Little Juan may not be able to read after graduating from public school, but at least he comes away with a whole lot of (unearned) self-respect.
Just think of the Aztecs as being the "Mexican Taliban"
Know what your kids are being brainwashed with - if you can't get them out of the government schools totally!
Maybe, maybe as a senior, but only in a balanced manner. At that point, the schools should report, the student should decide. And it should be reported not as an alternative to whatever beliefs the student has been given by their parents, but as a simple report of what Aztecs did. It is important to study history, but it is wrong to attach a cause. And, of course, it is wrong to only study it out of context.
Actually, this, if done correctly, is a very good approach, much better than just telling kids "It's bad." Having students play Devil's advocate - which is essentially what a persuasive letter is, and offering them a choice of which side to take or making them test the issue from both sides, will make them think more carefully about their views on right and wrong. Playing Devil's advocate as pro-sacrifice does not mean you are sympathetic to human sacrifice, but it is good training and preparation for learning how to counter the viewppoint that such things are acceptable. People who play Devil's advocate learn to predict how the other side will respond in a real debate. They can see things from the other guy's perspective, without falling prey to it. Know thy enemy, as they say. There is no better way to know him than by mentally imagining yourself to be in his shoes.
The ACLU or some Pagans, on the other hand, will get upset because the kids could choose to take the missionary's part. They might complain that this violated their sacred views on separation of church and state, or forbid students from using arguments from the Bible as a missionary would.
The only problem with this comes in if a public school teacher tries to make the two views morally equivalent. Just having kids try to argue either side does not do that, since kids will debate it out and so, discover the truth. Kids aren't as stupid as some people think they are, BTW.
As others have noted, human sacrifice was also present in the West in some cultures, quite often in matriarchical and land-based cultures. It was also done in the Middle East and as others have pointed out, early Judaism can be seen as stressing a move away from human sacrifice to animal and then, in Christianity to the paschal mystery in Jesus's self-sacrifice.
It's an interesting subject and I applaud comparative religious study at this level. It has to be carefully taught, though, as you point out.
I am speechless.
Disgusting. And a way to prep children to rationalize abortion. At 1 million abortions/year, we make the Aztecs look like pikers.
I was caught off gaurd by a liberal friend of mine a while back about the Spanish actions and relationship with the Aztecs. I wish I would have brought up that point. His mind would have blown at my lack of regard for the native culture. The next conversation will be fun. Thanks.
question by mvpel: Do you know who's running your schools?
Can you recall when our society's paradigm officially shifted from preserving the greatest quantity of innocent human life to ensuring the quality of human life?
Answer: It never was announced; but the current approach ought to be plain as day by now.
I believe it unofficially began around 1965 with a publication by the Club of Rome. Subject: Too many people on the planet.
passage by IceCreamSocialist: 22:8: And Abraham said, My son, God will provide himself a lamb for a burnt offering
passage by weegee and Forgiven_Sinner: [22:13] And Abraham lifted up his eyes, and looked, and behold behind him a ram caught in a thicket by his horns
comment by AnnaZ When the anti-religionists quote the story of Isaac and Abraham as showing the unloving nature of God I always have to laugh
Believers in God have faith that God will always provide them the means to measure up to His expectations. God said "be fruitful and multiply." He did not he say "but don't go crazy." We are simply told to have faith: "God will provide."
To avoid this question, which is arguable but nowhere near definitive enough for social planners, the intelligentsia introduced "God is Dead." And that was followed with the "enlightened" belief that God never even existed.
Well, this clearly places believers squarely at odds with those who doubt, and more fatally, puts them in enmity with those who are convinced He doesn't exist. If He doesn't exist, He cannot provide.
"Listen to us" our greatest minds, the new gods, will say when they dare. You must stop producing children because the planet already has 10 times too many people. "We have replaced God. Stop being fruitful. It's now okay and normal to adopt lifestyles which reduce the chances of pregnancy. It has become public policy to promote homosexuality like we once did heterosexuality. It is now almost time to make heterosexuality what homosexuality once was. We must do it for the children! Their "quality" of life must not suffer. (Well, for what children remain anyway.)
So take careful note of the spewings of the most virulent environmentalists. Their talk about how the world really should have no more than one half billion people should be viewed with more than a little suspicion. Given all the bloodletting of the Twentieth century, one can see that the "intelligentsia" has only been warming up to the task at hand. Their lack of protest when they could stop much of that bloodletting should be a warning to us all.
If the extent of such misanthropic thinking in the powerful is not the very essence of what it could mean to be Anti-God, how can one conceive what Anti-God really means? Whether or not one believes in God, there can be no doubt that such leaders, left unfettered, will make the Aztecs look like rank amateurs.
Oh, and by all means stop protecting the innocent! Since we have too many people, any exra who exist CANNOT be innocent. Every extra human being on the planet is a threat to our "quality of life." To the elitist, the ones who plan to remain on the planet, this is logical and just. It's just because they say it is.
It certainly looks like C. S. Lewis was right. We appear to be at the threshold that "The Abolition of Man" predicted. Those in power, those above it all, the superhumans, view those below as subjects somehow no longer human. Man, as we know him, is about to cease to exist.
We mere mortals, we who are no longer human, are therefore no longer vested with "certain inalienable rights" grante to us by a creator who -- how convenient -- also no longer exists.
Once the thinkers closest to the higher levels of our government began to fear unchecked world population growth, a conflict with the religious community was inevitable.
This all helps explain the gradual introduction of multiculturalism, even of cultures long dead -- like the Aztecs -- that found human destruction favorable.
And how about the media propagated buzz of "who are we to say which culture is better." And barely a peep out of the highest religious leaders! It appears that too many religious leaders were co-opted to this way of thinking. How many have become the new Pharisees? How else to explain their silence?
If the majority of us have begun to believe that cultures which worship death are on an equal moral footing with the Judeo-Christian ethic which helped establish the justice system of our great constitutional republic, we may be too far into decline to recover. Who will give up without a fight?
Thus the religious need to understand what is at stake. What has been an unspeakable thought for the last 35 years needs to be discussed openly. Especially if the religious think it is their duty to try and prevent the onslaught of Armageddon. But if we are to believe that God will provide, how can we remain passive?
Does God wish the Godly to prevent Armageddon or to give in? If they give in, are they really Godly? If the Godly uncritically permit man to forcibly limit procreation, to go against his explict wishes, does this make them and the country Anti-God? Are they God's soldiers or are they not?
Yes indeed DoughtyOne, "the sad thing is these people totally miss the significance of Abraham's willingness to obey God."
Because..since parents have nothing do to do with what their kids' schoolwork is, and would never be able to help them choose which side to take.
What also needs to be said, is while the Spaniards thought of conversion to Christianity for these new visitors, the Aztecs were thinking of castrating these men and making them eunuchs for the harem of women servicing the God-King.
But then again, why bother w/ petty facts when the purpose is to bash Western Civilisation.