This all changed when I went to a Catholic senior school. This choice was not made due to religious beliefs, it was chosen because they were good academically and I liked the friendly nature of the place which I noticed when I visited on open days. At this school, religion was solely based on Christianity and, in particular, Catholic beliefs. I appreciate that being a Catholic school they are under a certain obligation to teach these things, yet I greatly missed the diversity of religious education. Very few people of other religions went to the school so suddenly I was surrounded by Catholics, people from other Christian denominations, agnostics and atheists. It seemed to be that you either believed in the Christian way or you didn't. Everybody was accepting of others' beliefs and we were encouraged to debate our opinions on topics, yet for those 7 years, I did not hear much of any other religion.
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For most of my childhood and teenage life, I was fairly agnostic. I tried going to church and I did a little bit of research when I was about 12, eventually coming to the conclusion that I was still pretty agnostic. There are parts of Christianity I agree with and there are parts I don't, which led me to believe I wasn't very Christian. As I got older I started to understand that religion is not quite so black and white. Everyone is entitled to their own beliefs and opinions and you can choose to believe some things and not others. And so I stopped labelling my beliefs and started just explaining them when people asked.
In the last few days, I was watching a documentary on TV which mentioned the religion of a certain country. Out of pure interest, I searched for the key beliefs of that religion online. Suddenly I found myself in a whirlwind trying to find out as much as I could about all the most popular religions and finding some of my beliefs matched up to some religions whilst others didn't. I found I was able to relate to some religions more than others. In doing this research, I rediscovered the world that had been hidden away from me since junior school. Well, nothing would've stopped me finding all this out whilst I was at school, but I just never felt so inspired to do so. I was happy with what I believed at the time, which is fine. Yet now I have all this new knowledge of religions in my brain and it's really made me think. I still do not like to label my beliefs and don't think I completely agree with one religion in particular, but I've found aspects of numerous religions really fascinating.
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One of the things I would like the country to change about education is that I think religious education should be compulsory for a certain period of your childhood and that children should be taught about all the religions. I do not think it is right that a child should grow up having one single religion enforced on them. They should be exposed to all of them and then be allowed to make decisions for themselves once they are ready. At the very least this should reduce discrimination against religions less common to the country and encourage people to discuss calmly their different beliefs without causing argument. Of course, this is only my personal opinion and I am fully aware some people may completely disagree with me, and that's completely fine. I am open to different opinions, I am simply sharing mine.
Miss Muggs xx
