Teaching grandchildren Christian values

Why not give the children information about different religions, not just Christianity, and let them make up their own minds when they are old enough?
I think we have comprehensively discussed the indignation that some of us feel when it is suggested that only 'Christian' values are worth imparting.

Nobody is born a catholic.

having brought up my child in the Church of England, and seen her marry a young man born Roman Catholic and brought up in the Church of England (services were more to the family's taste!) i have every confidence that their daughter will be raised in the CofE, too.

Yes, I agree about informed choice, though it is a fine line between learning about religion, and being unduly influenced to belong to it. I sent mine to catholic schools, and they both made their own minds up. One is atheist now, the other agnostic.

Just as a matter of interest, priests and nuns come round to talk to the kids in their final year of high school, and ask if any of them have a 'vocation'. They never get any recruits, but at least these days the kids are honest about why. "We don't want a life without sex" they say.

In Australia though, most people are what I would call non-theist. They are not atheists as such, because that implies a thought-out decision. They just never give religion a thought.

My younger son told me when he was about 11 that he thought religion was a bit 'James Bondish' and when I asked what he meant he said 'You know, bit far fetched'.
His first child is due at Christmas, his partner is C of E but they have decided to have the baby baptised Catholic as it doesn't much bother his partner, and I have said I will take her to mass once a month. I live 25 miles away so weekly would be difficult.
My elder brother didn't have his now adult children baptised and says they could make their own minds up. I think however, that if you don't give a child some knowledge and background to work with, it is very difficult for someone to turn TO religion.
I was quite accepting when my son stopped going to mass at 11, but am pleased that his daughter will be brought up as a Catholic. She can then make up her own mind having been given the tools to make an informed choice.

Don't have a problem with feeling good about myself if I help someone out, whether it be directly, or from a distance. Just don't need to go on about it, and I don't expect thanks. It does irritate me when charities promise to send me leaflets, fluffy animals, thankyou letters from sponsored children and so on. No - any donated money is for the recipients, not for my feedback, thanks very much.

Doing good does make you feel good inside, but it doesn't stop the "doing" being good for those who need it. You don't need to glorify it, just do it.

Mamie I should put this in pedants' corner, perhaps (and start another exchange? )

I have only just read your comment on the line in "All things bright and beautiful" which runs "God made them, high and lowly, and ordered their estate"

Googling it, I found this page www.hymnsocietygbi.org.uk/70%20articles/1960s/The%20Rich%20Man.pdf

I believe that Mrs Alexander, who wrote it, originally had "God made them, high or lowly" with a comma between - ie God made them all, whatever their status, not that God deliberately made them to be high or low.

And "ordered their estate" meant not their comparative wealth, but the position in which they were currently situated, and where they could do good actions, if they choose. Highly placed gentry and businessmen could be virtuous as well as the honest poor, if they held to the responsible land-ownership and generosity in charity which had long been traditions in this country. The grasping mill-owner and wicked profligate squire were condemned by their own neighbours, as well as by history.

How many people actually do "serve and not seek for any reward"?

I think most do-gooders do it because it makes them feel good.

Which is fine in itself.

Exactly right, Carol; non materialistic people with integrity who just get on and do what needs to be done - quietly. "To give and not to count the cost, to serve and not to seek for any reward..." actually St Francis Loyola, but it is also the Forces collect. I quote it because it is apt here, by the way.

Completely agree with you green. Money, power and greed are corrupting. I have seen professionals and volunteers working in front-line services do a profoundly altruistic job with no regard for reward for themselves, then they have been promoted to a position where their own attainments take priority over the people they are supposed to be helping. My best role models have always been non-materialistic people who maintain their integrity and get on with doing good work as anonymously as they can, without any thought of reward. Not sure I have ever been able to keep to this standard, but that acid test in my head usually keeps me on the straight and narrow. Perhaps as we get older, we don't need to prove our worth through our possessions and status?

What is 'goodness'? Always there has been inhumanity to fellow-man, which is immediately recognised as such. Not always though, is basic kindness recognised and followed through, because it's not associated with resulting money and power. Unfortunately, once some individuals get into a position of power, even if this is simply in a 'caring' organisation, their need or self-aggrandisement and the associated salary becomes more important than anything else. Everything else goes out of the window. Cover-ups begin to happen, because should the relevant authorities find out about how those in power haven't met their responsibilities, then they would never be able to work in that sort of position again - and no high salary either. At the bottom of this pile is 'the person', be it child or other vulnerable individual. We can only try to instil into our families what 'goodness' is, perhaps? (Do as you would be done by!)

