Did you recieve mandatory religious education at any point of your life?

[Urban Ranger]

Re: Re: Did you recieve mandatory religious education at any point of your life?

Originally posted by Heresson
Which is comletely right. Complain to your parents for chosing religious schools.

I was only stating a fact.

Those were good schools, got nice chapels, and all those rituals were kinda interesting to watch.

[Heresson]

Re: Re: Re: Did you recieve mandatory religious education at any point of your life?

Originally posted by Urban Ranger


I was only stating a fact.

Those were good schools, got nice chapels, and all those rituals were kinda interesting to watch.

If it was not a regular state school, and You could go to a school that did not include it, I wouldn't call it "compulsory religious education". That's my point.

[molly bloom]

Originally posted by SpencerH
I was forced to watch the sound of music over and over and over again every christmas in Sweden. Does that count?

Sweden? Not Guantanamo ?


I had the usual Roman Catholic upbringing- a church run infant and junior school, masses said at the school regularly, compulsory attendance at the church on holy days of obligation, et cetera. No priestly molestation though.


Then a non-denominational grammar school where thanks to being an R.C. holy roller, I had forty minutes free every week, while the other (non-Catholic) pupils had to sit through religious education.



Made for a very enjoyable way to read through the school library at leisure.

[Dinner]

Originally posted by lord of the mark


Kids whose parents choose get released early to go to a church run religious ed program.

So you're telling me no public money was used and the best you can come up with is the school allowed students to leave early to attend religious events?

I stand by my previous statement.

[Richelieu]

Originally posted by St Leo

Originally posted by Dry
- NoneOfTheAbove. Its was called 'morale'.

I think you mean "morals". Morale refers to the happiness level of a group of people, usually troops.

In fact, morale is often at odds with morals.

He's using the french term.

[MikeH]

Originally posted by Buck Birdseed
It's part of the compulsory curriculum in sweden from secondary-level onwards. It's nominally a kind of "comparative sociology/anthropology of religions" course but in practice tends to be taught by rabid free-church (radical protestant) nutcases, often in cardigans.

I left Sweden age 11, thank god, and so missed out on that crap.

Basically the same thing here. It was more learning about other cultures and different world religions. Actually pretty useful in getting the basics of stuff like Budhism and Sikhism but they were the most boring/worst teachers lessons ever.

As the last question of my 1st year (year 7 these days, age 11) RE exam we had to recount the story of Rama and Sita. I wrote my own story involving ninjas and stuff that but using real character and place names etc. Got 93% on the exam.

[Kuciwalker]

I used to go to Catholic school, from grades 1-4, but since that's private it certainly doesn't count as "mandatory". We also studied parts of the Bible in English last year, but that was as literature.

[Dry]

Originally posted by St Leo

Originally posted by Dry
- NoneOfTheAbove. Its was called 'morale'.

I think you mean "morals". Morale refers to the happiness level of a group of people, usually troops.

indeed. I always mix up the two....

[Urban Ranger]

Re: Re: Re: Re: Did you recieve mandatory religious education at any point of your li

Originally posted by Heresson
If it was not a regular state school, and You could go to a school that did not include it, I wouldn't call it "compulsory religious education". That's my point.

Your argument is silly.

It's like saying that if I didn't go to university A I didn't need to take physics, or you wouldn't have to pay so much tax if you were in the US instead of Sweden.

[Paddy]

yes we did down-under. all part of our anglo-saxon colonial upbringing. good for keep the masses enthralled I believe. it seems to work just fine. saturday is our main day:

- church on saturday afternoon for wine wafer and song

- pub on saturday night for wine women and song

[Dis]

why are there so many yes votes?

I live in a country (U.S.) that is secular and does not require religious education.

Yeah I went to this one sunday school type thing at a church, but that wasn't mandatory. When my brother made fun of me, I stopped going. It was all my choice.

Where I come from, kids make fun of kids that go to church.

[Kuciwalker]

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Did you recieve mandatory religious education at any point of you

Originally posted by Urban Ranger
Your argument is silly.

It's like saying that if I didn't go to university A I didn't need to take physics, or you wouldn't have to pay so much tax if you were in the US instead of Sweden.

Uh, actually, the argument that college-level physics isn't mandatory is a rather good one.

[Pekka]

some of you guys had some 'awesome' teachers

We had a great one... I thought of him as the best teacher in school. Our religion classes were the opposite of religious. It was very.. it's tough to say, his approach was so great. He was funny, I mean genuinely funny dude and smart. I think highly of him even today. We went through all the major and some not-so-major religions and took the same approach on them all. It was definitely NOT Christian biased classes. We didn't whip out the bible, not a single time. The only thing we talked about bible was when he taught us how it was made, who wrote it and how it was put together. That's it. We took more like a global look at religion, and sociological one. It was pretty interesting, plus he made it interesting so most of us enjoyed it in fact.

He also came up with his own remarks about some of the loopholes in all religions etc, and of course the victims of religions of all religions by war or by monsterous religious leaders etc. And also psychological victims of religions. Hey we even had Scientology. SO that's how seriously the religious side was religious. It was more .. like history classes. But he was still tasteful always, while making total fun of all religions, he never .. talked them down. We were taught to respect them all, by knowing what they are about, and how much they are alike, and how they all have their loopholes, and how they all this and that. We were taught by example, but more from sociological and historical point of view. We even had atheist approach. It was religion, in its pure form. Not about religion as in believing in something.

We took a look at most things in religion, also in their architecture at times, he once brought his vacation pics from all around the world and we looked at the buildings from different regions, it was fun. Once he took out a guitar, and we were like 'oh damn what's this', but he just started singing the OTHER songs like Bruce Springsteen's born in the usa!

But yeah, while being funny and mostly making us laugh, and beating on religions, he also taught about them so we were left with knowledge of religions, their similarities and differencies, histories etc, unbiased and respectfully. It's too bad some of you have had bad experiences.. I wouldn't want a fundie teaching my class. That's exactly what it isn't supposed to be.

Furthermore, I feel they were great classes, that should be considered as basic information for civilized people. It builds tolerance and mutual respect and understanding. It's cultural thing. Of course if you have some whacko teaching it, then it's just a waste of time and scaring people and christian mongering. that's what it's not about in here, in the mandatory classes.

I remember doing 3 presentations. One was of Rastafaris, major point being the weed of course, one I did from Wiccas, and one from.. Satanism. So there's your 'YOU GO TO HELL IF YOU DON'T TAKE THIS AS THE TRUTH!' type of classes.. at least we didn't.

[VetLegion]

Originally posted by Dissident
why are there so many yes votes?

[Last Conformist]

There are so many yes voted because a great many of us come from places where religion classes are obligatory. They being obligatory seems to be the norm within the Western world.