My ex just texted me that my 9-year old daughter said that "Daddy doesn't believe in God and that if there is a god, he hates kids".
I personally don't think that I ever said anything about not believing in God. Just that I don't know and if he does exist, the bible couldn't be his book. As for hating kids, I have no idea where she got it. I think she saw a video clip about Abraham sacrificing his son. Or maybe about God slaughtering the firstborn Egyptian children, who had no decision-making power in the pharoah's decision to keep the Jews as slaves. I may have had a discussion with her about how God was playing both sides of that. Pharoah would be about to give in, then God would harden his heart. So I guess God wanted to enact all the plagues, including killing the Egyptian children.
She's a smart girl. She can figure out these things for herself and determined God hates children apparently.
So now my ex thinks she should start bringing the kids to church. Our kids have never gone to church. At least not during our marriage until my daughter was 8 and a half. Since then, who knows what happens when she has them? But they never mentioned it. She recently got remarried and one of my kid's fears was having to go to church because my ex's new husband is religious.
I hate the thought of my kids going to church. The ex was Baptist. I don't know what her new husband is, but it's the south so if I went with demographics, I'd have to lay odds on him being Baptist too.
It's like taking them someplace that teaches the Easter Bunny and Santa Claus are real too. Something my ex wife wanted to prolong as long as possible too. I don't want them believing in a 6000 year old Earth, talking snakes, global floods, or all the other BS and dual-thinking believing in the bible requires.
I told my wife as much in a reply. That I'm OK with teaching them there is a God. There might be. But asked if the bible is divine or manmade. That if it was divine, it wouldn't have so many contradictions. Why confuse the kids with that mess?
My ex and I only went to church briefly in the whole 14.5 years we were together, except for one brief period. She was having trouble getting pregnant and had a couple of miscarriages. She decided she should be more religious. We searched for a church. I didn't like any of them for various reasons. But, we settled on one anyway. Eventually, she said she got tired of my grumbling about going and we quit. A while later, a medical issue was fixed and we had 2 kids. She never talked about going to church again. And unless the kids aren't telling me something, she hasn't gone in the year and a half since she moved out.
I don't really want this to become an issue between my ex and I with the kids caught in the middle. Kids trying to please each of us. It's a bad move for her anyway. The kids don't want to go. They will be bored out of their skulls and are too smart for a lot of the religious BS. This will only cause the kids to resent her new husband and resent her for marrying him.
I don't see a way out. The kids are going to be affected if she starts this. We each have opinions on what we want to teach the kids that conflict. She'll be filling their heads with fairy tales and I'll be filling their heads with humanism to counteract it. And the kids will want to please each of us.
I know a lot of people have gone through similar things with ex spouses trying to raise kids JW. At least I won't have to deal with the shunning. But who knows what other troubles might lurk. Would she sue for full custody because I don't believe the bible. This is the south and there are many very religious people here, including judges.
Any way to reduce the internal conflict within the kids? Any way to stop the ex?