Poneke has been blogging about independent minded daughters. We have some of those in this house too.
I struggled out of sleep this morning to the dulcet tones of the strangelings arguing about the existence of god. Following their parents’ lead, Miss Ten and the elder Miss Seven say that there is no god, but the younger Miss Seven is determined to believe. I don’t think that she really knows what she is talking about, and I suspect that her belief is motivated by a penchant for perversity and a real desire to assert her independence from her strong willed twin and intellectual older sister, not to mention her parents. So she was insisting, loudly, to her sisters, that she was entitled to believe in god, and she was tenacious in defending her point. Eventually, the argument got very tense, and Mr Strange Land stepped in to stop the other two girls from monstering her.
But later on, I found this note attached to the mirror in the bathroom.
“You have a right to bely in god she is a gril”
Her feistiness and independence fill my heart with joy. As for the god-belief – well, she’s seven, and I’m not about to browbeat her into my belief structures, or lack of them. She will sort her own ideas out in her own good time.
17 responses so far ↓
Carol // Wednesday 19 November 2008 at 10:17 am |
Bless her!
I’m with you on the atheism front, Deborah, but I also value independent thought. Richard Dawkins makes quite a point of stating that children should not be brought up ‘religious’ so I guess it should work in a role-reversal sense too.
My nine-year old boy announced to his somewhat startled teacher that he didn’t believe in God, he believed in Helen Clark and the Department of Conservation .. I’m not sure if this is a sign that he is a clone, or that he has developed his own independent belief system!
artandmylife // Wednesday 19 November 2008 at 10:19 am |
That is simply priceless. I hope my girls will be like this. At the beginning of the year my 5 year old was upset because at school they had said fairies were real. She asked “do I have to believe in fairies?” I replied that of course not – but its ok for other people to.
Carol // Wednesday 19 November 2008 at 10:23 am |
It’s interesting with the Tooth Fairy that children are quite capable of both believing and not believing at the same time, if you see what I mean. They play along while making it clear that they see right through it. Quite crafty, I think.
Deborah // Wednesday 19 November 2008 at 10:31 am |
And Santa Claus, in our house.
Giovanni // Wednesday 19 November 2008 at 10:32 am |
My eldest son (seven) has just declared to us that he’s stopped believing in God (knowing that we don’t, I suspect). Until not long ago he used to say that he believed in Jesus and Poseidon. Jesus took care of everything but the watery stuff, one assumed. Still, I agree with Carol, children are crafty so Santa is still real (as of last night’s dinner conversation at least).
How did that Woody Allen joke go? I’m an atheist, my wife’s agnostic, we can’t decide which religion not to bring up our children into. Something like that.
Craig Ranapia // Wednesday 19 November 2008 at 11:03 am |
If I had children, I’d be encouraging them to assert their spirituality through meditative contemplation. Preferably sans chanting, music or, beating gongs or re-enacting the more rowdy (but torture-and-torching-lite) parts of the Reformation with their siblings.
stef // Wednesday 19 November 2008 at 11:59 am |
Brilliant! My act of encouraging rebellion in the Child has extended to using the idiom ‘it’s raining cats and dogs’ and singing into a hairbrush.
apu // Wednesday 19 November 2008 at 1:00 pm |
oh, this is priceless. wonder why she came to the conclusion that god is a girl?
Deborah // Wednesday 19 November 2008 at 9:43 pm |
She seems to have two reasons. The first is a complicated one to do with substances: if Jesus is a spirit, then Joseph and Mary, his parents, must have been spirits too, but they were human. She resolves this incompatibility by suggesting that there must have been one spirit parent, and that was Mary, so clearly, god is female.
The other reason is much more straightforward. It’s just not fair if god is male.
Even so, why a “girl” rather than a “woman”? I must ask her… but not right now – it’s 11.45pm here, and she’s asleep.
Carol // Thursday 20 November 2008 at 4:51 am |
It makes sense to me that she’d want god to be a girl .. if you’re going to have a god, you wnat them to represent your interests.
I like her lower-case approach.
Make Tea Not War // Thursday 20 November 2008 at 4:58 am |
I think that’s adorable. You must be proud of your little feminist free thinker.
I’m sort of following the approach Craig suggests to religious education with my daughter by encouraging meditative contemplativeness such as by suggesting she quietly focus on breathing when she can’t go to sleep and also encouraging her to see beauty in the world. Though I’m a free thinking atheist I do feel a spiritual dimension to life at times in the sense of exaltation and peaceful connection to the Universe through art, music and nature.
Carol // Thursday 20 November 2008 at 6:24 am |
Once when my boy couldn’t go to sleep I tried the meditative contemplative approach and suggested that he think happy thoughts .. when I went back later to check on him, he said that he was thinking of ‘introduced pests being killed’! Not quite what I had in mind, but consistent with his belief system (see above).
I blame those Forest and Bird magazines.
Paul Williams // Thursday 20 November 2008 at 8:56 am |
I echo the comments above, your kids sound like fantastically bright and independent young women. I’m the father of two daughters who’re increasingly shaping a world view of their own – I only hope I can provide them the space to explore widely (my own experience suggests an early dose of Catholicism inures you against the more crazy evangelical Christians who hang around teenage haunts looking to recruit those with the worst hangovers and recently broken hearts… opps, perhaps that’s just my experience)
Daleaway // Thursday 20 November 2008 at 8:56 am |
I can recall having a similar argument about fairies, amongst a group of loud seven year olds, of whom I was the youngest. I was also the only one arguing as a fairy agnostic – the rest were all fairy atheists.
My tenet was that fairies could be so small that you couldn’t see them, so you couldn’t definitely say they did not exist. Like germs.
The argument waxed so furious that we took it to our class teacher to settle. Being of a scientific bent, or possibly because he was Irish, he sided with me with a smile – a belated thank you to you, Mr Sullivan.
Nowadays, of course, it is compulsory for youngsters to believe in fairies (angels too), as those clever marketeers have found ways to merchandise them.
merc // Thursday 20 November 2008 at 9:02 am |
Hehe compulsory fairies, brilliant.
moz // Saturday 22 November 2008 at 11:42 am |
I know way too many kids who take Pascal’s approach: better to believe because that way you get whatever goodies come out of it. Fairies, gods, the old lady who chases trolls away, whatever you want they’re into it. Especially if there’s lollies.
It’s nice to hear about actual thinking…
moz // Saturday 22 November 2008 at 11:47 am |
On a tangent, I want the water tank fairy to visit.
It’s raining and our pathetic collection of drums from the second hand drum man are all full, as are all the buckets and one wheely bin (the rubbish one, not the recycling one). I am eyeing up a 2000 litre tank (we have ~1kl of drums) but there’s definitely a need for a fairy, coz all the commercial places are saying at least two weeks for delivery. Waaaah!