Today a facebook friend posted an interesting letter which came originally from the Huffington Post. It was a letter from a mother questioning whether she was raising her son properly in not teaching him some religious beliefs about God and church. The woman went on to explain that while both she and her husband had been reared in a Christian tradition that neither are exercising or practicing a faith and thus, her small son is going without any kind of religious upbringing. She was questioning whether she was doing him right or wrong in this attitude.
In the protestant faith, the traditions with in the church are usual and almost always the same, a few hymns are sung, a sermon is preached, a prayer is said, and a collection box is passed, and everyone is satisfied at the end that everyone has done their Christian duty and dutifully leave the church satisfied that another week has ended or begun well in satisfying the requirement of showing up to hear a mighty and awesome sermon.
The church plate is usually what is most important to many as money is always an issue in the survival of any church body, whether to support the preacher and his family, or to pay the building fund.
In the Catholic church, one is sinning if one does not attend all the necessary obligations that the church demands from its flock and again as in the protestant faith, the ongoing ritual of prayer, communion, and greeting one another in peace is supposed to satisfy the requirement that all true Christians gather together to pray in unison and agreement, acknowledging Jesus as their saviour.
Then one goes home, casts off all the pretenses, and settles back into the family ritual whatever it may be of arguing, fighting, putting one another down, or in the case of a happy and loving family, simply doing one's own thing whatever it may be, chores, play, homework, games, whatever.
There are always two different kinds of households in America: those who love each other and enjoy being together, living together, and praying together, and those who are actually hating each other, envious of one another's friends, time, pleasures, or whatever, and sibling rivalry of that kind often makes for great enmities so why bother with the pretense when one knows that one really wishes to bop the other one off.
So was this woman wise to ask about whether she should try to instill a religious notion in her son or whether to just let him be, not bothering to take him to church where he would be taught the usual Sunday School stories about Jesus loving little children, and wanting them all to come to him, or to let him grow up to decide for himself that mommy and daddy had let him down by not taking him to church to learn those early lessons.
In the number of inmates incarcerated in jails today, how many had gone to church in their youth? Why did it not penetrate their minds not to break the laws of society? In the hospitals and nursing homes today, how many are also a product of a religious upbringing? Does a religious upbringing matter to a child? Does a child need to attend a Sunday School to learn the lessons taught there? Does that lesson affect that child's lifestyle for the remaining days of his life?
If there is a God, she says, and you are out there, I am passing on this...
Does she pass? God is supposed to see into our hearts...can one even understand what is in one's own heart?
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