The video is an example of extreme religious actions. Like Moe, I also wouldn't use the words 'brain washing' in most cases.
The problem I have with it is that these churches are immersing kids into Christian rituals and practices without explaining to them what they're doing or why they're doing it. These kids are going through the motions so they don't get into trouble and can go play with their friends after.
The result is people who just blindly accept their faith and aren't even capable of rational thought about their faith (like LiveInPeace, for example).
I grew up going to Catholic School from kindergarten to third grade in one school, and 4th to 8th in another. In my second school, there were on average 38 students in my grade (2 classes, 19 students each). On average, only about two or three of us weren't baptised Catholic. Only a small handful of us didn't go to church at all on Sundays.
We would go to church every Friday during school. I very rarely ever talked about God and I never went to church outside of school. My family was just not very religious at all.
Every day, we would have a religion class. I noticed very quickly that I was one of the only ones who didn't understand the rituals going on in the church such as how old you have to be before you become this and that and whatever there is. I also noticed, that I was one of the few people who understood what God wanted and how we should act (according to the priest and religion teachers).
Sure, I couldn't tell you much at all about the box thing that they put the bread and wine in, but I was one of the few people who could answer questions such as "Will God forgive you if you know you will repeat that same sin," and "What about people who have never heard of God?" (which was funny because I disagreed, despite understang the answer better than most everyone else).
In short, I understood what God wanted (according to the church) and how everyone should act better than most of my classmates. The only other people I know who understood as well as me didn't care too much about religion.
While I wouldn't consider it brainwashing, exposing kids at a young age to religion is absolutely a bad thing.
I somewhat disagree with you here. I think that any family who wants their children to worship God should introduce them to religion at a young age. I do agree, though, that hell should not be used as a reason to explain wrong. The same goes for doing good to get into heaven.
Although it is not always the case, churches do often bring families and friends together. Sure, you can also acheive these results with family game night and Saterday night dinners at Applebees, but none the less it's an activity that the family can experiance together. The best churches to bring families together are those that hold a lot of fun events and focus on having a relaxed lecture on God rather than a whole boring ritual of singing and preachers telling everyone what to do rather than simply suggesting what it is God wants (if that made sense). Kids would rather listen to stories about good things happening to good people and friendships made on being honest and good people than listen to some man or woman stress out that "GOD WILL SAVE THEM! THEY MUST REPENT! THEY MUST LIVE FOR GOD! BLAH BLAH BLAH SIN BLAH HELL BLAH BALLS."
I beleive that parents should always acompany their children when going to church or any religios event. This means they should not send them to some camp unless they are going too. This may sound like haracy, but I think it's important that after church the family should talk about what they heard. I think it's important for them to talk about things they agreed with as well as things they disagreed with. Yes, I think it's important for a family to question the teachings of their own church from time to time! You don't have to always agree with your chu... oh... wait... in many cases you do... well fuck. Just avoid those crappy churches!
