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Originally Posted by Pookie
I think you're mistaking self awareness with innocence and also over simplifying.
Children's minds are not "authentic, sincere, genuine, insightful etc", they are under developed. Perfect time to instil ancient myths which have NO basis in fact in their susceptible minds.
That's why children believe in unicorns and fairytales. The only difference between religious stories and other fairy tales is that at some point a child will realise the non religious fairy tales are just that.
My children are lucky that they are growing up in a place where religion is not totally pervasive. And my daughter is already working out the bullshit.
And for that I am grateful. I don't want her fantastic, bright, joyful mind cluttered up with bullshit. Child abuse  . |
I have to say, as someone who's sympathetic to religion, that I entirely agree that it's more often massively dangerous to orient children, pre-rational reflection (I think that starts developing around 8-10, which I'm sure you'll correct me on) towards religion, especially religions whose little-d dogma (culturo-religious edicts, perhaps) is sprawling and ill-defined.
The only point I'd make is that I do see a difference to the religious 'myth', in its broadest sense, and fairy tales, ghost stories and so on. The equivocation is a fair one, but in terms of the status of religion, it purports to be a myth within society, rather than without - religious myth is transcendent and tied in with the social, while fairy tales are allegorical, fantastical narratives. Obviously, the equivocation on your part is fair, given I'd assume you'd still equivocate them at the point of the 'fantastical'. The problem is that the equivocation on the basis of the lack of historical 'fact' to any myth-system threatens to undermine the meaningful (and largely allegorical)
function of fairy tales
and religion in favour of a dry rationality that doesn't really square with the absence of an immanent rationality accessible to each person in a given society.