I am becoming increasingly alarmed at the occult practices that are being introduced to my children in public school and even in kindergarten.  As momentum increases to try to remove Christian Religious Education from public schools, it alarms me that I see the pagan influences increasing.

My daughter is in grade 4 and my son in grade 1.  Every year so far there has been a battle with regards to this issue.

When my son was in his last term of kindergarten he had a substitute teacher for the last few weeks to cover maternity leave.  She had the kids sit in a circle and pass around a stick.  This stick had a string attached to the end of it with a feather attached to the string.  She asked them to wish for a pet as they held the stick.  She also practiced visualization and meditation with them.  She would get them to visualise their parents as tiny and in the palms of their own hands as they said some sort of mantra exerting their own will over their parents.  When my husband and I found out about this we were extremely alarmed.  We complained to the kindergarten.  They could see nothing wrong with what she was doing and said she was encouraging “imagination” etc.  It was only when we threatened his permanent removal from the centre that they arranged a meeting with us and they agreed to stop this kind of “teaching”.  These kids were 4 years old at the time.

I have had to go up to school when my daughter was in grade one and meet with her teacher as I heard that she was about to start reading a famous story about witches to the class.  I requested that she consider not reading the book, but if she were to go ahead with it that my daughter be removed from the class whilst she read the story.  She decided to not go ahead with it.

In grade two my daughter’s teacher began leading them through guided meditation and visualization as they lay on the floor.

In grade four this practice still continues in her classroom but, praise God, after much prayer about this the teacher has now given the children the option to “opt out” of it.  My daughter now giggles and chats quietly with a friend or reads a book as it goes on.

A “reflections” garden is now being planned and designed for the school with winding pathways and orbs.  Maybe I am getting overly alarmed, but this to me also sounds a bit worrying.

There seems to me to be a double-standard here – get rid of Christian education, remove the history of our Judeo-Christian heritage here in Australia, but practices from another religion such as Zen Buddhism or Hinduism are acceptable.

I know that nature abhors a vacuum, and so the removal of Christianity in any form from our schools will have to be replaced with something else.

My husband and I feel we are really left with no choice but to pull the kids out and put them in a Christian school.  But what about those families who cannot afford this option?

Has anyone else experienced anything similar?  Would love to hear any feedback.