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March 15, 2010 8:14 AM   Subscribe

MindVirusVaccineFilter: Looking for elementary-school aged books about comparative religion for very bright kids...
posted by TigerMoth to Education (5 answers total)
 
In middle school, I loved Hamilton's Mythology and similar books about other culture's myths. I have a few books of tales from around the world for bedtime stories which are younger-appropriate, but no idea if any of them are still printed. Mythology and tales are comprehensible to kids; I don't think that comparative religion is. What those stories tell you about the people who wrote them will be pretty challenging, and introspection into the stories of ones own culture probably impossible.
posted by a robot made out of meat at 8:55 AM on March 15, 2010 [1 favorite]


Response by poster: Yep. We've already run through the Mythology gamut, but I'm looking for something age-appropriate that sort of delineates the doctrinal tenets, history, practices, etc of most modern world religions. I'm not a believer, yet I don't want to foist my (un-)beliefs on the kids. At the same time I don't want a single religion (they go to Catholic school, as did I) to have a monopoly on their mindshare. (This, it seems to me, is how these things operate...). Instead, I'd like to expose them to the Variety of Religious Experiences (with apologies to Wm. James) so that they can make up their own mind. I think they're already smart enough to see the mutual contradictions between them (and internal contradictions within them!) to draw the conclusion I would if I were (non-)indoctrinating them. Which I'm not.

And if they don't? Well, I'll still love the littler buggers with all my heart! :)

DK has a couple of books along the lines of what I'm looking for, just wondering if there's anything else...
posted by TigerMoth at 9:55 AM on March 15, 2010


Elementary school actually covers a wide age range, so you might want to say what age group you are talking about to help focus this. That said, The Usborne Encyclopedia of World Religions: Internet-Linked (World Cultures) might be one possibility?
posted by gudrun at 10:19 AM on March 15, 2010


I like Huston Smith's The World's Religions.
posted by handabear at 12:22 PM on March 15, 2010




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