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Is Ruairi a Catholic?
This discussion has been closed.
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Message 1.Â
Posted by smarttedebear (U3614285) on Friday, 31st August 2007
Forgive me if I have missed this but I would like to know if any reference has been made to Ruairi being a Catholic? I presume he was baptised a Catholic and so soon it will be First Communion time, then Confirmation etc, etc. Siobhan seemed to be a practising Catholic and I think if Ruairi had been left in Ireland he certainly would have been brought up as a Catholic. I know he is too young to know if he is a Catholic or not but that is not the way it works for Catholic children. (This is not meant as a crticism but a statement of fact).
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Message 2
Posted by JennyDarling Long Gone (U250754) on Friday, 31st August 2007
I believe he is, so he is.
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Message 3
Posted by mike (U2254029) on Saturday, 1st September 2007
Sat, 01 Sep 2007 09:21 GMT, in reply to THEJennyDarling in message 2
He's a lapsed catholic. -
Message 4
Posted by Polly Tunnel (U1530077) on Saturday, 1st September 2007
Sat, 01 Sep 2007 09:41 GMT, in reply to mike .... in message 3
Neither Brian nor Jennifer have shown any interest in what may or may not have been important to Ruairi before he morphed into JD's latest goodwill project. No mention sitting on a blanket eating bratworst for example and Shiobhan was every specific on how important that was to him. So I don't suppose that either of them have given any thought to his religious background. -
Message 5
Posted by RosieT (U2224719) on Saturday, 1st September 2007
Be fair, Pollers, the important thing to Ruairi iwas Mousie, and he's still there.
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Message 6
Posted by Polly Tunnel (U1530077) on Saturday, 1st September 2007
Sat, 01 Sep 2007 10:45 GMT, in reply to RosieT in message 5
Rosie, I did think about Mousie but has he's now been ousted in Ruairi's affections by Nellie (?) the Elephant JD brought back from SA I think even that connection with the child's life before Home Farm has been broken. -
Message 7
Posted by Mustafa Grumble (U8596785) on Tuesday, 4th September 2007
Tue, 04 Sep 2007 16:21 GMT, in reply to smarttedebear in message 1
"Siobhan seemed to be a practising Catholic" ... she needed rather more practise at it then, because about the only Catholic stricture she observed prior to her funeral was in not practising any form of birth control. And before anyone gets on my back, yes, Brian was equally (ir)responsible for not using any either.
We are not aware that she regularly attended Mass, either in Ambridge or in Germany; while her remaining family were rather more devout, Siobhan was adamant that she did not want Ruairi by them. She would have known that Brian & Jenny were CofE and that religion was pretty much irrelevant to Brian, and could therefore have stipulated any serious desire she might have had that Ruairi be raised a Catholic.
I guess the one notable thing to bear in mind is that Brian's contingency plan had R not got a place at Lower Loxley CofE County Primary, was to send him to a private Catholic day school. -
Message 8
Posted by Reggie Trentham (U2746099) on Tuesday, 4th September 2007
I hate to be all po-faced and rationalist about this but how could a child of that age possibly have decided which religion (if any) it was going to follow?
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Message 9
Posted by Mustafa Grumble (U8596785) on Tuesday, 4th September 2007
I quite agree, Reggie, however Smarttedebear had closed their post with:
"I know he is too young to know if he is a Catholic or not but that is not the way it works for Catholic children. (This is not meant as a crticism but a statement of fact)."
... and so I was deliberately steering clear of that particular issue, if for no other reason than it may not be construed as being fitting either for N&Q or DtA.
Personally, I think children should be taught about all the main religions in school, but not allowed to attend (or be inducted / indoctrinated into) any church / synagogue / mosque / temple etc until they are old enough to make the decision for themselves.
Like that's ever going to happen ... reason and religion would make strange bedfellows. -
Message 10
Posted by Dragonfly (U2223700) on Wednesday, 5th September 2007
Private, yes; Catholic, no, as far as I recall.
Having just finished The God Delusion, I feel the hand of Richard Dawkins on my shoulder eggin me on to repeat Reggie's point: one can only truly be a Catholic, Muslim, Jew etc once one has grown up and decided which, if any, religion to follow. So Ruairi can't be a Catholic. -
Message 11
Posted by Dragonfly (U2223700) on Wednesday, 5th September 2007
Eggin? Oh dear.
