My girlfriend is a scientologist.... I'm not...

[robvalue]

Hello there, welcome to the forum Thank you for sharing your story.

This is always a very tricky situation. I can only offer advice based on my experience and observations. I used to date someone who was religious, and it slowly became more and more of a problem. I know now that I could not devote my life to someone who takes religion at all seriously, it would drive me to despair.

It is great that you are having these thoughts before having children. That is about the only decision that cannot be undone. I would say you need to really thrash it out, every detail of how raising your kids would work, before you even consider it. Leaving anything to chance, to hope of reasonableness or the confidence that you'll be able to compromise is extremely dangerous.

My overall advice is don't have kids with her unless you are really, really sure she is going to allow your kids total freedom of thought. I find it hard to believe that anyone who is deeply into any religion is likely to stick to this. It's too deeply ingrained, and they often can't differentiate reality from mythology. Occasionally people will prove me wrong, of course. And it's gonna be up to you to make that judgement call. But on the whole, I don't like the odds, and the risk of indoctrination (child abuse) is high. So you gotta be as sure as you can be. Religion is by its very nature deceptive and controlling.

Of course I'm speaking extremely generally here. I have heard many stories similar to yours where it has gone horribly wrong. No disrespect to your girlfriend, but people can lie, even if it's just to themselves. And if she can't help herself in the end but to push this crap on them, it's gonna be really bad. Especially as if it ever came to custody battles, the mother always seems to have the trump cards.

The other possibility is adoption, which I personally would love more people to consider. That way, if things go wrong, at least you haven't created a new life to get fucked up. And I think you'd have more power if things went wrong, as she wouldn't have the blood mother innate rights. And it could be re homed again altogether as a last resort. Of course that's far from ideal, and you should still thrash everything out, but it limits the overall damage while helping overpopulation, and giving a child in need a home.