Deciding how to educate their children is part of their religion. If you tell them "you must send your children to a public school" you are limiting their ability to practice their religion.

And this isn't just an ad-hoc excuse... this has been true for a long time. For example the puritans in this country highly valued public education. They thought all children should know how to read so that they could read and understand the Bible (a direct consequence of their sola scriptura reformation roots).

So suppose you come from that background (like many Reformed and Evangelical Christians today), and the top priority in the education of your children is that they know the Bible: "The fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom" and all that.

Well children won't be getting that in a public school in America. And more than that the social institutions in this country (at all levels) are dead-set opposed to those kinds of traditional religious doctrines. (parents might point to things like evolution, sexual education, etc..)

Now I understand that from a secular perspective this looks ridiculous. That line of reasoning isn't even something I would necessarily agree with. All I'm advocating here is a bit of tolerance as well as a little bit of knowledge about your fellow citizens. The very type of people who are predisposed to bypass the public school system for religious reasons, are also the type of people who won't bow to government pressure. You'll have to lock them up and take their children away from them before they'll stop. (There is abundant historical precedent for this)

As to your point about Catholic schools... do you think that a Catholic school ought to be a place where other religious teaching is tolerated? Do you think such a school ought to be required to teach Islam or Protestantism for example? Or, to take a popular topic at the moment, should a church be required to perform same-sex marriages?

That seems like a very strange definition of tolerance to me... Catholic schools ought to teach Catholicism, and because the government doesn't require you to send your children to that school you have the freedom to educate your children how you see fit.

Yes that means parents will sometimes choose badly and children will suffer because of it. But that's the price we pay for living in a free society.

>> Deciding how to educate their children is part of their religion.

herein lies my naivety i suppose. :)

>> As to your point about Catholic schools... do you think that a Catholic school ought to be a place where other religious teaching is tolerated? Do you think such a school ought to be required to teach Islam or Protestantism for example? Or, to take a popular topic at the moment, should a church be required to perform same-sex marriages?

no, my point was simply that public and Catholic schools were my only options. and fortunately one of them was suitable for my beliefs (whatever they may have been).

i didn't intend to suggest that forcing public schooling was the best, or even a good solution. but i'm wondering how we extract the logic from that argument without alienating anyone.