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Message 12
Posted by Mustafa Grumble (U8596785) on Wednesday, 5th September 2007
Hi Dragonfly - we're both singing from the same "hymnsheet" on this one, I can assure you.
As to the back up plan ... the niggle in the back of my mind that Brian had mentioned it being Catholic means I'll bet you a pint of Shire in TB one day on that private prep school being a "left footer".
Maybe RosieT, Mike... or Mr K can confirm or deny? -
Message 13
Posted by irene (U8365703) on Wednesday, 5th September 2007
i dont recall him specifically mentioning st. chads being catholic, mustafa, but i guess the 'saint' bit gives it away. unless you do have schools with 'st' names, that arent catholic?
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Message 14
Posted by RosieT (U2224719) on Wednesday, 5th September 2007
Alice went to St. Margaret's, a non-catholic school, irene.
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Message 15
Posted by lizbeeb (U8518112) on Wednesday, 5th September 2007
Lots of C of E schools are Saint Someone
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Message 16
Posted by irene (U8365703) on Wednesday, 5th September 2007
thank you both. well there we are then, no proof st. chads is catholic. unless i'm misremembering and brian /did/ mention the word!
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Message 17
Posted by Quezzie (U2255959) on Wednesday, 5th September 2007
Having just finished The God Delusion, I feel the hand of Richard Dawkins on my shoulder eggin me on to repeat Reggie's point: one can only truly be a Catholic, Muslim, Jew etc once one has grown up and decided which, if any, religion to follow. So Ruairi can't be a Catholic.Â
So, how grown up does one have to be? Should we have an "age of consent" for religious participation. At 16? 18?
When I was 5 years old, I believed I was a Catholic; at 12, I still believed I was a Catholic, but had a much fuller understanding of what that meant; at 16, I knew a lot more about what effect it would have on my life; at 21 I knew a lot more about the effects it had on other people's lives; now, some time on, I am still a Catholic, but know I still have a lot to learn. At which point along the way was I, in Richard Dawkin's view, grown-up enough to decide my religious affiliation?
Q xx -
Message 18
Posted by DeeKay Bee - Disenfranchised (U236881) on Wednesday, 5th September 2007
Having googled various St. Chads it seems likely to be Catholic, though possible to be Anglican.
That was no use at all, was it?
I suspect it is just a good school and that any religious affiliations are by the by. -
Message 19
Posted by Mustafa Grumble (U8596785) on Wednesday, 5th September 2007
Hi Quezzie - certainly not at age 5, probably not at age 12, possibly at age 16.
Had your parents been Hindus or Muslims, Witnesses or Quakers, CofE or Wee Free, then you would have been equally "certain" in your belief as to your religion at the ages you cite.
No toddler or young child has the mental capacity to understand the differences between the religions, especially when their parent(s) and teachers indoctrinate them into their own particular choice, let alone the concepts involved.
As teenagers and young adults mature they develop the mental capacity to make their own decisions based on their life experiences. If their credulity then allows for a commitment to such an apparently irrational and superstitious concept as religious faith, then at least they will have made that decision for themselves, rather than having had it foisted upon them by their parents.
I suspect we may be on a "pink hat" issue here, however! -
Message 20
Posted by glen berro (U8860283) on Wednesday, 5th September 2007
Reggie
If Ruaraidh is old enough to believe in Mousie he;s old enough to believe in dogs.
reb -
Message 21
Posted by Quezzie (U2255959) on Wednesday, 5th September 2007
certainly not at age 5, probably not at age 12, possibly at age 16.Â
But who is to say at what age? That is my point.
I agree with you that for everyone there is a point at which they are definitely too young to know what a religion is (when newborn, for example) and I agree that for most people there is a point at which they are grown-up enough to know what a religion is.
What I don't see how someone else (even Richard Dawkins, God bless him) can look at a child and say whether they are or aren't 'grown-up' enough to truly understand the decision they are making when they choose a religion. I know that my understanding of religion is still changing and developing even now, so any cut-off is purely subjective.
