Secular Parenting In A Religious World

A mother of two amazing daughters and with her Master's Degree in English, Be-Asia McKerracher has taught at both the college and high school level. This background has led her to write Secular Parenting in a Religious World: Practical Advice for Free-Thinking Parents. What Readers Say: "Raising secular children in this religious world is a difficult one, and this book really does help raise children to think for themselves!" "Overall, I highly recommend this book to any parent. Especially those who come from a religious family..." "Secular Parenting offers strategies on handling and communicating with children about school settings, holidays, media, sex, family, and family gatherings.." Full of practical advice drawn from nearly fifteen years of parenting and educating children, Be-Asia McKerracher offers parents an alternative to a strictly religious upbringing. Secular parenting helps children establish respect for people regardless of their faith (or lack thereof). If you are looking for parenting answers, this is your book. Extended Book Description: This candid parenting guide rejects the idea that parents need God to raise moral children. Full of practical advice drawn from nearly fifteen years of parenting and educating children, Be-Asia McKerracher offers parents an alternative to a strictly religious upbringing. Secular parenting helps children establish respect for people regardless of their faith (or lack thereof). Instead, children raised in a secular environment grow to recognize the commonalities between the world's religions through guided exploration. Furthermore, as they mature, secular parenting allows children the freedom to choose their own faith--or decide not to choose religion at all. What greater gift could parents provide for their children? And what greater hostility do parents sometimes encounter--from friends, loved ones, and society at large--for attempting to deliver such a gift? Secular Parenting in a Religious World provides parents with the tools to raise free-thinking children and weather the storms of familial and societal disapproval, always with our children's futures at the forefront of our minds.

More Americans are religiously unaffiliated than ever before, but secular parents face particular challenges raising children outside religion. This book balances a personal story with research and exploration, using nonreligious sources to cover topics traditionally answered for by religion, including morality, awe, death, meaning, and tradition.

At the heart of our current moment lies a universal yearning, writes David Zahl, not to be happy or respected so much as enough--what religions call "righteous." To fill the void left by religion, we look to all sorts of everyday activities--from eating and parenting to dating and voting--for the identity, purpose, and meaning once provided on Sunday morning. In our striving, we are chasing a sense of enoughness. But it remains ever out of reach, and the effort and anxiety are burning us out. Seculosity takes a thoughtful yet entertaining tour of American "performancism" and its cousins, highlighting both their ingenuity and mercilessness, all while challenging the conventional narrative of religious decline. Zahl unmasks the competing pieties around which so much of our lives revolve, and he does so in a way that's at points playful, personal, and incisive. Ultimately he brings us to a fresh appreciation for the grace of God in all its countercultural wonder.

"The fastest growing religion in America is--none! Among adults under 30, those poised to be the parents of the next generation, fully one third are religiously unaffiliated. Yet these "Nones," especially parents, still face prejudice in a culture where religion is widely seen as good for your kids. What do Nones believe, and how do they negotiate tensions with those convinced that they ought to provide their children with a religious upbringing?"--Publisher description.

A gentle guidebook that reminds parents to turn to the ultimate source and authority on raising children: The Bible. Bible passages and simple activities enhance each chapter in a way that allows parents to make the messages come alive in their home and in their family's lives.

"Gathering the perspectives of educators and psychologists, as well as wisdom from everyday parents, Parenting Beyond Belief offers insights and advice on a wide range of topics including instilling values, finding meaning and purpose, navigating holidays, coping with loss, finding community without religion, and more. The second edition of this secular parenting bestseller brings back reflections from such celebrated freethinkers as Richard Dawkins and Julia Sweeney, and adds new voices including journalist Wendy Thomas Russell, essayist Katherine Ozment, sociologist Phil Zuckerman, and many others" --

Gold-medal winner of a Next Generation Book Award, silver-medal winner of the Independent Publishers Book Award. As featured on the PBS NewsHour “A gem of a book.” — LIBRARY JOURNAL (STARRED REVIEW) A step-by-step guide to raising confident, open-minded kids in an age of religious intolerance. Relax, It's Just God offers parents fresh, practical and honest ways to address issues of God and faith with children while promoting curiosity and kindness, and successfully fending off indoctrination. A rapidly growing demographic cohort in America, secular parents are at the forefront of a major and unprecedented cultural shift. Unable to fall back on what they were taught as children, many of these parents are struggling, or simply failing, to address issues of God, religion and faith with their children in ways that promote honesty, curiosity, kindness and independence. The author sifts through hard data, including the results of a survey of 1,000 nonreligious parents, and delivers gentle but straightforward advice to both non-believers and open-minded believers. With a thoughtful voice infused with humor, Russell seamlessly merges scientific thought, scholarly research and everyday experience with respect for a full range of ways to view the world. "Relax, It's Just God" goes beyond the numbers to assist parents (and grandparents) who may be struggling to find the right time place, tone and language with which to talk about God, spirituality and organized religion. It encourages parents to promote religious literacy and understanding and to support kids as they explore religion on their own -- ensuring that each child makes up his or her own mind about what to believe (or not believe) and extends love and respect to those who may not agree with them. Subjects covered include: • Talking openly about our beliefs without indoctrinating kids • Making religious literacy fun and engaging • Talking about death without the comforts of heaven • Navigating religious differences with extended family members • What to do when kids get threatened with hell

By some estimates, over 1 billion people in the world are non-religious (humanist/secular/atheist) yet we base some of our parenting techniques and traditions on religion. There are many books available on parenting around each of the major religions, but few around parenting in a Humanist household. This book is an attempt to outline how non-religious parents can have rites, rituals, and practices needed for a healthy, spiritually fulfilled family.