indoctrinating our children

What is indoctrination?

From Merriam-Webster Online

Main Entry: in·doc·tri·nate
Pronunciation: \in-ˈdäk-trə-ˌnāt\
Function: transitive verb
Inflected Form(s): in·doc·tri·nat·ed; in·doc·tri·nat·ing
Etymology: probably from Middle English endoctrinen, from Anglo-French endoctriner, from en- + doctrine doctrine
Date: 1626
1 : to instruct especially in fundamentals or rudiments : teach
2 : to imbue with a usually partisan or sectarian opinion, point of view, or principle

— in·doc·tri·na·tion \(ˌ)in-ˌdäk-trə-ˈnā-shən\ noun

— in·doc·tri·na·tor \in-ˈdäk-trə-ˌnā-tər\ noun

Main Entry: 2sectarian
Function: noun
Date: 1819
1 : an adherent of a sect
2 : a narrow or bigoted person


Main Entry: 1par·ti·san
Variant(s): also par·ti·zan \ˈpär-tə-zən, -sən, -ˌzan, chiefly British ˌpär-tə-ˈzan\
Function: noun
Etymology: Middle French partisan, from north Italian dial. partiźan, from part part, party, from Latin part-, pars part
Date: 1555
1 : a firm adherent to a party, faction, cause, or person; especially : one exhibiting blind, prejudiced, and unreasoning allegiance

The following quotes are some examples of founders of the public education system. Is there any doubt that they had an anti-God agenda. How hard is it to reteach each child every day? Do we even try? If we (Christians) are going to continue to send our children to a secular school, we MUST erase the indoctrination everyday. Remember Baptists, one of the reasons we send them there is to be salt and light, but if we aren't teaching them the difference between the dark secular education they are recieving and a Godly education, they cease to be salt and light. All day, every day they are taught about the world with people at the center, with people in control of their own destiny, about a world that created itself. Until the secular schools start teaching from a God-centered viewpoint, we must make extra, extra effort to teach them a biblical worldview. This might be particularly hard for the parents that were in school after 1973, when the US government took over and public schools ceased to be community schools. Many of us don't have a biblical worldview and we don't even know it! I know some people think the problem is that we took prayer out of schools. I think the problem started way before that, when we started teaching math, science and history without making God the center of it all.

“Education is thus a most powerful ally of humanism, and every American school is a school of humanism. What can a theistic Sunday school’s meeting for an hour once a week and teaching only a fraction of the children do to stem the tide of the five-day program of humanistic teaching?”

– C.F. Potter, signer of Humanist Manifesto 1930


“… [E]very child in American entering schools at the age of 5 is insane because he comes to schools with certain allegiances toward our Founding Fathers, toward his parents, toward a belief in a supernatural being, toward the sovereignty of this nation as a separate entity. …”

– Chester Pierce, professor of education at Harvard (1970)


“I believe that … [public] education is the fundamental method of social progress and reform … this conception has due regard for … socialistic ideals.” and “There is no God and there is no soul. … There is no room for fixed … or moral absolutes.”

– John Dewey, father of modern public education and signer of Humanist Manifesto 1930

However, Gresham Machen made a good point in his fight AGAINST government-run public schools. His predictions seem to have come true. I was "given" to the public education system and feel as though I was brainwashed with a feminist and anti-God and secular humanist education. Granted, my parents did very little, if anything, to counter the culture from school and society.

“If you give the bureaucrats the children, you might as well give them everything else as well.” -Machen

“Place the lives of children in their formative years, despite the convictions of their parents, under the intimate control of experts appointed by the state, force them to attend schools where the higher aspirations of humanity are crushed out, and where the mind is filled with the materialism of the day, and it is difficult to see how even the remnants of liberty can subsist.” -Machen

It seems in the early 20th century Mr. Machen saw the future of government controlled schools. I am afraid to see the next future.

*excerpted from http://www.thefreemanonline.org/columns/j-gresham-machen-a-forgotten-libertarian/