Kids Are People Too
A person is a soul. Immortal, accountable before God. An Other who is an I. Having an inner world that is complex, inaccessible from outside themselves, and not even fully accessible or understood by themselves. A child learns to be a person by being treated with the respect of a person by others.
All people are different people. – Ted Lasso
Kids are people too. Each his own person. A child is a soul. They may have a body and that body may be small, but their soul is the same size as yours. Unless you change and become like children, you will never enter the Kingdom of Heaven.1 A child can trust and follow Jesus. The kingdom of heaven belongs to such as these.2 A child can be indwelt by the Spirit. And if the Spirit of God indwells them, even though a child, they become a priest and king. If they have the Spirit, then they don’t need anyone to teach them because his anointing teaches them all things.3 No man shall teach his brother or his neighbor saying “know the Lord”, but each man shall teach his son.
Kids, as people, are owed personal privacy, the secrecy of their own being, the freedom to keep secrets, to be safe inside themselves. Not pried open. Even if you think you can see the truth of someone else, you should cover your eyes, give them the clothes of animals to cover what their poorly sewn figs leaves are leaving exposed. Helped as they discover/decide their identity, but not told who they are or who they ought to be. Respecting their secrecy, inviolability of their personhood. Allowed to be wrong, to be dumb, to tell their own lies. They must each build their own temple of identity encircled by their own fortress of beliefs. The walls you think you are helping build for someone else become not walls in their fortress but the walls of their imprisonment.
People, even young people, are complicated. Not simple machines. No simple explanations. No simple fixes. And most of the things in a person that need to be fixed can only be fixed by them. Far less moldable, less teachable, by society, by schools, by culture or by parents, than is generally assumed. They enter the world with their own bents and brokennesses. They tell their own lies, though they may use the words of others to do so. They need their own faith, their own personal redemption.
Right to be told the truth. Instruction isn’t made less effective by being explained. No hidden agendas – reeks of manipulation and superiority.
Can’t tell them who they are. No man can tell another who he is. Can’t tell them what they want. Options, costs benefits. Model.
Almost
Kids are people sort of. Kids are people sometimes. A child is a person when they agree with me, and are pleasant to be around, and are obedient and quiet. A kid is a person until giving them the space to be their own person is inconsistent with what I think is best for them. Kids are people too until a child makes a choice that I think is less than in their best interest. Because I know what the right choice is. Because I am an adult, a real person. I and my fellow adults have the wisdom and understanding that enables us to choose what is in our own best interests. And what is in the best interest of everyone else. Convention requires that we give other adults the freedom to make less than ideal choices. But children are not ready to be people and need us adults to protect them from themselves. A child is only a person if I let them. Therefore, any moral restraint surrounding my actions and intentions towards other people only apply to a child if I feel like it. I brought you into the world so I get to control you for your own good.
Children don’t have souls. They enter the world in sinless ignorant bliss. And stay like that until we inscribe upon them our own corruptions, infect them with shame and guilt and moral accountability. Better not to teach them at all. Better that they never learn right from wrong, then they will never face judgement. Children aren’t people who make choices, they are pets who only misbehave because they need more training. Kids are pets not people.
Kids can’t pray or worship. Those who worship him must worship him in spirit and in truth. They have not the Spirit, therefore they cannot worship rightly. So also pagan adults.