Who would you rather have teach your children?

Question

A christian fundamentalist?
An agnostic?
A pagan?
Or an atheist?

and why?

Answer 1

Any but the fundamentalist. In my (possibly limited) experience, fundamentalists cannot keep their religion out of the lives of others. I would like to keep religion out of school, aside from a comprehensive religion class (or any additional inquiry my child would like to make).

Answer 2

Which Christian fundamentalist? Which atheist? I can't see myself going for either Pat Robertson or Joseph Stalin, so it's really not helpful to reduce these arguments down to labels like this. I think the key to who you have teaching your children lies in whether or not their views are apparent in what they say. I daresay, for instance, that some of the parents of students I teach (yes, I'm a teacher) would prefer they were not taught by an atheist like me. But I go to some trouble to ensure that they never have the least idea of my religious affiliations, and from my knowledge of scripture probably think I'm on the theistic side of things more than the atheistic.

What did you hope to achieve with this question, or are you trying to weed out the bigots?

Answer 3

Teach them what? At school we had a pagan drama teacher and he was fantastic. His beliefs never came into the school so i don't see it to be an issue. If you mean teach them religion i would rather an agnostic teach them. This is because they don't specifically ally themselves to one religion but they are open minded about a possible existance. I'm an atheist by the way but i think an atheist teaching religion is a bit laughable as they wouldn't be able to teach it seriously.

Answer 4

I am an atheist, my wife is a Christian. We believe that children should be brought up to be good people. Not by any religious standards but by our standards, until they are old enough to make those decisions for themselves. Its called free will. My wife(and many on here) say God gave it to us. So, why should we force our views in impressionable minds, like children? If free will is so special then why shouldn't the children believe what they want to believe, without pressure from parents, pastors, or anyone else who spouts religious or non religious beliefs?

Answer 5

The Christian. They'd get the most holidays.

Do agnostics take holidays? Are you sure?
Pagans only get--what? Halloween?
Atheists--April 1.

What kind of school year would that be?

Answer 6

Definitely a pagan. Reasons:

1. I'm a pagan.
2. Wars were NEVER fought in the name of "paganism".
3. Paganism is earth-based and tends to respect the environment, as well as the people and animals living within it.
4. Pagans are generally very tolerant of another's chosen path, so they would most likely respect my kid's decision to follow whatever path he chose.

Answer 7

Well if I had children they would go to a public school and I do not care what belief system the teacher comes from so long as they do not proselytize in the classroom.

Answer 8

Atheist, agnostic or pagan

Answer 9

I don't have kids, but if I did I would prefer that their teacher not disclose his or her religion. I'm not against free speech, but there is no need to talk about religion in a public school classroom.
If I had children at a religious school, that would be different. I would expect them to discuss religion there.

Answer 10

I'd be unlikely to trust them with a fundie, as the ones I've known can't distinguish between their imaginary friend and the real world. Any of the others would be fine, though.