Understanding Childhood Indoctrination:
It is a fact that we are all born non-believers, the change only occurs when we are indoctrinated into the ‘one true religion’….
This is done using stories and the power of suggestion , often by parents or trusted adults with some authority over a child.
Repetition of church attendance along with (in most cases) extra lessons on scripture are all part of the indoctrination process designed to create a cultural normality and acceptance of religion for a child.
These things are very powerful tools for which all religions know and have used with much success throughout history.
Everyone can point out children who live in other parts of the world /societies or even families close by that are raised to believe things that differ from our own beliefs that seem absurd, irrational or even foolish .
From this perspective, we can absolutely view the indoctrination process as a negative, but cognitive dissonance helps us to ignore our own absurd beliefs.
When I was a young Christian, I could never understand why people believed in Islam, Hinduism or even Mormonism, since, as a Christian, I knew that I believed in the only true religion. Later I came to rationalise the appearance of so many contradictory religions as just part of a ‘fallen’ world, a world where I happened to be one of the lucky ones!
For those successfully indoctrinated into religion at childhood – as they grow up, the god character has already become presupposed in their minds, a mental reality to them, beyond doubt or the need for questioning. Their world only makes sense under this belief.
Yet as we know, the whole point of religious indoctrination is to teach people to replace critical thinking with faith, led by emotion and credulity. (usually well before the age of reason) .
For this reason, religious belief isn’t something faithful believers ever feel the need to provide good evidence for (in their minds they already have it.) – instead it is something they now strongly defend, …..sadly drawing from the same irrational ideas and bad arguments they themselves have become convinced by.
Is it any wonder then that real critical thinking and science ,(the things that bring us a true picture of reality) are either shunned by some believers (ie fundamentalists) …or hijacked by others who find ways to twist scientific facts into a shape that fits around their presuppositions.
God belief is essentially unfalsifiable to theists , it must always be this way for them (as explained above)…and their conversations around this subject will always reflect it.
Undoing your childhood indoctrination:
If you can, for one moment ,do the following things:
-Allow yourself to doubt the people who had authority over you as a child ,(who told you there is a god).
– Entertain the idea that the religion you now subscribe to, is based on nothing more than myth and wishful thinking .
– Imagine a world where no god/gods or any supernatural realm actually exists…how does it look? .
If you can seriously hold these thoughts in your mind, then for one moment, you are beginning to glimpse reality as it actually is.
Edward Banks Feb 2021