Do you ever say the wrong thing??

There's quite a bit to unpack there, and the whole situation is rather ambiguous. By local faith groups, to whom are you referring? Are the children in question already being raised within the religion of these groups? Where do your friends fit into this situation? Are the parents of the children aware of this idea?

Obviously I can't ask who you are in this situation due to anonymity rules, but as it's unclear what your position may be in regards to these local faith groups, it's hard to say how appropriate your idea is. It sounds like there's something in there that your friends find objectionable. Could you tell us what they expressed to you about it?

Without knowing more, it's hard to really assess the situation to know what to say about it.

Thanks for your reply. I wanted to pay for communities to write booklets for kids to have and also swap and share that celebrate the best and good bits about it their faith, and challenged stereotypes and herald historical heroes and living members of the community who have shown universally acknowledged virtues (humiiity, charity, love, compassion, patience, temperance, diligence, forgiveness etc). I met and spoke to an imam who was realy excited at the idea and also went to a synagogue to see if they’d be interested (who were also really keen!

When I told a friend who is a teacher she said it was really offensive for me to do this as I am a white middle class secular woman. I couldn’t understand why -I thought I saw a gap for a local initiative that could promote unity of different faiths and backgrounds but she felt I was being prejudicial and bigoted and islamophobic. My husband then agreed.

I can, and have accepted I have got this wrong. I don’t want to hurt or offend anyone-quite the reverse. But I can’t claim to understand it. 

I find social situations so incredibly difficult to navigate and feel despondent and can’t see the point in trying any more. Why has society made this so complicated - so complicated and so lacking in faith and trust in peoples ability to be well meaninged? The hypersensitivity to causing potential offence I myself find upsetting and offensive.

how can I ever advise my autistic daughter how to navigate the world when someone seeing an unkindness, deciding the pay a lot of money towards helping parties involved fix that unkindness is apparently offensive!? When the parties themselves seemed keen and thought it was a good intitiative!? How can life be so complicated!?  

I so often feel conspicuous that I don’t say or act in the right way. These sorts of things just make me want to hide away forever and never meet anyone or go anywhere or do anything as this makes me feel hurt, untrusted, scared, and stupid. 

I know this isn’t a sensible solution. But I suppose I just need to vent and would appreciate knowing if I’m not the only one to find adult life so im possible. I feel I fail at every turn at the moment. I keep offending people when I am trying to be as kind as I can, and honest at the same time.

please, if you have any experience of putting your foot in it, or doing the wrong thing, please let me know I’m not alone.

Hi and welcome to the forum. If you could change your user name from an NAS number to a nickname, that would help us recognise you more easily.

In reply to your post, I cannot find anything wrong with your idea. The teacher's claim that it is offensive due to your identity is racist (as racism is discrimination/ prejudice against people based on their race or ethnicity) and secular phobic (I think I just made that one up, but it does fit)

It can be difficult in schools to navigate teaching in personal and social education. When I trained as a teaching assistant 30 odd years ago I had to do a project, and as I had identified poor self esteem as a barrier to learning I wanted to work on that with individual children with special educational needs. However the head teacher told me that was impossible, as PSE could only be taught by a fully trained class teacher, to the whole class. She did take on board my ideas and implemented it in classes, but I was only allowed to assist class teachers with that, and had to choose something else for my TA project. 

Were you trying to get your booklets into schools? It is difficult, as faith teaching has to follow a set curriculum and process. Maybe talk to the Imam and mosque leader again, also contact local church leaders, and see if they have any other ideas - maybe the booklets could be used for Sunday schools or holiday clubs?

Hi and welcome to the forum. If you could change your user name from an NAS number to a nickname, that would help us recognise you more easily.

In reply to your post, I cannot find anything wrong with your idea. The teacher's claim that it is offensive due to your identity is racist (as racism is discrimination/ prejudice against people based on their race or ethnicity) and secular phobic (I think I just made that one up, but it does fit)

It can be difficult in schools to navigate teaching in personal and social education. When I trained as a teaching assistant 30 odd years ago I had to do a project, and as I had identified poor self esteem as a barrier to learning I wanted to work on that with individual children with special educational needs. However the head teacher told me that was impossible, as PSE could only be taught by a fully trained class teacher, to the whole class. She did take on board my ideas and implemented it in classes, but I was only allowed to assist class teachers with that, and had to choose something else for my TA project. 

Were you trying to get your booklets into schools? It is difficult, as faith teaching has to follow a set curriculum and process. Maybe talk to the Imam and mosque leader again, also contact local church leaders, and see if they have any other ideas - maybe the booklets could be used for Sunday schools or holiday clubs?