Letters to Newsline
Please send your letters for publication to letters@secularism.org.uk. We want to publish as many letters as possible, so please keep them brief. We reserve the right to edit. Opinions expressed in letters are those of the writers and not necessarily those of the NSS.
26 September 2008
From Mrs D.S. (name and address supplied):
My son attends school in Salisbury. It is a non-denominational infant school. He is in Year 1.
Yesterday, he told me that as part of the ‘light and dark’ science topic (which the school informed us he would be studying as part of science for KS1) he was taught how God created the earth and brought light to the world. I asked him whether he knew that only some people believed that and he did not. He saw it as fact because his teacher had told him. Other parents have reported the same thing. There is a poster in the school about ‘light and dark’ which has pictures of torches, the sun, Adam and Eve and bears the words ‘God created the earth’.
The school has a very strong Christian ethos which only became apparent after he started there. I have never seen any teaching on other religions or the fact that some people do not believe. They have never covered Diwali for example as he did in nursery and I have reason to believe that their RE plan does not cover any other religions.
Could you please confirm what the guidance is on the teaching of Christianity to the exclusion of other religions (or non-believers) in a non-denominational school?
Ed writes: Dear Mrs D.S. – I’m afraid there is little you can do to stop this indoctrination of your son short of removing him from RE lessons. This has its problems, too. More information in our parents’ pack which you can download from our website (pdf).
From Nicola (Lancashire – name and address supplied):
I thought you might be interested to hear about a situation I've discovered at some schools in my town in Lancashire. Six of the schools have been hosting an ‘Ignition’ week, where evangelising Christians come into the schools and take over the lessons. They have been in PSHE, Drama, Art, Music, PE and RE lessons. They have been using these lessons to preach to the children about the hope that belief in god brings; and other very Christian messages.
The parents were not informed that this was happening; and neither parents nor children were given any opportunity to opt out. The schools are supposed to be secular. Even Muslim kids were subjected to the Christian evangelising.
The head of one of the schools seemed unaware (and, frankly, unconcerned) about the fact that this group have been infiltrating lessons other than RE and using the time to try and brainwash the children into believing their supernatural message. I think perhaps the schools are attracted by the free teaching for the week, and the fact that the kids get access to something different such as music and dance events. There is no monitoring and the Head of Year and Head of School at one high school both said that they did not know exactly what had been said to the children; or even which lessons the Christians had been infiltrating.
I emailed the organisation running these events and they said that they intend to increase the number of lessons they take over. They run this event in schools every year and have been expanding every year. This weekend they are running a disco where parents are forbidden to accompany their children; and Christians encourage the children to go and worship in tents set up at the event.
Is there no legislation restricting the involvement of religious groups in schools like this? I was under the impression that parents could opt their children out of religious assembly, so what is the situation with enforced brainwashing like this? Is there anything we can do to curtail their plans to expand their activity?
Ed writes: We have advised Nicola to find out as much as she can about what is happening locally and to take it up with the school and the local LEA. She tells us the school in question is not even a “faith school”. If she can’t get a satisfactory reply, we will advise her on what further action can be taken. We regret, though, that this kind of infiltration of schools by fundamentalist religious groups is increasingly happening up and down the country.
From Peter Bolt:
Whilst recognising the inappropriateness of treating deists as the “enemy” nonetheless militant deists must be challenged. There is, in my opinion, no better way than to take their arguments at face value and demand the proof. The Bible, (particularly the New Testament) offers a rich source of counter argument to their exaggerated version of “Christian values”. In any event Bible study should be an essential requisite for all Secularists.
