If children were forbidden to be exposed to ANY religion until they were 16, would people still believe in god

Question

Assuming the very first time a person could be exposed to the concept that an invisible, all knowing, all powerful super being made the universe and everything in it wasn't until they were essentially a reasoning adult with their own ideas and opinions, do you think people would be as willing to just buy into faith based thinking?

Assuming they were only taught whatever available science we now have, do you really think the average intelligent adult would suddenly abandon it all, and embrace supernatural explanations?

For arguments sake, we'll say that they are ABSOLUTELY 100% shielded from religious concepts, even though we know this would be a practical impossibility.

Answer 1

If children were forbidden to be exposed to ANY atheism until they were 16, would they still believe there was no God?

Did you notice your question contradicts what atheists like you claim, which is that people don't start out believing in God? Also did you notice by my analogy reveals your grammar is horrible? So that is how well atheists can communicate huh? Once again leaving it for the Christian to translate your poor grammar your poor communication, yet you insult us day in and day out as if you are geniuses compared to us lol.

To give you an answer backed up by evidence, everyone is born with the knowledge that God exists, it is programmed into us to know he exists. It also becomes evident to us once we see the designed universe around us and that intelligent creatures like humans are often designing complex and beautiful things. So a person, as you may or may not have indented to say, believes in God when they are born, on top of that they have the built in ability to recognize beyond the faith programmed into them, the outer evidence that God exists. There is also another kind of evidence, our conscience, which is obviously not a product of evolution since you don't evolve morals, and whoever claims that is absurd since micro evolution has no built in method for programming laws into anyone like "Do not lie" let alone a conscience, let alone guilt, which is a spiritual thing, not some organ or chemicals.

So even without a person to teach us, we have the awareness of a being far greater than us and can and surely have believed the evidence around us at times even without others saying, "Hey, did you notice trees and humans have a complex and beautifully designed structure?"

Answer 2

Define "god". Yaweh? Allah? Buddha? Zeus? Inari? Grandmother Spider? Anansi? There is more than one "god" in the cosmos and not all "gods" are the same. I am assuming you are speaking of Yaweh, the Christian/Jewish God who fathered Jesus Christ, because no other religion ever presents their gods as all known, all seeing, and painfully perfect, though they will claim such things in their prayers and hymns so as not to summon the wrath of those on high.

IF that is the god you are talking about, the faultless, the all knowning, the all powerful, then no. No child will ever learn of THAT god. HOWEVER, only Christianity presents their divine master as perfect and all-powerful. No other culture has done this, no other religion believes that, because if the gods were perfect they would never have created US! Infact, the Greeks said the gods were "the best and worst" of mankind. Their love is more pure, their hate is more bitter, their tricks more cunning, their dreams more grand. The only difference between us and them is we can die.

Throw an infant into the middle of the wilderness, keep him/her isolate from all other humans, that child will come out and tell you of the gods of the forest. The spirits that makes the flowers bloom and the entities that bring the rain. There have been case studies of children abandoned in the wilderness at very young ages being found and taught to speak. Though their language never gets beyond that of a five or six year old even when they are in their twenties, they have spoken of the spirts and forces work within the world.

I am not saying Yaweh does not exist, I am not saying there is not SOME validity in the believe system. I am merely pointing out that there are more venues than just Christianity to be explored. Everyone acts treats the subjects of the Divine as a all or nothing sort of arguement. All the answers are either in the Bible or in not believing in anything at all. It is like saying "If I can not eat salad for dinner I will never eat again". Why starve yourself when there is milk, eggs, meat, bread, fruit and chesse in your fridge? Why turn you back on ALL possiblities because the most commonly accepted and practiced one seems to be built on poorly thought out logic circles?

~~ Abe

Answer 3

I think you've worded this to be a bit biased. I do think people would still embrace religion. A reasoning mind can still accept the possibility of a god-figure. The idea that 'god did it' is just a plausable an answer as 'it just randomly happened' for things like the begining of the universe.

That having been said, I think fewer people would be religious because humans are generally followers. They are religious because that's what they were taught. So instead of having a society based off christian (in the western world) dogma, you would have a society based of athiest dogma.

