real life wrote:ehBeth wrote:
A good instructor will NOT bring god/God into a discussion of history or ethics, or in fact any class. It is a lazy instructor who is not able to manage that.
Try teaching European history or American history, (just two examples) while making no reference to God and the effect belief in God has had on these countries (whether you think it has been for good or ill, it matters not). Do that and there's one word for you. Incompetent.
To pretend that subjects like this can be faithfully and adequately taught without making reference to God is absurd. You don't have to be a believer in God to realize that belief in God has had MAJOR impact on these countries(and nearly every other country in the world, and every civilization). [emphasis added]
In fact, the passage bold-faced above is the absurdity. The story of the "Pilgrim Fathers" has been taught for more than a century in the United States as though it were history, and that without mentioning god or their doctrinal canon, the handful of Puritans who represent the
Mayflower settlers have been presented as arriving in the the "new world" to escape persecution.
Nothing could be further from historical truth. The "Pilgrims" were a band of Puritans who first left England for Holland and then Holland for the Massachusetts Bay, not because they were persecuted, but because they were holier than thou to an extreme. Their desire was to get away from any other religious group so that they could exercise their religious beliefs in isolation, away from any sources of "pollution." The much vaunted "Mayflower Compact" was not a binding document on anyone, it is grossly overrated for its historical significance, and it was an attempt by the Puritans aboard
Mayflower to impose their religious bigotry on the captain and crew and other passengers who did not necessarily adhere to their credo.
Of far more significance for the future of government was John Winthrop's decision to extend the franchise to any adult male member of any recognized congregaton. Once again, when Winthrop and many, many more followers than those who sailed in
Mayflower arrived, soon to found the city of Boston, they were not only not fleeing persecution (although they asserted that they were going to be persecuted by Bishop Laud), they were intent upon founding a "godly republic" in the wilderness and "a shining city on the hill." Having established their "shining city," they got busy expelling those who did not hew the doctrinal line, Misstress Hutchinson and Roger Williams being the two most notable examples.
It is entirely possible to teach accurate history--although that is not often likely to get done at either the primary or secondary level--without teaching about god. Children are not stupid, and don't need to be told that religions exist or that a belief in god is common. I find this hilarious in fact, because to accurately explainly why King Charles
made it illegal to leave England (quite different than feeling persecution) you'd have to teach the children more than is reasonalbe about finance, credit systems, the shortage of specie and the flight of capital in the form of specie by Puritans who were not fleeing persecution, but seeking the opportunity to set up communities in which they could lord it over others. You'd have to teach them what antinomianism and arminianism are to explain why Hutchinson and Williams were expelled from the Massachusetts Bay Company settlements.
But because children are not stupid by nature, it is sufficient to give them an accurate picture to explain that people held different religious views, and that their objections to other people's beliefs were strong enough to make them leave their homeland seeking to get away from those who believed differently. You can easily explain that people like Williams were expelled, and so founded a colony which practiced complete religious tolerance without referring the character and details of doctrinal disputes. It would in fact, help the child's understanding to know what great, intolerant hypocrits the Puritans were, and how important the mere existance of Rhode Island was, as an island of toleration in a sea of religious persecution.
In none of that is it necessary to assert that god actually exists, and in none of that is it necessary to discuss any details of dogma.
The basics of the beatitudes are to love and to forgive. I think there is a lot of truth in love and forgiveness, don't you? :wink: 
