Christian recruitment of young people

heron said:
Still waiting to hear what the agenda motivating these haters might be.
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If you really wanted an answer you would not have asked such an obvious question with a vast amount of world history as well as current USA history on controversies of separation of state and religion. šŸ˜€ As a new member on the forum, I gave you an appropriate terse oblique answer as a test giving you the benefit of doubt as to your intent, however your response shows this person you are simply playing a baiting game I won't be drawn into beyond the below input.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antitheism

You can read under that article See also:
Antireligion
Evangelical atheism
Humanism
League of Militant Atheists
Materialism
Militant atheism
Naturalism (philosophy)
Negative and positive atheism
New atheism
Post-theism
Scientism
State atheism

Just one example of religious haters per above of a long list through history back to Roman times when Christians were Coloseum fodder for lions. Of course most everyone knows, during the early 20th century communists hated religion and of course you know that too, so yeah your question rings hollow.

League of Militant Atheists
snippets:

The league embraced workers, peasants, students, and intelligentsia. It had its first affiliates at factories, plants, collective farms (kolkhozy), and educational institutions. By the beginning of 1941 it had about 3.5 million members from 100 ethnicities. It had about 96,000 offices across the country. Guided by Bolshevik principles of communist propaganda and by the Party's orders with regards to religion, the League aimed at exterminating religion in all its manifestations and forming an anti-religious scientific mindset among the workers...
The league was a "nominally independent organization established by the Communist Party to promote atheism".It published newspapers, journals, and other materials that lampooned religion; it sponsored lectures and films; it organized demonstrations and parades; it set up antireligious museums; and it led a concerted effort telling Soviet citizens that religious beliefs and practices were wrong and harmful, and that good citizens ought to embrace a scientific, atheistic worldview.
 

David777 said:
If you really wanted an answer you would not have asked such an obvious question with a vast amount of world history as well as current USA history on controversies of separation of state and religion. šŸ˜€ As a new member on the forum, I gave you an appropriate terse oblique answer as a test giving you the benefit of doubt as to your intent, however your response shows this person you are simply playing a baiting game I won't be drawn into beyond the below input.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antitheism

You can read under that article See also:
Antireligion
Evangelical atheism
Humanism
League of Militant Atheists
Materialism
Militant atheism
Naturalism (philosophy)
Negative and positive atheism
New atheism
Post-theism
Scientism
State atheism

Just one example of religious haters per above of a long list through history back to Roman times when Christians were Coloseum fodder for lions. Of course most everyone knows, during the early 20th century communists hated religion and of course you know that too, so yeah your question rings hollow.

League of Militant Atheists
snippets:

The league embraced workers, peasants, students, and intelligentsia. It had its first affiliates at factories, plants, collective farms (kolkhozy), and educational institutions. By the beginning of 1941 it had about 3.5 million members from 100 ethnicities. It had about 96,000 offices across the country. Guided by Bolshevik principles of communist propaganda and by the Party's orders with regards to religion, the League aimed at exterminating religion in all its manifestations and forming an anti-religious scientific mindset among the workers...
The league was a "nominally independent organization established by the Communist Party to promote atheism".It published newspapers, journals, and other materials that lampooned religion; it sponsored lectures and films; it organized demonstrations and parades; it set up antireligious museums; and it led a concerted effort telling Soviet citizens that religious beliefs and practices were wrong and harmful, and that good citizens ought to embrace a scientific, atheistic worldview.
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Pobrecito ā€¦ but thank you for the reading list. I look forward to getting at the rationale for this eternal victimhood.

However, your list implies that you issues are with atheists. I am not an atheist and neither are a lot of people with serious disagreements with or criticisms of Christianity. So, patronize me all you want, Iā€™d still like to hear your understanding of our ā€œagendaā€.

Meanwhile, what do you think about Christians recruiting children?
 
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SeniorBen said:
In a related story...

****** abuse survivors call for answers amid probe into Catholic Church in Baltimore
Survivors of ****** abuse by Catholic Church leaders rallied in front of Maryland Attorney General Brian Frosh's office, calling for the release of preliminary findings of an investigation into the Archdiocese of Baltimore.
https://abcnews.go.com/US/******-abuse-survivors-call-answers-amid-probe-catholic/story?id=87873813
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Thre was a guy named Andrew Greeley who was an Irish Catholic priest, a Jesuit a practicing sociologist and a very good writer of both fiction and non- fiction. Some of his work describes his experience in the seminary, which he found to be pretty toxic. I discovered his work just as started hitting the fan in Boston - in the 80ā€™s (maybe?). He gave me a picture of seminary training that just breaks my heart.

These revelations of physical and emotional abuse keep coming out over and over again, going back something like 40 years.

Neither Catholicism nor Christianity in general have a corner on clerical abuse, either.

All around tragic.

I think, in general, Iā€™m kind of leery about unrelated adults recruiting children.m into their religion.
 
My personal recollections

As a child my mother sent be to Sunday School at the nearest church which happened to Baptist. My sister and I had been baptised as infants into the Methodist denomination but neither Mum nor Dad were churchgoers.

At Sunday School I was introduced to old and new testament bible stories and learned some traditional songs. At school I had a weekly scripture lesson and learned a bit more of the same but by my adolescence I had decided that only some of the volunteer scripture teachers were sane enough to be respected. I began my journey towards atheism.

As an adult I dismissed all religion as being mostly nonsense and irrelevant to my life. That is until the age of 33 when I had an epiphany while attending an inservice course for teacher counsellors that took place in a large motel/hotel.

To cut to the chase, I became an new creation, to use the jargon, but I kept quiet about it and went on with my life without belonging to any church.

A few years later I ventured inside a local church and gradually I became part of that lovely community of ordinary folk who all shared a common faith and tradition. I'm still there and I have been a Sunday school teacher ever since.

As a former science teacher I have always been careful not to indoctrinate the children. I regard that as a form of abuse but I also regard stories, whether biblical or simply folk tales, to be great resources for imparting wisdom, morality and ethics. Children's learning must always be fitted to their intellectual and emotional development. I have always been careful not to put anything into their minds that will need to be removed later on.

Adolescents are particularly vulnerable to indoctrination and radicalisation. Religion is just one possible source of indoctrination out of many. Politics is another.

Our church used to organise camps for country children and teens and the camp leaders were mostly younger adults. Hubby and I went along as camp parents and I kept a sharp eye on the leaders to make sure their religious zeal wasn't being used to manipulate the young campers. Elders can be a brake on extremism.

Being part of a faith community and following the tenets of a religion is not per se detrimental. On the contrary I have found a community of people who for the most part are kindly, generous and gentle folk. I have also seen other religious groups that were full of hate and anger disguised as righteousness. Not everyone lives out the teachings of the religion they profess to follow.
 
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I can only speak from experience that Christianity and other faith-based religions were one time as an. essential learning experience that taught right from wrong. However, history shows religion(s) were not as they seemed to be as members of religious organizations found guilty of physical, psychological and sexual abuse among young people who were under their care.

Growing up for me the only thing I knew was attending church because my dad was the preacher. With the church as my only life experience I was more than naive in the real world. Perhaps this is the reason PK's get such a bad reputation for learning how the world is outside of religious influences?
 

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