Norris

Emily Norris
Ms. Morton
UWRT 1101
17 November 2016
Dear reader,
This extended prose piece is an inquiry paper about my research, my
growth, and my shortcomings. My topic deals with religion and the impact
that is has on developing children from youth to adulthood. Through this
paper it is my goal to tell about my research process and the ups and downs
that I had. As I went through my research it became more and more obvious
that there was no right answer to my question. After looking through various
sources I have found evidence to support that religion can be both helpful
and harmful, mostly depending on the way it is delivered to children. My
audience would be anyone who wants to know more about my writing
process as they are looking through my portfolio.

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Extended Prose Piece: Inquiry Paper

I have learned a great deal since the day we were told to pick an
inquiry topic. At first I had a very hard time choosing a topic. I researched
everything from mental illnesses to the effect of children in fatherless
homes. I was overwhelmed with the amount of topics that my head was
cloudy and I just wanted something that was easy. However, as it got closer
and closer to the date we had to choose it hit me- religion! I am very strong
in my faith and I am passionate about the topic so I knew I wouldnt get tired
of writing about this/studying it. After much self-deliberation I chose to
narrow my topic down to focus on the connection between religion and
development. Many questions arose such as How does expressing religion in
the home affect a childs development? and Does religion make people a
better person? This project was great because it really challenged my
thinking in both research and also in life. I was surprised at the types of
information that I found as I was going through the research process. After a
lot of researching I found that there is definitely not a right answer to my
question. As it turns out, religion in the home can affect children in both
negative and positive ways. It was very interesting for me to read about both
sides of things. I myself did not grow up in a Christian home. My parents
never spoke about God or their beliefs on the subject. We never went to
church and my parents never sent me to vacation bible school. Looking
back, this is so funny to me now because I am very religious. On the flip side,

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my best friend Eva grew up in a fairly religious home and even went to a
Christian school from Pre-K to sixth grade. She now does not practice her
faith nor does she ever bring up religion in a conversation like she used to.
All of this has really made me wonder how much (or how little) of an impact
church can make as a child so I was very eager to get started on this project.

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I love an article I found by David Krueger that set me up for the rest of my research. His
text titled Christianity and Violence discusses the history of violence and Christianity and how
it goes against that of what the bible actually says. Krueger references Matthew 5:39 that says
But if anyone strikes you on the right cheek, turn the other also. Krueger goes into more detail
about the life of Jesus Christ as he mentions that Jesus was never violent towards others even
when he was condemned to death and brutally attacked. Krueger references the publication of
The City of God by St. Augustine and his opinions that say God was actually talking about
inward feelings of violence rather than physical violence when he said to turn the other cheek.
St. Augustine goes on to say that violence is okay if it is just (referring to Christians being able to
join the Roman military). Krueger brings up more recent events when he talks about Reverend
Paul Hill, who in 1994 murdered an abortion provider saying that this was just because he was
saving hundreds of babies lives. Krueger ties up his article talking about all of the nonviolent
Christian movements and groups i.e. The Religious Society of Friends and that pacifism does
not have to mean passive-ism. I love this source because it sets me up for so many questions. I
can look at all of this history and these specific acts of violence stemmed from Christianity and
act myself how child development may have played a role in each one. What was the household
of Reverend Paul Hill like when he was growing up? Could his upbringing have a large effect on
the extreme opinions he formed as an adult that led him to commit murder?
I wanted to start my research by looking for the positive effects of
children growing up in a religious home. I found many helpful articles that
made the claim that having a basis of religion is good for kids. An article I
found from Live Science talks about a study done by a Mississippi State
University sociologist that "asked the parents and teachers of more than

