How Conservative Christianity Can Warp the Mind

"Many Christian parents seek to insulate their children from “worldly” influences. In the extreme, this can mean not only home schooling, but cutting off media, not allowing non-Christian friends, avoiding secular activities like plays or clubs, and spending time at church instead. Children miss out on crucial information– science, culture, history, reproductive health and more. When they grow older and leave such a sheltered environment, adjusting to the secular world can be like immigrating to a new culture. One of the biggest areas of challenge is delayed social development."

After reading this, and also knowing some kids who grew up in a strict fundamentalist Christian home, I'm so grateful that my dad, raised in a devout Bible Belt family and small town decided to raise his children without any religious indocrination, leaving us free to explore and choose or not choose our own beliefs.

I'm all for freedom of religion, but I wonder, when parents essentially brainwash their children by restricting them too much, whether that isn't a violation of the children's right.

I'm convinced there are more than 7 billion belief systems (some non-belief systems) in the world, one for each inhabitant, and that's as it should be. I'm sure we all wind up in the same place anyway - if we wind up anywhere at all.

To each his own. Sigh.