I know that places of worship and the religious community associated with them bring great comfort to many good people, and I have no qualms about that. I do struggle, though, with witnessing the hypocrisy of some bigoted people who also associate with these communties. However, there are just as many hypocrites who attach themselves to other organisations and agitate and distort the values of those communities, too. I have found corruption in the organisation I worked in until I retired, and seen wholesale abuse and fraud in charitable, voluntary and statutory organisations that are supposed to help the vulnerable members of our society. If only there was a way to wipe this out without discrediting the organisations themselves. Perhaps these organisations that become aware of abuse within their confines should become more willing to expose it and be seen to deal with it, instead of brushing it under the carpet. I'm sure we would have more tolerance and respect for them if they demonstrated their willingness to uphold universal values about the sanctity of life and respect for their fellow man, woman and child, whatever their beliefs.

I so agree with all who have raised the point that you do not need religion in order to lead a good honest and worthwhile life.

I also agree that, in the main, the thrust of most religions is towards just this.

However we cannot ignore the way that religions have been corrupted by those involved and have in many instances wrought immense damage both on a mass scale (the crusades, northern Ireland for example) and for individuals (persecution of gay people, demoting of women, personal guilt etc.).

Tolerance of people's beliefs is a huge problem, because, while we would all like to do that, there are practices within some religions that are hard to reconcile with a humanitarian approach to others: the ritual mutilation of baby boys in the name of religion completely appals me and I am at a loss as to why this is still legal in this country; burdening young children with the concept of original sin and the guilt that this carries; female genital mutilation; etc. etc.

I am fully aware that most Christian churches in this country are entirely benign and in many instances a force for good, but we cannot safely ignore the corruptibility of religion to individual ends, because the results are so dreadful.

The basic problem is that religion deals in fundamentals (why are we here? why do we die? what are we meant to be doing with our lives? etc) and if people think they have found the answers to these questions in their religion, it is very uncomfortable to also tolerate the idea that someone else has different answers. Dealing in fundamentals has a natural tendencey towards fundamentalism and herein lies the problem.

You don't need god to be good. This was displayed on buses for a while, paid for by an atheist society, I believe. Anyway, it is true.

I do believe grandparents and parents should teach the little ones ethical and moral values. You don't need religion to do this.

Religion has far too many negative aspects these days, including pedophile priests and the church cover-ups, cults, jihads, fatwas, hatreds and rivalries between religions, anti-science fundamentalists.....the list goes on ad nauseam.

Not sure about "traditional values", Elegran, it seems a bit open to misinterpretation.
"The rich man in his castle, the poor man at his gate. God made them high and lowly and ordered their estate" - for example?

I'm with you bagitha. People's innate goodness doesn't have to be attributed to any faith or religion.

And a man's a man for a' that! If only all humankind could see that.

Perhaps we should stop saying just "Christian values" and say "traditional values". Christians can see the tradition as their own, non-Christians as theirs, so long as the word "values" stays in.

And, bagitha, that makes the best sense of all.

There are people who argue that there is not enough proper historical evidence to prove that Jesus as we know him ever existed. Furthermore, they argue that at that time in history in that part of the world prophets and messiahs were two a penny. Apparently there is evidence for this. I'm not supporting this belief, just saying it exists.

Devil's advocate? Who, me? As if!

What I do say (again) is that what are now called christian values (namely all that goes with not doing unto others what you wouldn't like them to do to you) are not solely christian. They are universal. They are human.

I think that may be what a lot of this discussion has been about jingle. The thread was actually called "Teaching Children Christian Values". The original post said, "Has anyone taught their children about Jesus?". For Grannylove these two things may be interchangeable but not everyone sees it the same way. And for the record, insofar as I am able to teach my grandchildren anything, given that they live in another country, stories about Jesus (and they are good stories in every meaning of the word good) and an awareness of the value of Christianity although I don't subscribe to its beliefs, do inform stuff we talk about and debate (depending on age).

"Has anyone taught their grandchildren about Jesus?"

Has anyone taught their grandchildren what a marvellous religion Christianity is?

Spot the difference.

Exactly.

Respect for others does not entail agreement with their views, nor even respect for their views. It's people we need to respect, not beliefs.