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Kids learn all too quickly, and by example, how to play the games of the adult world. To teach this concept of blind acceptance to a child is to ask — to beg — for such disasters as the savings and loan debacle, Wall Street Scandals, Jim and Tammy Bakker, Jim Jones, and an endless list of mindless, stupid acts based on false premises.
In today’s complex world, children need not just to be taught right from wrong—they need to learn the knack of figuring it out for themselves. They need to learn, not just that there are rules, but that there is a reason for the rules, and what those reasons are. Laws and religious principles provide only the basics, the stalling point.
The founding fathers, for example, steeped in religion, saw nothing wrong with slavery, although, presumably, they studied the same Bible in use today. (Either all the answers aren’t in the Bible, or our forefathers — and everybody else, right up to the 1960’s — couldn’t read very well!)
We should certainly teach children the wisdom that religion has to offer, but we must also teach them to question authority and to value and respect honesty and the truth. Otherwise, it becomes easy to rationalize the wrong but tempting choices we all must face.
BILL FITZSIMONS
Flint Hill
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