I just got back from a school committee meeting for the religious school of our local synagogue. I joined because our five-year-old daughter K has started her religious schooling this year and our four-year-old son M will start next year. I didn’t have to join, but I know my hanging around a place makes my kids more interested in going there. Although I’m glad I attended the meeting, I’m now wondering what religious education outside the home should be, and I’d like your opinions.
Peter and I want to raise our kids in a Jewish home, being Jewish ourselves. We feel able to impart certain knowledge but unable to impart the rest, as I’m sure most parents feel who participate in organized religion. Therefore, when we attendees of the meeting were asked to brainstorm goals for the religious school, I found myself wondering about what we should depend on the school for versus what we should do at home.
In our house, we talk to and about God. We talk to God at bedtime with the simplest of prayers, including “thank-yous” for five aspects of the day. (We have to limit them to five because M can be so, um, grateful that he significantly delays bedtime.) We’re trying to teach K and M what we were taught about how everyone has the right to a relationship with God. It’s easy to model but hard to explain. Should religious school attempt this teaching too? If yes, how?
What about ethical living? Our family discusses and tries to do good deeds. We’re impressed that K and M, who lived in an orphanage until 21 months ago, will set aside belongings to give to less fortunate people and will work alongside us when we volunteer. We love how concerned they are with the welfare of others even in the abstract (excepting, of course, each other). And we wince with admiration when they get on our case for neglecting to recycle something. Should religious school teach about ethics? If yes, what if the teaching isn’t reinforced at home, or isn’t reinforced in the same way?
How about teaching religious traditions? At home, we keep kosher and attempt to observe some sort of Sabbath, but there are plenty of home observances we don’t wish to do, or stopped doing, or don’t know how to do with kids this young. And our holiday observances at home are, in my view, depressingly half-assed. Can religious school teach home observance? If yes, what good does it do to teach the children when they might go home to adults as clueless as we are, or worse?
How about teaching appreciation of diversity, both within and between religions? Teaching the sequence and meaning of prayers said in the synagogue? Teaching Hebrew, which Peter and I don’t speak? Teaching about Israel, where we have never been and for which our support is ambivalent at best? As with any good synagogue-based meeting of the minds, I came away with more questions than answers.
What about you? Are your children in religious school? Did you attend? What do you feel the goals of home-based and non-home-based religious education ought to be?
Photo graciously provided by david55king, through a Creative Commons license, some rights reserved.
2 responses so far ↓
Tere // Oct 15, 2008 at 8:18 am
This is very thought-provoking; great post.
I attend a Catholic high school, and my private elementary/junior high school, while not religious, taught Catholicism. Our education was limited to the history of the religion - studying the Bible, learning and memorizing the Ten Commandments, the Beatitudes, the prayers, etc. Basically, Cathechism.
In high school, it was deeper. Each year covered a different aspect of the religion: Old Testament one year, New the next, social justice and personal relationships the other.
In both cases, I felt that it was enough to give anyone the necessary knowledge of the religion, and how it all connects to the way we live our lives. My schools also focused on the “spirit of the law” vs. the “letter of the law,” which matched the philosophy at home.
Honestly, though, it was at home that the real example of how to live my faith was set. School just supported it.
STL Mom // Oct 15, 2008 at 5:26 pm
I didn’t attend church at all between high school (when my parents made me go) and when my daughter became old enough for Sunday School. Despite having my own ambivalence about church and religion, I always wanted my kids to have a religious education. I also wanted them to receive it at a church that supported my own beliefs and values, as much as possible. I feel lucky that we found a church home where both they and I felt comfortable.
I’ve had friends whose kids attended schools more orthodox than their homes. For example, they packed kosher meals for school even thought they didn’t keep kosher at home. Apparently their kids could handle the difference between home and religious school, although there were a lot of conversations about why they made certain decisions.
My religious beliefs and activities are somewhat different now than what my parents and church taught me in my childhood, but I think my basic ethics and values are fairly similar. I think it’s worthwhile to educated your kids in religion, while recognizing that they may end up with a different approach in the long run.
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