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16,000 kids, most of them first-graders, to rate how much self control they
believed the kids had, how often they exhibited poor or unhappy behavior
and how well they respected and worked with their peers." They then
compared these answers to how often parents claimed to attend church
worship services and talked about religion in the home. The study found that
demonstrating apparent religion in a child's life is beneficial for the child
because religious organizations often provide social support to parents, tend
to be self-sacrificing and pro-family, and give parenting a new kind of
significance. UV sociologist W. Bradford Wilcox says that for many religious
parents, getting their kids into heaven is more important than getting their
kids into Harvard". This is very interesting to me as it puts this topic from a
parents perspective. It really made me consider how I will raise my children
and how that will affect them in school and elsewhere.
I found two different articles that touched on the fact that children who
grow up with religion are more resilient to overcoming problems. Michael
Ungar writes about children he observed in Nepal and mentions the abuse of
the Aboriginal children in Canada, The United States, and Australia. He says
that in general, religion makes children very resilient to over coming
problems depending on their situation.
Nancy Nason-Clarks article titled When Terror Strikes at Home: The
Interface between Religion and Domestic Violence also touches on this.
Nancy explains how people who grow up in religious households can better
cope with hardships ie. being victims of violence. As the title would imply,

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her article mainly focuses on domestic violence within Christian and nonChristian relationships. She discusses many studies both in America and in
other countries that show there is no specific evidence of Christian husbands
being more violent than non-Christian husbands. She does not say, however,
if non-Christian husbands are more likely to be violent. Nancy also covers
how this domestic violence in turn affects the spouse who falls victim to it.
She says that people of faith are able to better become empowered to face
problems and flee from abuse while those who are not so spiritual typically
do not have that type of support that they need to cope with hardships.
Next, I researched negative effects on children who grow up in a
religious household. I can admit that when I started this project I was a little
more closed minded than before. I had already made up my mind that
children who grow up in a religious home are often more well off than
children who dont. I quickly learned through my research that this was not
always the case. There are so many scenarios where children can end up
mean, judgmental, or violent. It really comes down to how the parents
demonstrate religion and how the parents live their lives according to their
religion. One article by Harriet Sherwood of The Guardian talks about a
study that took place in several universities around that world. Researchers
studied Christian, Muslim, and non-religious children and if there is a
relationship between religion and morality. Almost 1,200 children, aged
between 5 and 12, in the US, Canada, China, Jordan, Turkey and South Africa
participated in the study and the conclusion was shocking. Despite the

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popular assumption that most children with faith are more altruistic towards
others, this study found that having a basis of religion actually gives children
a sense that they can be more judging of those who are different or who
behave badly.
I also found one article that looks at the extremist side of things. Aaron
Hughes writes about extremist group Islamic State and how their violence is
completely stemmed by their extreme views of religion. This led me to
realize that perhaps my research was too broad. There are so many different
religions and also so many different ways of expressing them. Of course the
majority of children who grow up in the Middle East under the influence of
ISIS are going to turn out violent as that is all they are taught.
I was definitely surprised at the kind of research that I did and
did not find during this process. Finding valid information was definitely a lot
harder than I expected it would be. Most things I found were based off of
opinions or religious or non-religious people who have their own testimonies.
I assumed that there would be more research listing the positive effects of
religion on children but I was wrong. In fact, the first three sources I found
were not about the benefits of religion but instead were negative and
describing the personalities that children have. Harriet Sherwood of The
Guardian straight up said that children who live in religious homes are
meaner than their secular counterparts. While I dont think this is
necessarily true of elementary-aged children, I definitely see this in high
school aged kids. In my experience working with high schoolers in Young Life,

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I find that many of my girls who are strong in their faith are very judgmental
of their peers who make bad decisions ie. the kids who party on the
weekends. While I do believe that the type of religion kids grow up in can
cause kids to be mean or judgmental, I think that teenagers who really
understand The Gospel will know that the Bible says to be accepting and love
others because none of us are perfect.
The positive effects of religion that I found mostly focused on the fact
that people can better cope as kids and as adults when they have a basis of
religion in their lives. This can be due to having a support system in a church
or elsewhere or it could also be due to the fact that people believe in a
higher power (God) who controls their lives and watches over them.
I came cross a problem while writing this extended prose piece that I
have never encountered before. I had one source found on the American
Humanist Association website that basically took a study about religion and
proved it to be not so credible. This source was included in my annotated
bibliography where I critiqued and summarized it. As I was writing this piece I
wanted to include this source to talk more about it and I see that it has been
deleted from the web page. I tried getting to the article by clicking on the
link, looking for it on Google again, manually looking for it on the American
Humanist Associations website, etc. I have never had this issue before and
Im not sure what to make of it. I tried looking up the staff on the website to
find my author and I couldnt find her name. Perhaps the website decided to
delete it for some reason or if maybe the author of the article, Jean Mercer

