There are ways parents can approach the issue of guiding a child’s faith that respects the child’s rights and honors the parents own faith. Parents object that they do not see a way to have their religion and not involve their children. But these are two separate issues.

There are strong objections to the way that child raising has assumed an element of obligatory childhood religious indoctrination. Children can be, and should be taught about religion, but it does not follow that they have to be forced into a particular faith. Teaching children about religion is quite different than forcing them to take up a specific religion.

The choice to commit to a religion is one that belongs to a person with a mature mind that can weigh the pros and cons and consult their own (their own) conscience about the matter. Notwithstanding this injunction, we can find child adherents that claim they became religious of their own volition. Clearly their parents must have unfairly influenced such children.

The documentary film Deborah 13: Servant of God tells the story of a such a child. Here is an abbreviated version of the film that was broadcast in the UK.

http://video.google.com/videosearch?q=deborah+13%3A+Servant&emb=0&aq=f#

Parents should wait to allow their children time to form the ability to think like an adult before allowing them to undertake religious training. Development experts say children around 12 to 14 are starting to think like adults. Furthermore, the initiative should be coming from the child not the parents. But, only after children have learned all the facts about religion: the relationship between religion and cults, the history of religion, and the impact of religion on society, both positive and negative.

All the ramifications should be discussed, parents must lay out all the possible options including eastern religions, not just various sects of Christianity. Also children should learn about the option of staying free of religion. Atheism or humanism are perfectly viable honorable choices.

Why should parents try to prevent their children from considering these options? Approximately 30,000,000 Americans lead happy productive secular lives guided by reason and as we can see in Europe and Scandinavia societies that are secular enjoy a high quality of life.

What parents, indeed cultures around the world, are doing now is dishonest and unethical. Parents withhold the knowledge of other options and do not fully disclose the drawbacks that go with getting involved in the supernatural. Religious communities can effect a persons freedom to be self determining and autonomous because for the indoctrination to work, the natural impluse of children to question everything must be tamped down. Religious institutions are not exactly hotbeds of skepticism, and that goes double for Sunday Schools and faith based schools.

Once a child enters a faith they usually find that leaving is not easy. Would it not be more fair if children knew this up front?

A frequent issue parents raise is what to do with small children if they do not take them to religious services. Surely this is not an insurmountable problem. There must be friends or family members who will care for children a few hours per month. Perhaps Christians could strike bargains with Jewish or Muslim friends who have a different Sabbath. Arrange a mutual support pact. In every family there is a circle of friends or family members that would step in. Parents can find ways to practice their faith, while simultaneously insuring their children’s religious freedom rights are not abridged.