Friday, June 1, 2012

1970s Children’s Christian Group - Bring Along a Friend


In Regina my mom had me take part in a Christian group for kids. There were prizes to be won with that group, but only (or at least mostly) if you brought along a friend.  Even as a kid I didn’t feel quite right about bringing along a friend to a church group for prizes. In fact, one of the few times I did so the friend’s father got angry that he went with me (I don’t know if they were atheists or different religion/different sect of Christianity but I understand more clearly as an adult that the friend’s parents probably did have different views on religion and that it wasn’t appropriate to bring him along).

Luckily my mom, the most religious person in the family agreed with my concerns and in fact managed to get some of the prizes for me by complaining to the head of that group.  Later a new session was starting and a new woman showed up.  We expressed our concerns to her and she said that things were going to be different, no bring along a friend business. So I went to the first part of the new sessions and at the beginning one of the first things she said was “And bring along a friend...”  I never went back.

The whole thing seems even more sinister as an adult even though I still have some Christian views. Using kids to get other kids in in cases where adults might not easily be able to access a particular family.

2 comments:

Eric said...

Wow. That's underhanded and creepy! Yikes!

Andy E. Nystrom said...

Agreed. As mentioned in a previous blog post, the Kitimat library once gave kids helium balloons saying they wanted a new library (i.e. in a different location). Of course the kids are going to take the balloon no matter what is says. Kids shouldn't be used as pawns.