From Chris Hardman:
I’m inclined to agree with Michael Conroy (Newsline, 19 September) – this is the National Secular Society, not an Atheist Association, and the amount of antitheistic material on the NSS website and continual digs at religion in Newsline do not support the central message of Secularism, which is that while people should be free to practice and express whatever they believe in, our government and public services ought to be free of religious influence. Atheism is simply the belief or opinion (whether formed by logic or intuition) that there is no higher being or ultimate creator, whereas secularism is a cause with defined, realistic aims such as the disestablishment of the church and the abolition of religious observance in schools. We must be careful to draw a line between opposition to religious interference in public life and opposition to religion itself. While the NSS rightly supports the rights of atheists and other non-religious people, and of those whom religious groups attempt to discriminate against, it should not be in the business of attacking faith and religion as a whole, since this is likely to alienate religious secularists and also the many people who hold no firm beliefs either way, whose support is necessary to achieve our secularist goals.
From Olivia Hanks:
I’d like to voice my support for the views expressed by Michael Conroy in last week’s Newsline. The conflation of secularism with atheism is all too common, and it seriously undermines secularist aims when the same link is made, or implied, by the NSS itself. I was also disappointed to see the hostility expressed in Newsline towards the Accord coalition. While accepting that there are differences in opinion between the two, I feel it would be a shame if the NSS were to blind itself to what it has in common with Accord; namely, support for non-discriminatory admissions and employment policies in schools and the abolition of compulsory acts of worship. Rather than seeing it as an enemy, we need to acknowledge the coalition as a step forward and realise that its ‘softer’ approach has enabled it to gain the support from religious figures that is ultimately necessary for secularism’s success.
From Malcolm Hutton:
I think Michael Conroy has a point. Christians losing their faith often need something else they can turn to, perhaps as a stepping stone to greater understanding. Dr. Francis Macnab is filling that gap. He rejects Jesus and Moses, but is offering a new faith for those going down the river without a paddle. See here..
I myself am sure that there is something more beyond this physical (or dream) existence, but it is definitely not the Bible God. People are now deserting Christianity in an ever-growing flood. Ministers and Priests are beginning to follow. Perhaps it is still only a trickle of the one time teachers, but they will all go in good time. Many of them don't publicise their defection, but there are those like Tom Harpur ("The Pagan Christ"), John W Loftus and now Dr. Macnab who are telling the masses that it is time to end the Christian farce. A few more of these courageous people and the dam walls will burst open.
From Jack Lavety:
Now that the Christian Legal Centre seems to be objecting to depicting Jesus as a normal man, it is surely time to ask the question – ‘If man is made in the image of God, then what is God doing with a penis?’ Now there is a simple question.
From Kaveh Manavi:
On the second floor of my favourite booksop, Chapters, are books on philosophy and science. The striking feature is the number of books against atheism and atheists, especially Richard Dawkins and his superb book The God Delusion.
The majority of religious books there had the sole purpose of refuting that book! The most ridiculous title belonged to a guy who claimed The God Delusion converted him from atheism to christianity!
All those books are a testimony to the convincing tone of Dr Dawkins’ excellent book. I hail him and wish him the best for the future. This book has certainly been a great force of reason for some young minds. The teenage son of a friend of mine has read the book seven times. When recently asked in school about his religion, he stated he was an atheist! The school reported this to his father “for his information”!
From John Hein:
Fundies say the daftest things, and to prove it have a look at this lot.
From Sheila Kinsella:
This is a message for Derek Waite who wrote briefly in last week’s Newsline that he would not be attending his grandson’s christening.
I would urge you to change your mind. As ‘rationalists’ we have to behave ‘rationally’, and I fear that you taking this action equates to the Catholic parent who refuses to go to their offspring’s wedding because they are marrying a Protestant! There will be many reasons why your son is taking this course, but your dialogue with him on the issue in the coming years is really important and therefore you must not close the door on any such conversations. With your help, your son, in time, will come to respect your views and that you hold them ‘without prejudice’ to your love for your family. In the past I have had the same dilemma, and found myself having to sit through a horrendously conservative high Church Christening Service all about impurity, fallenness and sin, which made my stomach wrench, but my son and daughter-in-law (the active Christian in the duo), knew how much I disagreed with the process, but appreciated my being there because I love them. Who knows where your son’s journey ahead lies? But you must be a part of it.
