Burns Supper tonight. I’m piping a little bit, although I don’t really want to anymore. I don’t want to do anything, I’m just so fucking exhausted all the time. Feeling okay this morning but it was a Hell of a week.
But it should be a good night, and we’re sleeping over on Suomenlinna island like we did last year, so that’s cool.
Wump has expressed dissatisfaction with one of her teachers at school – her religion teacher. She likes the stories they learn about in class, but she doesn’t like the way he talks about other religions and general non-Orthodox teachings as “being wrong”. She doesn’t like being told that her friends are learning “the wrong religion”.
I feel uniquely unsuited to offering any sort of advice to her about any of this. We didn’t have any alternate religions taught in school when I went to school, and the religion we were taught was so pointlessly wishy-washy that it really was a waste of time. But for my part, I had to agree with her that the stories carried by organised religion really are cool. They’re some of the oldest stories we have, and they tell us a lot about the sorts of creatures we are.
But anyone in that context tries to tell you what’s right and wrong, or what’s true and what’s not, you want to take out the bag of salt and start shovelling. Because yes, it’s sort of part of the job description of a religious authority to peddle their version as right and the other versions as wrong … but that doesn’t mean you need to pay any attention to it. Especially if it makes you unhappy.
I know a lot of theists, atheists and antitheists who would want to weigh in on this, but at the moment my blog is a relative ghost town so maybe this doesn’t need to blow up.
Hatboy's Hatstand 
So educate me. Finland has an official religion, not the ostensible “freedom of religion” we theoretically have in the US and that is bolstered by our lack of an official, legally declared religion?
If that’s the case it kind of puts a damper on what can be done, I’d say. But if legally the religion teacher is not supposed to be doing that, you have some recourse should you desire to take it.
Furthermore, the obvious replies that they’re all unproven, since there isn’t evidence (Thank You, God), therefore speaking of one as wrong and another is right is meaningless…. That 95% (or whatever high number it is) of religious persons belong to the religion they were BORN into (they didn’t CHOOSE it)….that with about 4,000 religions and — how many people — belonging to this particular one you’re discussing means that most of the world is wrong and totally screwed….
I mean this sort of BS is one reason religion turned me off.
You don’t see chemistry teachers saying physics is wrong, you know? I fucking love science!
There’s no state religion, but schools have religion as part of the syllabus. During religion class, all the Lutherans go to one class, the Muslims to another, the (currently just a couple of) Orthodox go to theirs. Presumably the atheists get to go and murder a hobo or something. Or they go to the Lutheran class, since they’re the majority religion.
I think it’s fine, if it gets too upsetting I can make a complaint but I think Wump gets plenty of agnosticism from me. It’s not like Mrs. Hatboy is a bible thumper, I leave it in her hands how much Christian Orthodoxy our kids get. Tempered with sanity and intellect, religion is benign.
*glances sidelong at the USA*
Oh, this class is not the religious majority? That changes my entire view. Yeah, seems harmless enough to me, and Wump is thinking about it all very maturely and intelligently, as to be expected. I support underdogs, so I say carry on smartly.
Or not so smartly since it’s religion XD I keed I keed.
Hee, yeah, our lil Wump is Orthodox. They … do things a little differently these past 1700 years or so.
“Wump has expressed dissatisfaction with one of her teachers at school – her religion teacher. She likes the stories they learn about in class, but she doesn’t like the way he talks about other religions and general non-Orthodox teachings as “being wrong”. She doesn’t like being told that her friends are learning “the wrong religion”.”
Every single day she impresses me more and more.
She’s sensitive, and has a very keen sense of the importance of the truth. She also gets upset when her friends use hyperbole to seem cooler than they are.
I think with the right set of grown-ups to help her navigate, she’ll do fine. Or in their absence, we’ll bard up, roll for initiative and do our gorram best. Toss a coin to your Witcher, my friend, it’s on.
Yeah, +1 to all of this except the joke about you being bad parents. I mean, this was her religion, and the teacher thereof, and she didn’t take to the bad-mouthing of others, even though she’s in the minority.
I know a lot of adults who aren’t that empathetic or intellectually honest. I mean…in this country alone there are about 100 million based on polling of Trump support….
I’ve got my “occasionally helpful semi-uncle” dice set all ready and waiting.
I’m adding in a magnanimous portion of non-Trump supporters in that 100 million, to be fair.