Christianity

[Slim]

I was reminded of this earlier today. President Trump's spiritual adviser responds to the news that he appears to be losing to Biden in the election by calling upon divine intervention at a special prayer service. November 4th, 2020.

[dom]

I don't get the logic of that at all. If God does exist, surely he's universal and would never favour one faction over another.

Praying for your team to beat another or for you to win the lottery is ridiculous even if you do believe in God.

Prayer should be about acceptance and the coping skills to be able to cope with whatever life throws at you rather than to ensure life goes in a particular direction.

[The Picnic Wasp]

I have to question this thread's title. I think insanity would be more appropriate. Christianity is basically quite simple. Accept that this man is who he says he is or do something else. The diversity of Christianity has thrown up some behaviours incongruent with the original message. Man's problem, not God's

[pxr5]

Less than half of England and Wales population Christian:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-63792408

I'm one of the majority I suppose.

[Slim]

I don't get the logic of that at all. If God does exist, surely he's universal and would never favour one faction over another.

Why?

[Matt2112]

Less than half of England and Wales population Christian:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-63792408

I'm one of the majority I suppose.

And that minority figure is just for nominal Christians (NB. Apparently, for this "optional" Census question (itself badly phrased as a leading question), the response rate was about 95%).

If a "practising" Christian is defined as someone who regularly attends weekly worship, then we're talking more like 5% of the population.

The proportion of those stating, "No religion" (not necessarily all atheists) has rocketed.

So clearly it's high time to re-evaluate the place of the church in state affairs - especially given the CofE remains doctrinally homophobic by any accepted definition.

[Slim]

It's time we taught kids that God isn't real in our schools, seriously.

[The Picnic Wasp]

I believe sadly, that we have subtly but assuredly staggered blindly into the end times. Crank post of the year award probably coming my way. So be it.

[Matt2112]

It's time we taught kids that God isn't real in our schools, seriously.

I wouldn't go that far, appealing as it intuitively is.

They should be taught how to think about these things, as opposed to what to think about these things; and I can state from first-hand experience that there are insufficient safeguards against the latter, even in community schools.

I will have more on that very soon, incidentally.

[Matt2112]

I believe sadly, that we have subtly but assuredly staggered blindly into the end times.

It's actually just part of the trend line that originally took us out of the ultra-pious dark ages. Relax!

[David L]

I believe sadly, that we have subtly but assuredly staggered blindly into the end times. Crank post of the year award probably coming my way. So be it.

Not so subtly, I might add

[pxr5]

It's time we taught kids that God isn't real in our schools, seriously.

I wouldn't go that far, appealing as it intuitively is.

They should be taught how to think about these things, as opposed to what to think about these things; and I can state from first-hand experience that there are insufficient safeguards against the latter, even in community schools.

I will have more on that very soon, incidentally.

Surely by the time children start school, their path is already set by their parents in terms of belief and faith. If parents have a strong religious leaning then it's highly likely their children will too. And those kids will likely got to their own faith schools which reinforces their belief. Not so much with CofE though.

My own parents had no faith and neither my sister or I were christened. I was taught RE and attended school religious services but the whole thing was meaningless to me and actually quite confusing. RE was just some stories from the past and that's all they were. Other kids I knew, many catholic, had religion shoved down their throats as soon as they could crawl and grew up to be devout and remained so.

So it matters not what is taught in schools - if belief is already there, not much can change that.

[Slim]

I'm not sure about that. Some kids will have agnostic parents and could still be influenced by religious belief. They can still be helped.

One important reason these old superstitions persist is that rational people turn a blind eye or accommodate them in the name of good will or a misguided sense of kindness. They can and must be overcome by reason but they won't be unless we actually bother to do that.

[Matt2112]

Surely by the time children start school, their path is already set by their parents in terms of belief and faith. If parents have a strong religious leaning then it's highly likely their children will too. And those kids will likely got to their own faith schools which reinforces their belief. Not so much with CofE though.

My own parents had no faith and neither my sister or I were christened. I was taught RE and attended school religious services but the whole thing was meaningless to me and actually quite confusing. RE was just some stories from the past and that's all they were. Other kids I knew, many catholic, had religion shoved down their throats as soon as they could crawl and grew up to be devout and remained so.

So it matters not what is taught in schools - if belief is already there, not much can change that.

That seems a very fatalistic way of looking at it and, besides, is only one scenario out of many. And, it strikes me, your last sentence couldn't be more wide of the mark!

Just plot the results on religious belief from the last three census and there is a clear dramatic decline in stated Christianity and an equally dramatic rise for stated "No religion"; yet there has been relatively little change in RE curricula, despite them often being taught sympathetically even in community schools.

I've always said - and this will sound paradoxical, given there should be no such thing as "faith schools" - that if you want to ensure your children are atheists, then send them to a Catholic school.  Because that's pretty much my personal experience as someone who went to Catholic primary and secondary schools as an observant, Church-attending Catholic, and came out the other end as a firm and emancipated apostate.

Of course, many schools of all categorisations likely have some kind of organised religious representation trying to ensure their "message" is afforded deferential and privileged access in assemblies and lessons etc - remember that, by law, all schools, "faith school" or not, are required to have communal worship "of a broadly Christian nature", which is just the open door the likes of the CofE require - because hardly anyone is minded to go and knock on theirs.  And that tells you everything.

[Nickslikk2112]

Well, I wish that 99% of the population were devout Christians, we might get Christmas starting on 25th December then and not in the middle of bloody September