From Belinda Forbes:
Derek Waite is upset that his grandson is to be christened. If it’s not too late and, assuming that his son and daughter-in-law are not practising Christians, I’d like to recommend an excellent alternative – a Naming Ceremony. For more information on this, and on Civil Wedding ceremonies and Civil Funerals, please visit this website.
Of course, the BHA provides humanist celebrants. However, many people prefer not to be associated with a particular ideology, and with a Civil Ceremony the emphasis is on personal choice. I have recently qualified as a Civil Funeral Celebrant and I’m finding that most people do not realise that there is an alternative to religious or humanist funerals. Many funeral directors will provide details of a religious celebrant only. This is slowly changing. As the number of civil celebrants grow (and more civil ceremonies are conducted) many “non-church-going-cultural-christians” will feel confident to choose a civil ceremony.
From Simon Perry:
I’m not sure if this point has been made before, but there could be a scientific medical reason for removing religious chaplains in the NHS: research into effects of prayer by the Templeton Foundation in 2006.
This was an extremely well designed scientific medical trial. The results are clear: praying for cardiac bypass patients makes no difference (no surprise there). Much more interestingly though, the study also found that if you told cardiac bypass patients that you would pray for them, they had more complications. This is a very surprising result. Surely this is an extremely strong case against hospital chaplains. If people come around and tell you they are going to pray for you, this increases your risk of complications during cardiac bypass surgery by 15%. (15% is my interpretation of the results, I’m not a scientist so I might have read it wrong).
This clearly demonstrates that at the least, NHS chaplains should be banned from visiting cardiac bypass patients. I can’t think of anything else that, if shown conclusively by a large scale clinical trial to increase cardiac bypass complications by 15%, would still be encouraged by the hospital. Hope this helps in your campaign.
From Steve Curr:
From the article Happy Talk by Hilary Rose in The Times Magazine, 13th September 2008. “I have compiled a self-help list of Cheap Ways to be Happier, which runs, in no particular order, as follows.
1. Get out of bed; 2. Apply make-up; 3. Drink more cocktails; 4. Find God. Religion leaves me cold, but it seems to make plenty of people happy (or occasionally, mad). Plus, the divine will mean that you’ve always got someone to blame when your life’s crap. How fabulous is that? A complete abdication of responsibility for the rubbishness of your own life in three little words: “It’s God’s will.”
5. A cup of tea and a heavily buttered crumpet. But one thing I do know: if the secret to a happy life lies anywhere, I’m more likely to find it in a cup of tea and a crumpet than a pew.”
From Paul Braterman:
From The Onion (Brits: it’s a pseudo-newspaper):
DAYTON, TN—A steady stream of devoted evolutionists continued to gather in this small Tennessee town today to witness what many believe is an image of Charles Darwin—author of The Origin Of Species and founder of the modern evolutionary movement—made manifest on a concrete wall in downtown Dayton...
From Desmond Barber:
As a professional physicist working in large research projects in large laboratories I have been dismayed at the distortion and inaccuracy prevalent among news media reporting or commenting on the Large Hadron Collider. For similar reasons I am also dismayed at the headline at the NSS web site: “Eminent scientist says we should respect creationism. No, it's not April 1st. Yes, an eminent scientist has said we should respect creationism and debate it in science classes'”.
I do not wish to give an opinion here on his speech or on the dismissal of M. Reiss from his post at the Royal Society, but I do wish to point out that as far as I can judge the word “eminent” is misplaced. He is perhaps very competent in what he does within the Institute of Education and he is a co-author of a school book, but if he were an eminent biologist, he would be doing high value research in biology, not thinking primarily about education.
Parts of the article itself are polemical and sneering and smack of the kind of material that one finds in the down-market newspapers. That is not an effective way for the NSS to get its message across and leaves it open to the accusation of intolerance. I hope that in future headlines, the NSS will stick to the facts and refrain from the kind of attention-grabbing distorting hysteria that we now get from much of the news media. Surely it would have sufficed to write “Educationalist comments on how to handle creationism in schools” and to then have given more sober reports and opinions. That article does us no favours.
