It really really saddens me knowing that many children were raised in a household where religion was forced on them. My thinking might be extreme, but to me that's kind of like child abuse. Even though I feel privileged that I was raised with a mom who was fairly religious, but didn't force it on me... It still makes me so sad knowing that others had to go through a childhood where religion was forced upon them. My dad, who didn't live with me, is an atheist. He also didn't force his beliefs on me. I didn't know he was an atheist until high school. My grandmother is VERY religious and kinda of pushed it on me, but she did not raise me.
This is how I think it should be. Raising children to have a mind of their own and make their own decisions about what they believe when they become old enough to do so.
That is not how religion works. If you have your child baptized you are essentially committing yourself to brainwash your child into following your beliefs which your parents parents had probably done at the time they baptized your parents.
I was lucky, my Mom was a Brethren, who are Anabaptist like te Amish and Mennonites, who don’t baptize children. You must choose baptism into the faith as an adult. My Dad was raised Methodist, but I believe at heart he was an Agnostic, so he differed to her belief and neither me nor my sister were baptized. Mom occasionally now voices regret for that decision since both of us are Atheists and will not be meeting her in heaven .
I was as lucky as you were. My father grew up in a Methodist family and my mother in a Catholic, but they did not practice the religion, nor they forced it to us. I went to a Scottish Presbyterian school and I obviously went to the Sunday school and daily 'Scripture Union' but no pressure from home, it was my own choice. Then around seventeen I quickly started growing apart from anything religious and became an ardent atheist.