Vacation Bible School has gone off the deep end.

@ehBeth,

Psychological torture? That seems a bit much.

@DrewDad,

Not to me...

but we have varying views,

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@jespah,

jespah wrote:

Intrepid, isn't it also kinda used as a time for before kids start regular sleepaway camp (or after), e. g. a kind of alternative child care during the Summer months? At least that's how a former boss of mine viewed it for her daughter.

It seems that many people look at vacation bible school as a free day camp for a week in the summer. Send the kids off and get a break.

Nothing wrong with that, but sometimes these same people are appalled at the fact religious teaching goes on. it is, after all, it is Vacation BIBLE School.

It is something for the church going kids to do and they can bring their friends. It is not meant to sway anybody and we do not force anything on anybody and keep it rather low key. it is a form of outreach.

Prayer is said at the beginning and end of the VBS day, but it is done with the knowing that there are those who may not be familiar with it and is kept low key.

The experiences I have read in this thread are not something I would want to subject my children to. Unfortunately, there are some religious institutions that give the rest of us a bad name.

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just my own curiosity but I do wonder how many kids drop away from church/religion after attending bible school.

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@Intrepid,

Quote:

Unfortunately, there are some religious institutions that give the rest of us a bad name.

Undoubtedly--which is why it is a much a mistake to automatically defend religion as it is to unthinkingly attack it.

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@Setanta,

Quote:

Undoubtedly--which is why it is a much a mistake to automatically defend religion as it is to unthinkingly attack it

wrong. That is why it is as much a mistake to automatically defend religious INSITUTIONS as it is to attack religious INSITUTIONS. Religion is part of who and what man is, humans are, so to attack religion in general is to attack man. It is the process of self hate. This is ALWAYS wrong.

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@hawkeye10,

Well, I'm a woman, so I'm out of your loop.

Despite our recent fizz, I agree with set on this one.

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@dyslexia,

dyslexia wrote:

just my own curiosity but I do wonder how many kids drop away from church/religion after attending bible school.

Good question. I would venture a guess that more are not drawn to it, because of many of the reasons given.

Attending bible school, in and of itself, is not the problem. Attending bible school put on by religious zealots with blinders is the problem.

1 Reply

@Setanta,

Setanta wrote:

Quote:
Unfortunately, there are some religious institutions that give the rest of us a bad name.

Undoubtedly--which is why it is a much a mistake to automatically defend religion as it is to unthinkingly attack it.

Certainly.

But it is never a mistake to defend that which you believe in. It is always a mistake to attack that which you know nothing about.

Would you agree?

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@Intrepid,

I would agree only to the extent that you are certain that you believe what others believe. So, for example, to defend someone who considers homosexuals to be among the damned, just because you think your beliefs are similar as being christian, places you squarely in the anti-homosexual camp even if that is not in fact your belief.

And to assume that someone knows nothing about what you cherish simply because they do not cherish it is also a mistake.

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@hawkeye10,

No, clown, you are wrong. It is an insecure personality who identifies so narrowly with a belief set that he or she considers an attack on that belief set to be a personal attack. If i condemn blind faith, and you, as an adherent to a form of blind faith, take personal offense, that is a clear-cut case of wearing the shoe if it fits you--Rapist Boy. I sure as hell don't need correction from a moral worm like you.

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I'm not stepping into the fray here, but I did want to make the point that I think young people need to know bible stories. It would be difficult to really understand a large section of literature without knowing a few bible basics. Reading authors such as Melville, Faulkner and Steinbeck would be greatly diminished if you didn't get the biblical references. I'm not saying bible camps are the best way to do this, probably not, but in the case of someone like DrewDad, who is around to answer to tough questions, it probably does more good than harm.

Stepping out of the ring now and ringing the bell for the next round of punches...

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so, this post was just a way to encourage people to connect to your website, right?

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@Intrepid,

Intrepid wrote:

Attending bible school, in and of itself, is not the problem. Attending bible school put on by religious zealots with blinders is the problem.

Really? I would have said the Bible itself is the problem. On balance, all chapters considered, it actually is a bat-****-crazy book. The blinders and the religious zealotry aren't the school's; they pervade the whole book, and the school is only passing them on. Given the content of the book, you can't blame a Bible School for having a bat-****-crazy curriculum. It would be failing its job if it didn't.

With all due respect, I think that DrewDad, who very reasonably has a problem with the message taught in that school, shouldn't be shooting the messenger. He would be better-advised to question the source of the message instead, and reconsider his allegiance to it.

In the long run, in its own, twisted way, this Bible School is probably doing DrewDad's daughters a favor. As dyslexia suggests, by teaching them truthfully what the Bible is all about, it will immunize them against the meme that the Bible is a book to live by, and that the unpleasant character it calls "The Lord" or "Yahwe" is worthy of their worship.

Nevertheless, it sucks that Yaya and Keeta have to go through this anguish.

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@Green Witch,

Green Witch wrote:

I'm not stepping into the fray here, but I did want to make the point that I think young people need to know bible stories.

I second that.

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@Setanta,

Setanta wrote:

I would agree only to the extent that you are certain that you believe what others believe. So, for example, to defend someone who considers homosexuals to be among the damned, just because you think your beliefs are similar as being christian, places you squarely in the anti-homosexual camp even if that is not in fact your belief.

And to assume that someone knows nothing about what you cherish simply because they do not cherish it is also a mistake.

I do not defend those who consider homosexuals to be anything other than human beings that may be a bit different from the norm. I do not consider tham damned to anything.

Actually, I make no assumptions as to what you assume me to assume.

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@Thomas,

You seem to be ignorant of the fact that they are not schools. They are churches that put on the bible schools.

Of course it sucks. I have agreed with that from the beginning. My posts point to that.

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@Thomas,

Thomas wrote:

As dyslexia suggests, by teaching them truthfully what the Bible is all about, it will immunize them against the meme that the Bible is a book to live by, and that the unpleasant character it calls "The Lord" or "Yahwe" is worthy of their worship.

Regrettably, that isn't necessarily the outcome at that type of Vacation Bible School. The churches don't continue to run them because they are unsuccessful. They run them because they work. Or at least, work often enough.

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@Thomas,

Hah, an opportunity to disagree with people I often agree with. I think getting tiny children to parrot bible stuff is veritable brainwashing. I was a brainwashed (well, nearly) person at seventeen, and consider myself now to have been rampantly and intensively mistaught for twelve years.

I don't mind if older children learn about how different people in the world think, and the connections of that thinking to history and literature.. To put tots into bible school fries my gizzard.

If I had a gizzard.

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@Thomas,

I second that too (does that make it a third?).

The Bible as literature is a great cultural education, but that's not what most of the VBSs are pushing. The UCC church does a good job with bible stories in a non-damaging way but they're probably the most liberal of all of the Christian denominations.

The Bible as literature makes a great high school or college class for cultural enrichment. Anything younger should just be about having fun in the summer with an occasional story thrown in as just that... a story.

1 Reply

Vacation Bible School has gone off the deep end.

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