Raising Richmond: “Do you know about Jesus?”
I have practiced in my head many times how my husband and I will handle all the tough talks with our daughter, like drugs, sex, and gender politics. But the hardest one for me–religion–is up first.
After only two days of preschool, while my daughter was getting dressed in the morning, I heard her shout “Jesus.” At first I thought she was just copying one of my casual swears. Then she sang something like: “I need Jesus, you need Jesus, we need Jesus.”
Although the word “Christian” is all over her school paperwork, I hadn’t really thought about what it would mean to enroll our daughter in a Christian preschool until then.
We knew the school was affiliated with a church when she enrolled, and I did ask about how much that influenced the curriculum. I was so in love with the school that I don’t think the answer would have mattered, but I wanted to know.
Despite celebrating Christmas, I do not identify as a Christian.1 My husband grew up Catholic and still identifies as one. We have a non-christened child. I know what it’s like growing up without religion and how confusing it is to navigate that world alone as a child, and I suspect that she will go through some faith-based confusion and searching. Probably not in preschool, but eventually. When that time in her life arrives, we will let her decide what she believes without comment, take her to whatever church she wants to explore, and (this is specific to me) will not call Jesus “Jebus” around her.
Does that sound like a cop out? It’s the most practical pathway I can think of. I don’t want to force atheism on a person any more than I’d want someone to force their beliefs on me. It’s such a personal issue that I can only leave my child open to the options and answer her questions as fairly as I can. I’m as curious about how this works out as anyone. I anticipate having tearful conversations with my child about how she’s afraid I’m going to Hell.
My reservation is that my daughter is experiencing something heavy and huge when she attends a church service twice a month, and I’m not there to experience it with her (I will be attending it with her soon). But since she also has sat through funerals and weddings in churches and had no follow up remarks, I’m not sure how much of an impact it will make.
For now, she’s getting instruction about God, Jesus, and their lessons, and culturally that seems important. Whether she ends up a believer, the Biblical references can only enhance her cultural understanding, like having basic Shakespeare knowledge or seeing The Wizard of Oz and Seinfeld. I’m embarrassed by my lack of knowledge about Bible stories.2 I watched Noah with my husband recently, and it took everything in me to not keep asking him “Did that happen in the book?”
Jesus has come up a few times in the last month. She has a choreographed tune she’ll sing about how “Jesus’ love is bubbling over” that is pretty catchy. She asked me if I knew Jesus the other day. I just said yes, and then she explained to me who he was (he is a man who helps people or who helps people to help people–it was a fuzzy explanation, and apparently her dad was the one who gave her the bio). When I asked her what her first school time church service was like, she said “It was a show.” I do sort of expect her to pass over a handmade flier with macaroni glued to it next time she asks me if I know Jesus. Or maybe Jesus doesn’t register as anything heavier than when she learns about other people in songs or stories. It makes it easier for me that Jesus was a real person, so I don’t feel like I should talk about Him like we’re talking about Santa or the Easter Bunny.3
Clearly I’m biased and don’t want a religious child because I don’t have the tools to support it. I’m afraid that it would create a separation between me and her, and it could maybe change the dynamic between all of us if she and her dad turn churchy and I stay behind. Or would I pretend to be into it just so we could all go as a family? Maybe I’m not as open-minded as I say that I am, but I don’t want to forfeit my claim in being useful at all when it comes to spiritual growth.
She’s only going to be at that school for one year (two years, tops), and, in addition to minimal religious instruction, she’s getting lessons, experiences, and exposure to things that are going to give her a head start on being a good student and (not that she wasn’t already) an empathetic person. I think her excitement about school and learning is the more important takeaway.
If Jesus becomes something other than a thing to sing about, I hope she’ll let me know what she’s thinking. And I hope that I won’t mess it up for her.
- I don’t need to go into it reasons why, and this is not meant to be read as an attack on Christians. Good people are good people, no matter what inspires them. ↩
- I know this can be easily remedied, but it’s not like when I finish one book I think “I’m ready to read the Bible! That sounds like fun.” It took me more than a year to finish Moby-Dick. I would never finish reading the Bible. ↩
- I’m not sure my daughter could really believe that I let some man or giant rabbit into our house in the middle of the night when I don’t even answer the doorbell during the day. ↩
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Kelly Gerow
Kelly Gerow lives and writes in Richmond. She probably does other stuff in Richmond, too.
