Parenting in Tolerant Scandinavia

DON VINCENZO writes:
A while back, my daughter sent me a news story about the case of the Bodnariu family in Norway, who have had their children removed from their home by the government.
There are some interesting aspects to the situation. As was described to me innumerable times when I lived in Norway, the average Norwegian goes to the Erastian (State) Lutheran Church three times in his life: when confirmed; when married, and when he dies.
You will note that the father of these children is Romanian; the mother, Norwegian, but the real problem the officials of the Norwegian nanny-state have with them is not their origins, but their intensely held religious beliefs, which they choose to instill in their offspring. Norway, like Sweden, now can remove a child from its biologial parents for a mulitude of reasons, but the use of corporal punishment and insisting the children are Biblically educated are just two. If the Norwegian welfare unit believes that there are “too many” children, they can, legally, remove the children on the assumption that they will not be taken care of properly. How, and under what conditions, they reach that conclusion cannot easily be explained, for the power of the nanny-state has far reaching implications, most of them.
There are now tens of thousands of Muslims living in Norway, many with large families. My question is whether or not the same officials of the nanny-state will be as attentive to “remove” Muslim children as they apparently are in doing so to Christian ones? (more…)