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quit working for this association and therefore her writings were removed
from the site.
I have learned so much about myself through this project both as an
individual and academically. I realized that I could have turned out to be a
completely different kid had I never found religion. Although I didnt grow up
in a religious home, my friend brought my to church with her in middle
school and I have had a lot of supportive adults in my life who have made
my faith grow exponentially. I also found Young Life in high school, a
Christian ministry for high school kids that completely changed my life (I am
now a Young Life leader myself). Thankfully, I am proud of who I am as a
woman of God. I am also extremely proud of that fact that I am accepting of
all individuals no matter who they are which is something I cannot say for all
Christians. Academically I have learned a lot and really challenged myself to
be above and beyond in my research. In the past, I would have chosen the
first five sources that came up on Google regardless of if they were good or
credible. I have learned how to truly dig through an article, journal, etc. to
see what it is I can use and what I cant. I have also realized just how little I
retain about MLA or APA every time I write a paper for a class. It is so
frustrating having to reference Purdue Owl all the time because I cant
remember how to cite or how to format a paper in Word. I dont know
anything that could help this besides writing papers more often.
I think that I may have benefitted from narrowing my project to only
focusing on Christianity. I had so much to research that I was really all over

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the place and disorganized in my research. Part of me feels like going too
narrow would have been even harder, however, since there isnt much
information based on numbers around this topic.
In my own opinion, regarding Christianity, people who grow up around
non-Denominational Christianity grow up to be more joyful, more positive
people who are better able to cope through the hardships of life. While there
isnt really information to back this up, I have seen in my own family and in
the families of my friends that stricter forms of religion and Christianity leave
children feeling trapped. Stricter forms of religion also tend to have beliefs
that are skewed from that of what the Bible says. Non-denominational
Christianity solely focuses on what the Bible says and nothing else. If people
truly focus on the Bible they would see that The Lord says to love and accept
others and to not condemn people for their sins because we are all sinners. It
also depends a lot on the way in which people interpret the Bible. The Bible
was written so long ago and in my opinion it was made to be interpreted for
the time today and not as if we are still living in B.C. times.
I dont think there will ever be enough evidence either way to say that
religion will affect a child the same way every time. I have really enjoyed
researching this topic and I hope to continue doing so in the future.

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Works Cited
Hughes, Aaron W. If Islamic State is Based on Religion, Why is it so Violent? The
Conversation. 17. Feb. 2016, http://theconversation.com/if-islamic-state-is-based-onreligion-why-is-it-so-violent-52070. Accessed 10 Oct. 2016.
Krueger, David. "Christianity and Violence." Religion Compass, vol. 7, no. 7, 2013, pp.
243-251, http://web.b.ebscohost.com/ehost/pdfviewer/pdfviewer?sid=f030b9c7-c6af4f4d-9941-7b37f22aeaea%40sessionmgr106&vid=1&hid=128. Accessed 08 Nov. 2016.
Mercer, Jean. Religion and Child Development: Absence of Evidence in a Report by
Bartkowski et al. American Humanist Association, 28 April. 2007,
http://americanhumanist.org/Parenting/mercer. Accessed 08 Nov. 2016.
Nason-Clark, Nancy. "When Terror Strikes at Home: the Interface between Religion and
Domestic Violence." Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion, vol. 43, no. 3, 2004,
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.14685906.2004.00236.x/abstract;jsessionid=5CD3008353CA0CF8F6D747953C363CCC.f03t
04. Accessed 08 Nov. 2016.
Sherwood, Harriet. "Religious Children Are Meaner than Their Secular Counterparts,
Study Finds." The Guardian, 06 Nov. 2015,
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/nov/06/religious-children-less-altruisticsecular-kids-study. Accessed 10 Oct. 2016.
Ungar, Michael. "Does Religion Make Children Resilient?" Psychology Today, 26 June
2014, https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/nurturing-resilience/201406/does-religionmake-children-resilient. Accessed 08 Nov. 2016.
Wenner, Melinda. Study: Religion is Good for Kids. Live Science, 1 Jan. 2008,
http://www.livescience.com/1465-study-religion-good-kids.html. Accessed 10 Oct. 2016.