Religious Conflicts Within Families
Religious Conflicts within Families
Religion can be a source of unity within families but can also cause conflicts within families too as well as between countries.
Main ways in which religion can cause conflicts within families:
1. Children no longer wanting to take part in their parents’ religion.
If parents are religious and go to a place of worship, they will expect their children to go with them. If their children refuse when they reach their teens, this can cause conflict because:
* Religions usually tell parents that it is their duty to bring their children up in the faith and ensure they become full members of it as adults; therefore if the children no longer take part in the religion, their parents will be regarded as failures by other believers. * Parents will worry that their children will become immoral without the guidance of religion. * Parents will worry that their children will not be with them in the after-life because they have left the faith. * Children will feel that their human right to freedom of religion (which includes the freedom not to believe) is being taken away by their parents. 2. Children wanting to marry a partner from a different faith
In a multi faith society, young people of different faiths are going to meet and want to marry. This can raise many problems because:
* Often there can be no religious wedding ceremony because the couple must be members of the same religious for a religious wedding ceremony to be allowed. * There is a question of which religion the children of the marriage will be brought up in. Some religions insist on a child being brought up in their religion, but a couple might have trouble deciding this. * There is also the problem what will happen after death? Will the couple have to be buried in different places according to their religion? * For the parents and relatives of the couple there is often the feeling that they have betrayed their roots
Religion can be a source of unity within families but can also cause conflicts within families too as well as between countries.
Main ways in which religion can cause conflicts within families:
1. Children no longer wanting to take part in their parents’ religion.
If parents are religious and go to a place of worship, they will expect their children to go with them. If their children refuse when they reach their teens, this can cause conflict because:
* Religions usually tell parents that it is their duty to bring their children up in the faith and ensure they become full members of it as adults; therefore if the children no longer take part in the religion, their parents will be regarded as failures by other believers. * Parents will worry that their children will become immoral without the guidance of religion. * Parents will worry that their children will not be with them in the after-life because they have left the faith. * Children will feel that their human right to freedom of religion (which includes the freedom not to believe) is being taken away by their parents. 2. Children wanting to marry a partner from a different faith
In a multi faith society, young people of different faiths are going to meet and want to marry. This can raise many problems because:
* Often there can be no religious wedding ceremony because the couple must be members of the same religious for a religious wedding ceremony to be allowed. * There is a question of which religion the children of the marriage will be brought up in. Some religions insist on a child being brought up in their religion, but a couple might have trouble deciding this. * There is also the problem what will happen after death? Will the couple have to be buried in different places according to their religion? * For the parents and relatives of the couple there is often the feeling that they have betrayed their roots