Why it is a good idea for religions not to take money from the state

Because then they come in and violate parents' prior rights to the education of their children. This is a ghastly story out of Quebec in today's National Post. I have bolded the most egregious statement:

After eliminating denominational education from schools, the Quebec government announced plans Friday to extend its ban on religious instruction to toddlers.

The new policy will make it illegal for workers in the province’s network of subsidized daycares to teach their charges, aged five and under, about a specific religion. Teaching religious songs, including many Christmas carols, will be off limits, as will crafts with a religious connotation. Government inspectors will enforce the rules beginning next June.

“I want the young Quebecers who attend our daycare services to do so in a spirit of openness to others and diversity,” Family Minister Yolande James said as she unveiled the changes in Montreal. Ms. James said daycares will still be allowed to highlight “cultural traditions” rooted in a religious faith. “We will not remove Christmas trees from our daycare centres,” she said. A daycare could also display a crèche depicting the birth of Jesus, an aide to Ms. James said. “The line is drawn when a daycare centre teaches about the birth of Jesus, who is Mary, who is Joseph,” Geneviève Hinse said. “The line is crossed when there is a transmission of religion.”

The initiative was sparked by media reports last spring that some subsidized daycares in the province were offering Muslim and Jewish programs to toddlers.

Under a system created in 1997, parents pay just $7 a day to send their children to state-subsidized daycare. The government covers the balance, approximately $40 a day. There are currently about 2,000 subsidized daycares in the province offering spaces for more than 120,000 children. Ms. James said a tiny minority of those facilities — about 100 — currently offer some degree of religious instruction.

The daycare initiative is another example of Quebec’s continuing struggle to define where it stands as a secular society. Its debate over the “reasonable accommodation” of religious minorities has led to legislation currently before the National Assembly that would require women wearing veils to reveal their faces before receiving government services.

Daniel Weinstock, a professor of philosophy at the Université de Montréal, said it makes sense for children attending state-subsidized daycare not to be indoctrinated in a specific religion, even if that is what their parents wish.

“Religious communities and families hold sway over children through the household and through churches, mosques and synagogues,” he said. “I don’t see it as a problem for daycares and schools to be, in a way, a kind of counterweight to the hold that religious communities and families have over their children.”

Read more: http://life.nationalpost.com/2010/12/17/quebec-toddlers-can-see-religious-symbols-but-now-can%e2%80%99t-have-them-explained/#ixzz18WDPRhNM