Polly’s Story

I am sending you this anecdote from my daughter’s primary school experience of Scripture some years ago. Hannah did go to Scripture classes even though we are not a religious family and I had offered her the ‘out’. However, she did not relish the thought of the boredom that was the alternative, saying that the non Scripture kids’ time was akin to detention ie a punishment. So she went to Scripture led by someone from the local church. One day she came home in tears because she had had her ‘work’ marked as wrong. The question was “What is the greatest problem facing the world today: poverty, the environment or sin.” Hannah reasoned that the environment had to be the biggest – if the environment was fixed, then everyone would have enough to eat, poverty be alleviated and the world would be a better place, where people did not need to do wrong to get enough to live. She was only seven, so somewhat simplistic in her thinking but not nearly as simplistic as the person from the church who marked her question wrong. The ‘correct’ answer was, of course, sin. My assurances that there was no ‘correct’ answer and that I applauded her excellent reasoning did not reassure her. I am happy to say that Hannah as an adult still ‘tells it like it is’ but how do those children fare who have no home influences to counteract such nonsense.

Polly Price