The preparation for the civil confirmation includes a course provided by a humanist organization. The course emphasizes ethics and critical thinking. Very good. Critical thinking is what all kids should learn. Don't accept old dogmatic truths.
I think the term coming-of -age ceremony is better than civil confirmation. Unlike the Christian confirmation, there is nothing being conformed. It's rather a kind of cancellation, rejecting all the religious nonsense associated with baptism.
(Picture taken last summer, on a farm with the ruins of an old monastery from the 13th century. The farm has a micro-brewery which makes very good beer. On the wall inside the farm house I read this quote by Martin Luther: "It's better to think of church in the ale-house (bierstube) than to think of the ale-house in church.")
I understand your repulsive attitude towards religion. I just wonder why you follow so obediently a similar bullshit created in your own mind. Sorry for being this honest. But you've just killed something so extraordinary that it's difficult to comprehend the logic and the lack of your otherwise always present scientific spirit.
ReplyDeleteMy mind works in mysterious ways >;)
DeleteI've never heard of a civil confirmation, but I have heard of humanist churches or Unitarians. Critical thinking is one of the goals of the common core curriculum in the US. In mathematics, they are striving to examine less concepts, but go deeper into a few concepts. They are presenting things at a far earlier age than when I learned them, which is good, but some of the longer methods the kids must follow drive me nuts.
ReplyDeleteCivil confirmation has become very popular over here. We have become a very secular country, with atheism soon being the largest "religion", written in quotes since atheism is not religion but rather the absence of it >:)
DeleteI'm not into the whole 'confirmation' thing at all; it's mere ritual and often has no real meaning for the participants. But your comment about Christians 'conforming' is simply wrong. Christianity isn't about 'conformation,' it's about 'transformation.'
ReplyDeleteThey tried to teach me to become Christian in elementary school. It wasn't very successful. I rather transformed in the other direction >:)
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