Q xx -
Message 22
Posted by Reggie Trentham (U2746099) on Wednesday, 5th September 2007
I don't think Richard Dawkins would dream of proscribing an age at which a person is fit to accept or reject religion. He is after all a scientist not a shaman and he would regard anyone who believes in god as equally deluded whatever their age.
It's obviously a process and while I agree that five is too young, all you can do at that age is parrot what your parents or teachers have told you (isn't it the Jesuits who say 'give me a child until he is seven and I will give you the man'?).
Personally after a childhood of church parades, Sunday school and compulsory religious education I became an atheist at the age of fifteenn (I still am nearly fifty years later). Maybe the mid teens are the time when you can slough off childhood influnces and really decide for youself. -
Message 23
Posted by Spare Mousie (U8154627) on Sunday, 9th September 2007
I don't think Richard Dawkins would dream of proscribing an age at which a person is fit to accept or reject religion. Â
I agree, Reggie. What he objects to is the labelling of the child by others *before* they have a chance to make up their own mind, which he suggests we would not dream of doing with politics: e.g. "a Marxist child" as opposed to "a child of Marxist parents"!
Ruairi is the child of a (lapsed?) Catholic mother - and a father who behaves like he is god, which makes for an interesting start. As no-one will be very eager to tell him the truth of his origins he'll probably end up believing in the Immaculate Conception.
I know, bad joke. -
Message 24
Posted by RosieT (U2224719) on Sunday, 9th September 2007
Or Immaculate Deception as Jazzer called it.
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Message 25
Posted by Leaping Badger (U3587940) on Monday, 10th September 2007
This may be 'the way it is' for Catholic adults as regards the children in their community, but I would say it's not that way for the children themselves. (Unless, as another poster said, the child feels they have some understanding of what it is to be Catholic and feel themselves to be so.) I disagree that an act performed by adults on an unwitting child has any bearing whatever on that child's status. -
Message 26
Posted by bob larkin (U2297537) on Monday, 10th September 2007
This is something that has long puzzled me.
Religionists would presumably say that religion is far more important than the relatively trivial, worldly and transient thing called politics.
And yet...
We are not considered sufficiently mature and knowledgeable to vote until we are 18 (21 not so long ago).
On the other hand a child can fully "sign up" to a religion, accept all its dogmas and make promises that they may not understand at the age of 13? younger? (I refer to confirmation - I am sure that other religions have similar ceremonies at similar ages).
I would welcome an explanation of this.
bob -
Message 27
Posted by JennyDarling Long Gone (U250754) on Wednesday, 12th September 2007
In answer to a previous post, nearly all church schools have a saints name, either RC or C of E.
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Message 28
Posted by studioj (U1600165) on Thursday, 13th September 2007
Thu, 13 Sep 2007 00:07 GMT, in reply to bob larkin in message 26
I think you'll be waiting a long time, Bob.. especially if you want a justifiable explanation.
I can't tell you why it's /allowed/ to happen.. but I can tell you my understanding of why it does happen.
You gotta get 'em young, you see. You gotta get 'em young and malleable enough to make it really easy to weave the poison into their backbones so that it's very difficult - if not impossible - for them to rid themselves of the poison for the rest of their lives... or at least until they've managed to do the very same to their own children (that's the really important bit). That's why it's so successful.
jont {;¬· >···{ -
Message 29
Posted by barwick_green (U2668006) on Friday, 14th September 2007
According to the media there's only two types of Catholic; lapsed or devout.
What about us RCs that are neither? -
Message 30
Posted by barwick_green (U2668006) on Friday, 14th September 2007
He should know; his Celtic FC tattoo gives him carte
blanche to make Dave Allen style jokes. -
Message 31
Posted by Spare Mousie (U8154627) on Friday, 14th September 2007
According to the media there's only two types of Catholic; lapsed or devout.
What about us RCs that are neither?Â
Lol, I've always thought 'lapsed' was an odd term. One lapse too many?!
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Message 32
Posted by irene (U8365703) on Friday, 14th September 2007
and media wise, if you're a protestant you must be 'staunch'.
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Message 33
Posted by JennyDarling Long Gone (U250754) on Friday, 14th September 2007
And if you are an Anglican you are High!
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Message 34
Posted by bob larkin (U2297537) on Friday, 14th September 2007
Still waiting.
bob
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