An email exchange between me & Jeff Sharlet at KillingtheBuddha.com:
(Me) Can we talk about what we talk about when we talk about Christmas to our children? Much obliged.
On Nov 8, 2009, Jeff Sharlet
I'm the only active KtB editor with a kid, and my daughter is seven months old, so we really don't know the answer to this question. What do you talk about when you talk about Christmas to your children?
On Sun, Nov 8, 2009 at 8:14 PM, NYCAlice
I suppose it's just part of the bigger question: how will I talk to my daughter, who's now three, about God? I got religion through total immersion. I went to Catholic school and stuck dried palms behind the crucifix over my bed until I left home to go to a Jesuit university. The Father, Son & Holy Spirit were family, the fabric of my every day.
On the one hand, bringing my daughter up in the Catholic tradition is unthinkable. Yet as damaging as I believe it was for me, I feel uncomfortable keeping her ignorant of its undeniable richness. Trotting out God for Christmas and possibly Easter just feels icky to me. And then there is faith ... and belief ... by ignoring religion now, am I denying her the roots of something more profound? Obviously she'll find spirituality without me. But I think I might feel almost superstitious about closing the door on what was absolutely a way of life for the generations that came before me.
Growing up, my brothers and I were required to attend mass every Sunday (or Saturday night) and Holy Day of Obligation. When I was 18, on the Feast of the Assumption I was badly, tragically hung over. There was no way I was going to make it through that mass without throwing up. So I took a stand and refused to go. It was the worst fight my mother and I ever had. I was seething; my relationship with god was my business, not hers. She said looked me dead in the eye and said, "Don't turn your back on your faith. It's the only thing you ever really have."
What I want to know is, how can I give my daughter the foundations of faith without fucking her up with religion?
On Mon, Nov 9, 2009 at 9:56 AM, Jeff Sharlet
Dear Alice,
The only thing I think I can contribute is the idea that "religion," so widely despised these days -- even the fundamentalists I mainly write about say they are not religious -- is what's worth remembering, if not necessarily holding on to. I don't think you can give anyone faith; anyone who took it unquestioningly would be dangerously gullible. But "religion" is simply history, not faith but facts. And not facts about the afterlife or virgin births, but facts about human institutions, organizations, ideas, convictions, and arguments. Faith denies doubt; religion is nothing but doubt, not least because so much of it is plainly horseshit. At KtB, we're more interested in religion -- the things people do or don't do because they believe or don't believe or give loyalty or refuse it -- than the vast vagueness sheltered from questioning by the term faith. I'll go one step further, though I'm not speaking for KtB here: I think faith may be the opposite of stories. But the great story you tell so perfectly below? That's some true religion.
Best,
Jeff
- - - -
1 comment:
Hmmm. Interesting question. If I remember correctly, Christmas in our half-Episcopalian/half-Jewish house was mostly about...well, presents, but aside from that, it was about a cozy,family traditional feeling. I went to a wonderful Episcopalian convent school, and happily absorbed all the religious teaching, but my evangelically atheist Mom said Christ was just a very nice man but not God. I didn't care. I like the stories and the feeling.
I think kids instictively understand the concept of God and the role myth/stories play in underlining the magic and mystery of that concept. So,in other words? Don't sweat it.
love p
Post a Comment