Jack: "Dad, are we atheists?"
Me: "No. I am."
"Well, what am I?"
"You're you. You're Jackson. What else could you be?"
"Well, I'm not a Christian, right?"
"There are something like 2,800 religions practiced on earth."(I've since looked it up, it's closer to 4,200. I updated Jack just now.) "A christian is someone who thinks that 2,799 of those religions are false, and that their religion is true. An atheist is someone who thinks that all of them are false- or at least that they all fail to provide compelling evidence for themselves."
"Okay, then I think I'm an atheist."
"It's fine for you to call yourself whatever you like, but I want you to remember that you can change that at any time, as many times as you like, for any reason.
My only goal in this area is to help you discover the best ways to learn, and the best and worst reasons to believe something.
You're not my property. I don't get to tell you what to believe, or not believe. You're a whole, complete person. You have been since you were born. This is important. You'll find that people think of you as a person-in-training - who should believe what tall people say without asking why- rather than a person. That human-but-less-human idea is the source of so many kinds of suffering. It's just-"
"Can I play xbox?"
"Yup."
-----------------------------
My children and I have indirectly discussed religion many, many times. It usually only arises in the context of why people would vote to keep rights away from this group, or why they'd have a problem with that group in the first place, etc. It's pretty beneficial to remember that most people are generally good, feel that they're spreading or defending good, and believe that they're doing so for good reasons. Knowing these reasons has assisted me in not giving in every time to cynicism, or fully giving up on discussion.
I actually find it quite surprising (and I imagine many of the people who glance twice at my posts would agree) that today - a bit over 7 years into his very bright and inquisitive life - this is the very first time Jackson and I have ever directly discussed atheism or religion. I honestly didn't realize what had happened until I was reflecting later on the narrowness and brevity of my definitions.
I've received some startling and often vitriolic push-back from some of my fellow unbelievers, in the past. Presumably this is due to the view that religious indoctrination of children is child abuse, and so they equate my failure to 'armor' my children against religion with that same abusive practice. I've seen it on other issues as well - most notably my continued support for religious studies in US schools as early as 3rd grade.
(Before anyone starts searching for my email address - jdozat@gmail.com - let me clarify the above statement:
Religions have been with humanity from the beginning. They have influenced art, shaped history, and informed philosophy and science. For these reasons, I think that comparative religious study at a young age is a justifiable part of a complete education. Also, it may be the only chance that some children have of hearing that others believe differently from their parents.)
However, I would argue that 'armoring' against religion is exactly what I'm doing, only more so. I'm committed to teaching my children that there are objectively good and bad reasons to believe something. Religion is is truly a wealth of bad ideas being believed for even worse reasons - but it holds no monopoly. Pseudoscience, alternative medicine, and the host of psychics, mystics, gurus, and other charlatans on Twitter prove as much. For maximum effect, this commitment absolutely has to extend to what I hold to be true and how much of it I discuss with my children. I won't let our relationship in these vital, early years be another example of lazy intellectual dishonesty: Dad expecting them to believe what he says, for the bad reason that he's Dad.
Your children are not your property any more than your great-grandmother. If you're going to try to tell them what to believe, I hope you at least have enough courage to ask yourself the following:
Why do I believe this? Why do I need my children to believe this? Would I consider teaching my children about beliefs that compete with mine?
If your answer to this last is no, it's almost certain that your answers for the first two aren't very good.
Try raising people who think for themselves, and who question their own conclusions as readily as the beliefs of others. It's a pain in the ass much of the time, but parenting isn't about making life easier for yourself - at least not until your children can help out with chores.