Notice: Comments that are not conducive to an interesting and thoughtful conversation may be removed at the editor’s discretion.
You are making a huge mistake (IMHO). Get her enrolled in another preschool where
religious indoctrination is not taking place. You allowing these people to corrupt your daughter’s mind.
I am a Christian. Not all religious teachings are agreed upon by Christians. If the school has a chaplain, I would ask for an appointment. See the person and ask for information on what is taught about Jesus. Explain you aren’t a believer and that you just want to understand this better. Whether you are a believer or not, it would be good to read the Bible, if for no other reason but it is the foundation of our laws and the world does relate to it. If you would like to understand the Bible or Jesus better, I offer my time personally to you.
I appreciate your honesty in writing this paper. I hope you and your husband continue your open dialogue with your daughter. One of the most important lessons we can teach is to have an open heart. The Lords speaks to whom He wants when He wants.
Kelly, what a beautifully honest post. I couldn’t agree with Lena more.
BTW, its okay to raise your kid(s) without religion. You won’t break them. In fact, they might turn our better for it. Traditions, morals, and being “good” are not the province of religion, they are the foundation of being human.
Kelly, Do you really, REALLY love Pumpkin Spice Lattes? What about yoga pants?
For the record, children will believe the wildest cultural stories without encouragement. I had a gentle discussion about Santa and the Easter Bunny with my seven year old this year, because she was pretty certain they were real and I was personally uncomfortable with the lie. The challenge in that route is trying to do it in a respectful enough way to keep them from destroying everyone else’s fantasies (we will see how that plays out in a few months).
More to the point of the article, raising a child in an environment that is overwhelmingly Christian can be challenging. It’s always nice to hear from other conscientious non-believing parents doing the same.
Ooooohh girl, you are braver than I am for writing and publishing this. Next step, tell people what you think about vaccines. That’ll be a riot =D.
But really, I appreciated your honesty here. The part about being afraid of the separation it might cause… I had never thought of it, but I would bet that that fear, being separated from the group, or distanced from loved ones is at the basis for many a conversion.
And in case anyone is inspired to say ugly things to you, in response to this article, allow me to remind you that you are creative, witty, thoughtful, entertaining and probably healthfully thin (I am just assuming, but it seems appropriate!) Keep up the good stuff!
Thanks, Hoobie, for humbly pointing out the “huge mistake” my wife and I are making (sarcasm here, and not meant to offend but to make a larger point, which is…) We did our research into the school, know families who attend it, and found a lot to admire (particularly in their acceptance and celebration of diverse families). The huge mistake, in my opinion, would be to disallow our daughter’s exposure to any way of thinking or believing. That is indoctrination as well, just from a different tack. But, like you others have stated, there is a lot at stake in raising or not raising a child in faith. My approach, which my wife (the writer of this column) agrees with, is to let her explore and come to develop her own sense of self and to find herself within or without a church. And exposure is necessary for that to happen. The approach Hoobie seems to want us to take is akin to not going into a library because they might have a copy of The Story of O, or something.
Anyway…she loves it. And she’s happy. And that’s what counts, right?
I love this article and I love your thoughtful approach to your daughter and religion. This may be a good time for her to learn that there are many people in this world, and many of them have different views. Perhaps she can take away the real message that transcends organized religion, that we all must take care of and love each other.
As a private preschool director:
There are lots of great, private, non-secular preschools you could have chosen to enroll your child. To claim that you did your research is not really a fair assessment. If you had done your research you would have known that you had lots of options outside of faith-based approaches to child care. Instead of taking your child where all your friends go, you should have looked at places that actually work for your family. Should your Christian preschool decide that you and your family aren’t pious enough, they may suggest you find another school anyway.
I am not religious either and would never consider a religious preschool, so I’m having a hard time understanding your justification for doing so, especially if you’re uncomfortable with your decision. Your child’s formative years shouldn’t be an experiment. Don’t underestimate the power of indoctrination.
Good on you all for essentially giving your daughter a choice. As a child, my parents tried to force religion on me, and force me to participate in church activities that i did not want to join in on. All this did was strain the parent/child relationship, and tainted my thoughts towards organized religion.
