...does what it says on the tin. Adoption agencies : comments.
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![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
(no subject)
Having thought about it a bit since the irc conversation...
In an ideal world churches would be allowed to make whatever bizarre rules they wanted, and the state would not be expected to interfere in people's private beliefs. People who disliked their church's rules would have to attempt to reform it from within without help from the state, or change church, or whatever.
However, when (for instance) people bring their children up in their own religion, it's not clear that everyone is ending up in a given church through an entirely free choice, so perhaps state interference is warranted after all?
Doctors definitely shouldn't be allowed to let religious beliefs get in the way of the welfare of their patient.
(no subject)
OOI, are you assuming that human beings are atheists by default, and/or that children are not capable of choosing to follow (or not to follow) a religion?
I very much doubt that all the adults in a church -- or indeed in any other organisation -- can say that they are making "an entirely free choice" without being influenced by others.
(no subject)
I don't think I'm assuming that people are atheists by default; i.e. I don't think it's guaranteed that if not pushed in the direction of some religion or other by a parent or whoever then people would always turn out atheist.
I do think children are capable of making a choice - the question is really the extent to which they're given a chance of making a choice in the first place; no so much about direct pressure to choose one way or another but simply knowing that there's a choice to be made. "We believe there is/is not a god, other people believe otherwise" from parents as opposed to "There is/is not a god". I got the former and made my own mind up; I don't think anyone would dispute that quite a lot of people get the latter however.
Obviously there comes an age at which one stops uncritically believing whatever one's parents say about the world, but it's a bit unlikely that the question of religion won't come up at all before then. And there can remain parental (or otherwise) pressure to conform into adulthood.
(And there can be less subtle pressures, "I don't care if you think you're an atheist, while you live under my roof you're going to church on Sundays"; but those don't seem likely to influence people's actual beliefs; they might indeed end up lying for the sake of the quiet life. And once they're trying to adopt a kid with their civil partner the game is pretty much up anyway.)
(no subject)