So this little Christian girl said to her Atheist dad, while her Christian mum was out of the house :
"What's the point doing Maths homework; Jesus could come back tomorrow"
Atheist Dad's brain turned to mince. It churned slowly through the following possible answers :-
(1) "Don't be daft - there's no such thing as Jesus - and even if there were, he's never coming back"
-- Not nice to belittle anyone's faith; not least the faith of his little princess. Also it's not a provable statement - just a belief of Atheist Dad's.
(2) Use the Bible back at her
-- His knowledge of scripture isn't up to scratch - and little Christian girl knows it pretty well. And anyway he doesn't believe that book can be used to prove anything.
(3) Victorian father : "Because I am your Father, and you will obey my commands ! For I am wise in the way of the world, and you are but an infant."
-- Puh-leez !
(4) Sit there with mouth hanging open and mind doing loop-the-loops
He opted for option 4.
When Christian mum came back, she compiled half a dozen decent quotations where the Bible is down on laziness, lack of pride in your work etc.
It figures : the stereotype of Jewish children being pushed so hard to study must have had some basis in the Old Testament. Most people I know who are serious about their religion also take immense pride in their non-religious work.
Christian Girl was obviously just trying to wind up her dad, which is natural and BOY did she ever succeed.
Any advice gratefully received !
4 comments:
I have the advantage of a wife (last time I looked she was still my wife) who is as atheist as I am, henceforth our sprogs have never been subject to any form of religion. None of them have even been christened.
My step-daughter had a dalliance with religion but her rather awkward questions were met with very unhelpful responses from Da Missus and I to the effect of "you have to make your own mind up as to what you believe -- we cannot tell you". Thankfully the phase passed within a couple of months, and then we were back to Pokemon and IM'ing.
Come to think of it, I'm not sure which phase I hated most.
Possible response -
"People have been saying that sort of thing for nearly two thousand years, they've all, everyone of them, got it wrong and ended up looking very silly when Jesus hasn't shown up in time for their maths exam, rescue from certain death, prediction of the apocalypse by next week, etc. The chances that you are going to be the first person to be correct in this respect are very small. The odds are much greater that you are going to fail your maths exam and look like a complete twit. Indeed, if you did your maths homework you might understand something about that. Here, let me show you the prices at William Hill on the second coming...
:-)
PS. The Religious Tolerance site is very handy for this sort of thing, as it summarises what different strands of Christianity think about these things. Probably the majority of mainstream Christians believe that Jesus is going to come back sometime, but the idea that he's going to turn up so imminently that nobody need do any work is lunatic fringe. Nobody except perhaps a few rapture-ready loons in the USA actually believes that. If your offspring claims to believe it, then she's having you on. You are perfectly within your rights to have a good laugh at this sort of thing and tell her that in that case you don't need to give her any pocket money as if Jesus is turning up any moment she wont be needing it!
Thanks Flit & Kenny.
Turns out it was definitely a piece of logic-judo on the part of Christian Girl. She wouldn't have pulled that stuff with Christian Mum, who was pretty irate that Religion was being used as a labour-avoidance device.
Definitely a gap in the market for a book for Atheists on living with Christians. In fact, probably a gap in the market for Atheists on living.
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