One of the worst moral offenses of this world is even encouraged strongly by the self-declared guardians of our morality.  This is the routine and even organized indoctrination of children before they are of a maturity to be able to assess what is going on and make up their own minds.

I think rape is about as accurate to describe this as anything.  To impose something one someone else without their informed permission is rape, and doing it to innocent children is to saddle them with a belief system all their life.  It is an outrageous thing to just contemplate.

Religious questions, such as about death or God, as well as political questions and questions about sexuality, need maturity to handle properly, and children do no have that maturity.  Therefore they should properly be answered with, "When you are mature, you will learn about these things and decide for yourself." 

Perhaps too often we force maturity on children, and they are of course eager to assume it, so they do need to be told that they are not mature, and that maturity comes in time slowly, and they must therefore respect their elders, even though many times even the elders are not mature.  Most importantly, teenage and early twenties years are not years of intellectual and emotional maturity.

It is not necessary to threaten a child with a vengeful God or with some magical karmic cycle to get them to be moral beings.  Indeed, such things interferes with true moral behavior.  Most children (although unfortunately we know that a small fraction of the population are sociopathic and thereby absent this instinct) are born with a desire to do what is right.  All they need to learn is how to figure out what is right.

Rules are not the way to go.  A lie may be generally wrong, but there are exceptions when a lie is even the morally essential way to go, such as to prevent hurting someone.  That is the key -- harm and help.  Acts that harm others are wrong, all else being equal.