Answer 4

Several people who were never exposed to religion until they entered adulthood are born again Christians, and to be honest, they are usually more enthusiastic about it than those who were brought up by it in their youth. So my guess would be no. What some don't understand is that religion isn't just about the man in the sky, it is mainly based upon a way of life, and moral standards. I don't believe in the man in the sky, but I do believe if we all lived by the golden rule,( do unto others as you would have them do unto you), the world would be a much better place. What does any of that have to do with science? Any psychologist that told you the golden rule is mumbo jumbo would be a liar! With everything comes good and bad points, it all depends on what you choose to see. ;-)

Answer 5

Probably not.. but think about it this way. What if children weren't exposed to any "beliefs" or science, what would they come up with then? If you raised a child without any knowledge of anything like sciences etc, in a primitive environment it is a likely possibility that they would invent or imagine their own explanations, supernatural or not. I think any human no matter what way they are raised or taught will either search for explanations, or failing any resources to do so will make up their own explanations. What happens with religion is simple.. it's just people sharing their explanations for that which they have not found real answers for.. some people are satisfied with that because it is human nature to deny ignorance, the hardest thing for a human to do is admit they don't know, and then go searching for that knowledge.. but there are some among us who are not content, these are the ones who admit their own ignorance embrace the unknown and continue the real search for knowledge.. All we have to do is teach our children to abhor self-induced ignorance by instilling them with insatiable curiosity.. Curiosity is religion's arch nemesis.. not science or anything else.. just curiosity. Teach a child all his/her life to believe in god if you want but if they are curious then inevitably religion will never satisfy them, their curiosity will lead them to the truth. If you ask me we don't have to remove the influence of religion on children, we need to equip them with the weapon to free themselves.... Curiosity..

Answer 6

Not so much. Because, as we grow, our brains grow and change. We develop neural pathways for whatever we learn. That is why it is so hard for an adult to learn to read, because they did not create the neural pathways early enough, and it is a much slower process as an adult. That is also why brainwashers like to target children, because the effect is more permanent. Once a child has been taught that "Magic" is the answer to everything, then every logical answer becomes a "False Prophecy"! They do not have the proper nerve endings required to learn anything beyond their beliefs. This is why I consider religious teaching to children to be "Mental molestation". However, adults who still fear death would still have to look to magic for an answer. And death is the main motivator for religious belief. They are not blissful because they are going to magical heaven, they are just happy to have escaped hell.

Answer 7

In another era, lacking in scientific explanations for such previously terrifying things such as eclipses, probably deities would still have been invented. In this day and age, I am not so sure. The ultimate "question" of what happens after death might still be unresolved, but without a dogma of a god as existing to explain it from birth, I think it would be likely chalked up as an unsolvable mystery.

But then, who knows? People would still be afraid of this as unsolvable, and would probably still struggle and strain against its inevitability in their own lives, and that fear and anxiety could conceivably lead to some modern day bone head trying to invent a theological way out.

people are like that when they get very nervous.

Great question, as always,
Ciao,
Lady Morgana )0(

Answer 8

i was raised as an atheist/agnostic and secretly held ...spiritual, if not religious...beliefs...i only came out of the closet in my late 20's!!!

i have alot of time for science, bearing in mind i have studied the philosophy of science and Kuhn made some good points about paradigms and paradigm shift i tend to bear in mind when listening to 'scientists' claiming any sort of absolute proof(it's a map - it ain't the territory would kinda sum up my attitude)

i have less respect for religions as they are in the world - seems like men organise and become political and corrupt and i don't need that in my life TY...but the same can be said of alot of scientific institutioins, particularly, to my mind, in education and the broader academic circles.

i'm glad i wasn't exposed to religion though - it seems to seriously mislead people and i only trust my heart and intuition in deciding what is true spiritually.

=)

Answer 9

Yes. And anyone who became a Christian at that point would never be able to use the "well my parents were Christians, so I'm a Christian" excuse.

Lots of people become religious after the age of sixteen, even if they were never raised with any religion.

After all, I was twenty-five when I became a Christian, and I know several Christians who were atheists until they were in their late twenties/early thirties.

Answer 10

Yes.

Remember Atheistic sociologists and anthropologists believe that early humans came up with the notion of god without any previous exposure.

Catholics believe the desire for God is written in the human heart, because each person is created by God and for God; and God never ceases to draw each person to himself.

Most religion is man's attempt to reach out to God to fulfill this desire.

Judaism and Christianity is God reaching out to man to fulfill this desire.

For more information, see the Catechism of the Catholic Church, section 27: http://www.usccb.org/catechism/text/pt1sect1.htm#chpt1

With love in Christ.