Campus Chronicle

Issue date: 11/25/03 Section: Legal

Do children have a say in whether they will be religiously indoctrinated, even if it affects the adult they will become?

Religions have survived through the centuries by requiring their followers to pass their beliefs onto their children. The Supreme Court has acknowledged this parental right to "teach [children] the tenets and the practices of their faith." Prince v. Massachusetts, 321 U.S. 158, 164 (1944).

Because of this Court-recognized right to control children's religion, "[p]arents may believe as a matter of religious freedom [that] they have a right to raise their children in their own faith, even when their 'faith' conflicts with widely accepted and defensible secular beliefs." Laura M. Purdy, In Their Best Interest?, 171 (1992).

Thus, many religions successfully require parents to make permanent choices about their children's development that could detrimentally affect that child's future adulthood.

Using Education to Isolate a Child from Alternative Viewpoints

Religious indoctrination can be particularly strong when taught in an educational environment isolated from the diverse public school system. Private religious schools and home schooling can provide an atmosphere free from external influence, maximizing a parent's ability to cement religious beliefs in a child.

Religions more likely to use oppressive teaching techniques tend also to have more restrictive practices and beliefs. For instance, the Roman Catholic Church - which teaches against premarital sex, homosexuality and the use of birth control even for married couples - considers religious schools "an integral part of [its] religious mission." Lemon v. Kurtzman, 403 U.S. 602, 608 (1971).

In Lemon, the Supreme Court recognized that 95 percent of the private-school teachers involved in the caseworked for Catholic schools.

Furthermore, a study of 2,000 home school families found that more than 90 percent of the parents described themselves as born-again Christians. Christopher J. Klicka, The Right to Home School 49 (2nd ed. 1998).

Such indoctrination often begins early, before the child has a chance to learn alternative viewpoints. "Parents who are determined to inculcate specific religious or political beliefs usually realize that success depends on an early and emotionally laden start. Young children are likely to take such teaching for granted and hence won't rebel." Purdy at 139 (emphasis added).

Parents possess many options when indoctrinating their children. A parent may choose not to allow her child to associate with children outside a particular faith. The parent may choose to send the child to a private school that shelters its pupils from sex education and evolution while teaching intolerance and gender-based bigotry. (Religious schools "explicitly, routinely and unapologetically teach their students that females are inferior to males, that gender equality defies God's word, and that a girl's primary, if not sole, ambition in life should be to serve a husband and be a homemaker." James G. Dwyer, School Vouchers: Inviting the Public into the Religious Square, 42 William & Mary L.R. 963 (2001)). This all occurs with a minimum of state interference.

Or the parent may choose to forgo an educational institution altogether and home school the child with even less state intervention.

In Wisconsin v. Yoder, 406 U.S. 205 (1972), the Supreme Court invalidated a state law requiring Amish children to attend school past the eighth grade contrary to the religious beliefs of the Amish, who object to the worldly influence of advanced education. The Court in particular recognized the "strong tradition of parental concern for the nurture and upbringing of their children," particularly religious indoctrination. Id. at 232-233. The Amish instead wished to raise their children in their own isolated environment, learning the vocational roles they would need to perform in the community.

Justice Douglas dissented, noting, "[i]f a parent keeps his child out of school beyond the grade school, then the child will be forever barred from entry into the new and amazing world of diversity that we have today ... If he is harnessed to the Amish way of life by those in authority over him and if his education is truncated, his entire life may be stunted and deformed." Id. at 244-246 (J. Douglas dissenting).

Restricting a child's education not only restricts her religious options. It can restrict her future career as an adult.

Justice White brought up this concern in his Yoder concurrence: "It is possible that most Amish children will wish to continue living the rural life of their parents, in which case their training at home will adequately equip them for their future role. Others, however, may wish to become nuclear physicists, ballet dancers, computer programmers or historians, and for these occupations, formal training will be necessary." Id. at 239-240 (J. White concurring).

Both Justices White and Douglas pointed out the frequency at which Amish children leave their faith at adulthood. Id. at 240, n. 3 (J. White concurring) (noting, "large numbers of young people voluntarily leave the Amish community each year and are thereafter forced to make their way in the world."); Id. at 245, n. 2 (J. Douglas dissenting) (noting that between 30-50 percent of one Amish order's children defected at adulthood.)

Whether the children themselves wished for their parents to pull them out of high school around the age of 15 was unclear at best.

Do Children Have Say in Where or Whether They Attend School?

A parent appears to have full control on where (and if) her child attends school until the child is an adult, whether or not the child consents. In Yoder, the majority pointed out, "[t]here is nothing in the record or in the ordinary course of human experience to suggest that non-Amish parents generally consult with children of ages 14-16 if they are placed in a church school of the parents' faith." Id. at 232.

By these ages, most children have begun secondary education and may be considering college and/or career choices.

Only one of the children involved in Yoder testified that she wished to leave high school. Yet while Frieda Yoder's on its face appeared to show that she supported her religious indoctrination, one scholar notes, "[w]hile Frieda may, in fact, have believed precisely what she said, and even believed it with fervent conviction, it is impossible to ascertain whether her words, in fact, reflect such true beliefs. Her words could have been offered, just as easily, as the response that she was required to make by her position in her family and her [religious] community." Emily Buss, What Does Frieda Yoder Believe?, 2 U. Pa. J. Const. L. 53, 68 (1999).

This brings up two issues. First, intensive religious indoctrination isolated from alternative viewpoints can effectively brainwash a child to a point where she can no longer truly make her own decisions regarding religion or other aspects of her life even as an adult. Such indoctrination, whether in a private school setting or in complete isolation from society, "may effectively prevent many children from developing capacities that would allow them to think freely and independently about religious matters, since they enable parents to enroll their children in schools that stifle intellectual autonomy and critical thinking." James G. Dwyer, The Children We Abandon, 74 N.C.L. Rev. 1321, 1440-1441 (1996).

Second, religious sects assure the continued spreading of their beliefs by generating fear among their young to stifle dissent. Some Amish sects, for example, "shun" those who stray from practicing their faith, which can include using modern technology or marrying an "outsider."

When considering these two forms of control over the minds of children, could Frieda have chosen public high school even if she had wanted to?

Children liberationists argue that children should determine where they go to school and whether they will be religiously indoctrinated at all. "Freedom from indoctrination means that children choose whatever belief system comforts and inspires them, not necessarily the systems that adults would have them choose." Philip E. Veerman, The Rights of the Child and the Changing Image of Childhood, 135 (Martinus Nijhoff 1992).

The most notable recognition of a right of autonomy for children comes from Douglas' Yoder dissent: "If the parents in this case are allowed a religious exemption, the inevitable effect is to impose the parents' notions of religious duty upon their children. Where the child is mature enough to express potentially conflicting desires, it would be an invasion of the child's rights to permit such an imposition without canvassing his views." Yoder at 242-244 (J. Douglas dissenting).

Parents do not own their children. Their control of them is ideally limited until children reach adult age and are capable of caring for themselves and making their own decisions. But decisions affecting a child's religion can reach far beyond the limits of a childhood. They can affect a future adult's values, decisions, career and health. And in some of the more oppressive religions, this could prove detrimental to these children's - these people's - lives.

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