate the main point, that humans make up little fables and parables to try to teach moral lessons; but I think it's perfectly reasonable to let him know in no uncertain terms that it's not actually true. You told them that was off limits, and they ignored you, so it's a perfectly natural consequence of their actions.

You probably realize this. I just wanted to say that because I am really really mad that someone did that to him.

[thedoc]

Originally Posted by lisarea

You know, on that ugly and sordid thing, I'd probably take the gloves off as well now too, and tell him what I told TLM when he was little: Those stories are just the same as fairy tales. They're stories that are made up to try to show people how to behave the way the author thinks people should behave. Some are supposed to encourage you to do things the author thinks people should do; and others, like stories about evil stepmothers and stories about hell, are supposed to scare you out of acting in ways the author thinks are wrong. Some people's feelings get hurt when you tell them that those stories are made up, though, so you should be polite about it if they are also being polite.

Showing him similar story lines from other cultures can be a good way to illustrate the main point, that humans make up little fables and parables to try to teach moral lessons; but I think it's perfectly reasonable to let him know in no uncertain terms that it's not actually true.
.

This is pretty much what Mythology does along with helping the person understand how the world is. The problem is that most of the Myths that are recognized as Myth were created for Hunter Gatherers, or early farming cultures and the imagry does not mean the same thing to someone raised in a technological society. Most Mythology and Religion is out of touch with modern culture.

[wildernesse]

I'm interested in this, also, even though it's not like I will need this information for a while for froguar.

Since Kiddo is older, maybe getting books where the characters are of different religions would help kind of start the conversation. Do you do family reading time or anything? I'd like to make a little book list for myself. Or maybe go with holidays as they come around. Maybe there are some different religious festivals in a city near you? Even if it is still Christianity, it might be different from what is dominant near you.

I want froguar to know about different kinds of religion and what people believe around the world, even though he'll be raised in our Christian/atheist home. We're still working out what that looks like.

**I am a very slow poster and about a million ppl posted before me! wah.

[LadyShea]

The ugly and sordid, for those who haven't put it together yet, is that we told everyone that Hell and Satan was off limits until a later date to be announced, yet Kiddo popped off about the "dark angel, God's greatest enemy". In trying to figure out where he heard it and what he heard and where to go with it, hubby got asked "Why can't I teach him that if I want to because it's what I believe?" and his answer "Because I am his dad and I told you not to" was not accepted.

So yeah, gloves are the fuck off

[Watser?]

I don't know who that assholeperson was, but if it was up to me that would be the end of any contact between them and Kiddo. At the very least I would never let them be alone together.

[wildernesse]

Originally Posted by LadyShea

The ugly and sordid, for those who haven't put it together yet, is that we told everyone that Hell and Satan was off limits until a later date to be announced, yet Kiddo popped off about the "dark angel, God's greatest enemy". In trying to figure out where he heard it and what he heard and where to go with it, hubby got asked "Why can't I teach him that if I want to because it's what I believe?" and his answer "Because I am his dad and I told you not to" was not accepted.

So yeah, gloves are the fuck off

gah, hope you can limit visiting them to supervised only at the max. It's one thing for Kiddo to learn about that now though random ways (kids at school, ppl who don't know your rule) and a totally other thing for someone to knowingly break the rule.

It's not ok to teach other people's kids your religious beliefs as reality.

Also, as a heads up, the rapture is also a very disturbing concept for children, imo. For me and for many ppl, much more so than either the devil or hell. So something to think about if that is the way your extended family believes.

[lisarea]

Yeah, I was very severely traumatized as a little kid when the mean gypsy girls my mom made me play with told me stories about hell and how the devil was going to get me and torture me for all eternity. I was a really little kid. I didn't get that not everything everyone tells you is true.

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I lost a lot of sleep, had awful dreams when I did, and I pretty much just walked around scared all the time.

Those are awful, awful stories, and little kids can be very literal and very gullible. Even if you do genuinely believe those things, it's horrible to put that kind of imagery into a kid's head before he's old enough to evaluate it critically or understand the context or anything.

[LadyShea]

hope you can limit visiting them to supervised only at the max.

Implemented immediately, yes

And yes, it is a terrifying story. It is meant to be so in order to provide a need for salvation, because what is it you need saving from? And we tried to be really open and tolerant too. You can pray, you can tell little stories about Jesus loving little children or whatever, we have been trying really hard to stay neutral and all "Some people think that" and not go hardline. Here's the sad thing, we don't even know if this person was the source of the dark angel thing, but when asked about it, this person got all challenging of hubby's parental authority to set limitations on such topics. Hubby was not pleased. In fact he went beyond rage into "I'm done with that person" indifference land.

[ceptimus]

I think it's a good idea to talk about ancient religions - maybe first, but certainly at some time.

In some ways the ancient religions made more sense in that they chose to worship real things that could make a big difference to their lives: the sun, the weather, the sea, the river, animals, ... that kind of thing.

The newer successful religions have abstracted their gods away from these concrete items - it seems that, as knowledge advances, people start to understand how things like the river, or the sun work - once people understand then it doesn't make sense to continue to treat these things as gods.

There also seems to be a tendency to move from many gods to one god - though that is often fudged somehow (holy trinity, Mary mother of god and such).

[Janet]

I'm a huge fan of mythology, so I would naturally recommend you buy or get from the library a copy of Daulaire's Book of Greek Myths, aka my beloved childhood companion. One of the better comparative religion titles you'll find in any library is How to Be A Perfect Stranger, but I haven't read it myself so can only professionally recommend it, not personally. My favorite website on the subject is the Ontario Center for Religious Tolerance. They take a very even, unbiased stance on a number of different faiths and explain them well.

[LadyShea]

Religious Tolerance.org is one of my all time fave resources and I blanked it out this time. Thanks for the reminder Janet

[LadyShea]

Oh, he has already shown an interest in Buddha (from The Last Airbender and eating at Asian buffets and stuff led to questions and that led to some basics from memory. Then he bought a little Buddha statue) so I will prolly start with that.

[thedoc]

D. T. Suzuki was pretty good on Buddhism, especially Zen, and promoting it for western cultures.

Christmas Humphries is another good writer about Zen.

[Angakuk]

If he is already interested in Buddhism, then you should totally start teaching him about Tantric practices. Seriously, it is never to early to start providing proper sex education.

[LadyShea]

[thedoc]

Originally Posted by Angakuk

If he is already interested in Buddhism, then you should totally start teaching him about Tantric practices. Seriously, it is never to early to start providing proper sex education.

Then you will need to refer to this thread to properly cover that subject,

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