THE British Humanist Association has found support from an unexpected quarter after launching a series of billboard advertisements urging parents not to “label” their children with their own religious faith.

The posters are part of a campaign to challenge state-funded faith schools and come roughly 10 months after the controversial atheist bus-poster campaign.

The adverts, unveiled on Wednesday, include the slogan: “Please don’t label me. Let me grow up and choose for myself.”

Campaign supporters hope the posters will discourage people from assuming that children share their parents’ beliefs.

David Warden, chairman of Dorset Humanists, said: “Obviously we welcome this new campaign to highlight the premature ‘labeling’ of children as Christian, Muslim and so on before they are old enough to decide for themselves. “However, we recognize that it’s impossible to raise children in a complete vacuum and that parents will want to pass on their beliefs and values to their children, whether they derive from a religion or from a freethinking tradition like Humanism.”

The Evangelical Alliance told me this week they agree that children should not be labelled. Justin Thacker, head of theology at the Evangelical Alliance, said: “It is great to see that the Humanists are now agreeing that children have to make their own decisions about faith. “Evangelicals do not believe that God has any grandchildren, only children. You are not a Christian simply because your parents are. Every child or adult has to make up their own minds about the reality of God.”