Thank you, Kelly, for your honesty here. Both your inclination to think so deeply about this situation *and* your willingness to expose your daughter different ideas will have nothing but a positive influence on your relationship with her and her experience in the world. You’re doing a great job. Don’t let anyone tell you different.
I am right there with you Kelly. My little dude is attending A religious preschool/daycare this year and The mom part of me is worried he will take up religion and decide I am a heathen. I freaked. Then decided to view the religious part as if he is a foreign exchange student in another country, let’s say France. He will learn a ton about an amazing culture and hopefully be more aware and empathetic to views not his own. If he decided to be French, sure it would be weird, but it will make for lively conversation over drinks when he is older. (Where I will be drinking the devil’s whiskey to his saintly water.)
“The approach Hoobie seems to want us to take is akin to not going into a library because they might have a copy of The Story of O, or something.”
No, not at all.
Your daughter is a preschooler. She doesn’t have the maturity or intellectual capability to evaluate the ideas being presented to her. Your approach is better suited for an older child.
This is all interesting feedback. There are a lot of parallels in the comments here to the comments to a recent column I wrote about RPS schools.
I maybe misrepresented that it is not a Christian school, just run through a church. Sort of like when Paramount owned Kings Dominion. There was the Wayne’s World section and Star Trek characters walking around, but otherwise it was just King’s Dominion so you could still get a good KD experience no matter how you felt about the Hurler (terrible analogy).
I do not feel like I am experimenting with my child. I am curious about how everything she does will affect her, and if I over-worry about things. I’ll be sure to update everyone in 25 years to let you know how she turns out.
My parents didn’t raise my sister and I on any particular religion – they were Protestant and Methodist. I went to Episcopal school from 4th to 6th, Catholic from 7th to 12th and Methodist for college. There were times when it was very confusing and I had a number of questions which I had a hard time finding satisfying answers.
Sometimes I wished that my parents had involved us with a church of some kind but more for the sense of community that I imagine there is around a church. But it was interesting to be exposed to a number of different Christian teachings. As an adult I’ve done a lot of reading about different religions. I don’t follow any one in particular but I do try and adhere to Buddhist teachings.
I wouldn’t imagine exposing your daughter to a number of different cultures is a bad thing, especially as the world is “shrinking”. She may have a lot of questions and you may or may not have any answers but I would think that would be a wonderful opportunity to explore them together.
You are awesome. Thanks for sharing. It’s a risk as it is one of the few forms of allowed discrimination in this society. Atheist can’t even hold office in certain states. So much for our enlightened society. I think that letting your child choose when they are able to fully grasp the concepts is the way to go. It’s so easy to sell an ark and cute animals but more difficult to comprehend a god with infantile rage slaughtering millions of innocents. It took me thirty years to look critically at the book but reading it, learning about all of it’s mistakes and how it was put together by councils of men during dark times in human history, plus the violence throughout, thr torture of Job, and reading Leviticus was the quickest way to atheism for me. Stand up, speak out! God is not great.
@Hoobie respectfully, I don’t think you’ve taken the time to consider Richard L’s point: “The huge mistake, in my opinion, would be to disallow our daughter’s exposure to any way of thinking or believing. That is indoctrination as well, just from a different tack.” If you’re honest, keeping children away from any particular faith tradition, is in itself exposing kids to a faith framework (i.e. “faith is not necessary for a moral / educated life.”) Do your kids have the intellectual capability to say “faith is unnecessary?”
I think this is one of the biggest challenges of parenting our two-year old son. No matter how we cut it, we are exposing him to things that we’ve come to see as good and true and he has very little say in the matter (good/bad food, good/bad manners, good/bad environments, good/bad morals, etc.). I can only hope and pray that when we’re long gone, he can say that we stewarded the power and authority we were given to raise him well by being authentic and exposing him to what we’ve come to see as true while giving him the dignity and respect he deserves to formulate his own opinions. I may very well weep if he comes to believe that a loving God is just fairy tale; however, I will never force or shame him into believing what we’ve come to see as true.
@kellyg Thanks for writing such an honest post. I have a lot to learn from people like yourself who are willing to be open about their parenting decisions.
Kelly and Richard: You guys are my favorite friends I never see. Loved this post and think you’re both great parents. The world needs more people like you.