Question for religious parents

Would you have a problem with your child being friends with an atheist,
or being friends with a child who's parents are atheists?

Barbara...

SNIP
I tend to stay away from the bible thumpers,

The reason I ask is that I am an atheist and I have a daughter who is
almost two and I live in a very religious area. Now that my daughter is
not really a baby anymore I am starting to think about these issues and
wondering if she is going to have trouble having friends.

Barbara...

I wouldn't have any problem with it whatsoever, so long as you were
respectful of our beliefs. (And we, of course, would do the same for
your beliefs.)

I think you have to recognize that as your daughter grows, there will
be questions by both your daughter and her playmates (*how come ...*),
there will be discussions, and there will be times when she feels
excluded (eg, when the other kids are discussing religious school or
services). That's all part of growing up, and part of teaching your
child to adhere to a belief system.

Marie...

When I was growing up, my parents did not allow me to be friends with other
kids who were not Christians or were not "good enough". I frequently lied
about who I talked to at school, because even though someone might have gone
to church, if he/she wasn't perfect (or didn't give off that perfect
righteous image my parents fell for) I would get in trouble for hanging
around with them. So yes there are people who will not let their children be
friends with atheists.
I doubt your daughter will have trouble having friends, though, as long as
you don't live in a hokey little town in the Deep South like I did. I am not
religious now, and in fact we are in a group of secular homeschoolers and
all of my closest friends(including my best friend from middle school) are
pagan, agnostic, or atheist. I tend to stay away from the bible thumpers,
because I'd rather not be told that I'm going to hell, or my kids need to be
in church.

Barbara...

SNIP

And this would differ from religious people who would prefer that their
children not play with non-religious people ... exactly how?

In which area of the US do you live?
Marie

Barbara...

-L....

Non-religious people aren't going to tell you how wrong you are for
your beliefs and are not going to try to cram *their* beliefs down your
throat. One is an aggressive stance (proselytization) the other is a
passive stance.

Michelle J. Haines...

Um. I submit that if you have actually met any atheists like that,
you're pretty sheltered, because I have.

Michelle
Flutist

toypup...

I live in a religious area. I kid you not. Within a two block area near my
house, there are five churches. If I drive from here to the freeway, there
are even more. We don't have many trick-or-treaters anymore because they're

toto...

Evanston, IL where my kids grew up has churches all over the town,
but that doesn't mean that everyone in the town is religious.

purplepain78...

I don't think she meant that everyone in her area is religious, just
the overwhelming majority are. Churches are a supply and demand kind of
thing, like businesses.

purplepain78...

(I typed this once before but something weird happened, sorry if a
similar message shows up.)

I don't think she was saying everyone was religious, just the
overwhelming majority is. Churches are supply and demand as are
businesses.

toto...

Church attendence even where there are lots of churches as in
Evanston is still going down. We had one church recently that
ended up consolidating its congregation with another church of
the same denomination which was down the block. The Church
itself has been sold.

Banty...

Church attendance doesn't even equate to particularly religious. Many people go
for the fellowship; others go because it's part of being in the community where
they grew up (I think many Catholics are in like this).

toypup...

The churches here are so full on Sundays and even some weekdays that they
have to have people out directing traffic.

dragonlady...

I feel compelled to point out that "religious" does not mean
"conservative"...

toypup...

I don't believe I said that it does.

and that regular church attendance does not necessarily mean a person is
religious...

toypup...

That is true, but people who attend church do tend to believe somewhat in

bizby40...

There are definitely atheists who spout their belief
that you have to be intellectually inferior in order
to believe in God. Not *all* atheists of course,
just like not all Christians are "Bible thumpers."

I have a friend who is a born-again, extremely
conservative Christian. She bemoans the fact
that conservative Christians on TV are so often
portrayed as extremely judgmental, intolerant,
and hypocritical.

the church's teachings. They usually believe in God. I don't think an
atheist would normally join a Catholic church. There are more and less
religious Catholics who go to church, but I don't think an atheist would
want to go just for community.

There are people who don't go to church, they go to temples or whatever. We
don't have those here, but those people are also religious, and they don't
go to church, so you are right about that.

and that NOT attending church does not necessarily mean a person is NOT
religious.

toypup...

That is true, but I think someone who is religious Christian is more likely
to attend church than someone who is not.

You may be referring to people who are religious but are not Christian who
don't go to church because they are not Christian. True, they are also
religious.

I do think the number of churches, temples, etc., does indicate how
religious a community is.

dragonlady
who considers herself to be deeply religious -- but don't panic, it

darth_breather...

There's one in San Francisco that's painted with an enormous tiger in a
bamboo forest.

I believe the person who lives there is a muralist.

doesn't necessarily mean what you THINK it means!

all at church the harvest festival (aka Halloween). There are plenty of
religious people knocking on our doors trying to convert us. We are not
religious. However, I don't think my kids will be friendless. It just
doesn't come up. If the kids were that intolerant, they just lost the
opportunity to know my wonderful kids.

Anyway, I spent a part of my childhood in an all white neighborhood that did
not like Asians much because of the Vietnam war. When bigotry was a
problem, I did not understand it, so it did not affect me. Looking back, I
can see the racist comments, but I had no clue at the time. Likewise, your
DD may not even notice why things are. By the time she does, she'll have
her own way of dealing with it.