October 27, 2006
Believe It or Not
Future Park, San Francisco
Yesterday while walking home from work (for the last time! WAH!), I passed a kid about six years old strolling with a middle-aged dad type, i.e. khakis, inoffensive sweater, untrendy spectacles. And not to judge a book by its accent, but I can say with certainty that this guy was Jewish. Jewish the way Woody Allen is Jewish, which is to say obviously. And what was he talking to the kid about, of all things? Jesus.
"Jesus is...well...," he started, and at this point I slowed my white-girl roll because I was curious how a middle-aged Jewish man was going to explain to a six-year-old the concepts of messiah and redeemer and god-as-man.
"Jesus is...," he continued, "well, a lot like Gandhi, I guess. Yes. Definitely Gandhiesque." Okay. Didn't see that coming. Do six-year-olds know Gandhi?Or is there a new monster on Sesame Street I haven't heard about?
Simon and I have had numerous conversations about family planning--things like public versus private schooling, nannies, music lessons, and yes, religion--but never have we discussed that last one in any kind of detail. The best way to describe it is that we have theories but not methods. (I know this kind of thing is waaaaaaay premature since we don't even have any kids, let alone kids of "thinking" age, but this is actually the kind of thing I turn over in my mind in the wee hours, and since this is my blog, this is what you get, so nyeah.)
Simon was raised what I think of as "casually Catholic" (correct me if I'm wrong, bud), and I was raised outside of but under the far-reaching shadow of the Mormon church. My immediate family stopped attending services when I was seven ("She asks too many questions," the authorities told my parents) and since then I've been grouped into the "anti-Mormon" camp, because when you grow up in Salt Lake you have no choice but to pick one side or the other--it's practically the law; remaining neutral or claiming you simply don't care is out of the question.
If you were to ask Simon and me about our religious beliefs, we'd be just as likely to shrug our shoulders as commit to anything even as non-committal as agnosticism. But even though religion (and this includes all sects, not just Western ones) are not part of our spiritual existence, the are inevitably part of our social existence. Not believing in a god figure or some other omni-whatever being or force does not excuse a person from knowing what all the fuss is about (I should apply this same rule to politics and maybe start paying attention, shouldn't I?). My usual gague of religious savvy is how many questions I can answer in the Bible category during Double Jeopardy. I figure I should at least know as much about the Old Testament as I do about eight-letter words or world capitals, which is to say a good amount. Most of the time I do okay, but most of the time the questions are in the answers to begin with anyway (oooh, deeeep).
My parents did a good job of raising me to be more or less knowledgeable about and comfortable with religion without having to be a part of it (or was it that they raised me to be so comfortable with myself that I wasn't as bothered by it the way a lot of my friends were?), and they never pushed any belief systems on me. "When you're old enough to choose for yourself," they said, "you're free to do so," and the fact that I didn't go to church past age seven was probably just as much my preference as it was their decision.
As I look faaaaar into a future in which I will be responsible for the religious education of my own children, I realize that I might not have it as easy as my parents did. As far as I can tell, they basically sat back and let osmosis do its thing. Each day, I was practically marinating in Mormonism; everything from the cartoons on the local PBS affiliate to the whisperings about special rings and magic underwear on the playground was forming my understanding of religious culture. And the fact that there was only one religious culture in suburban Salt Lake County actually made it easier, I think; there wasn't a need to learn about Buddhism and Judaism and Islam, and so I didn't until eleventh grade, when we spent one whole week studying the world's five major religions. (Why five? Because there are five days in a week, duh.)
But what am I supposed to do with my own kids, who will most likely grow up somewhere among a variety of people who believe a variety of spiritual philosophies? If I sit back and let society teach them, they may end up knowing as much about religion as they know about normal family dynamics through watching The Sopranos. And if I leave it up to the schools, they won't learn anything until that special week in eleventh grade when they read the relevant sections of the Siddhartha Cliff's Notes.
But how best to teach a child about religion without actually sending him to church? How much personal prejudice (see: churches skeeve me out) will I have to overcome to ensure that my kids know enough about spiritual philosophy that they can engage with it and decide for themselves what works for them? I guess it's one of those things I can't really plan ahead for. At least not the way I can spend lunch hours memorizing world capitals so I can sweep the category and get the Daily Double.
Posted by Leah at October 27, 2006 11:21 AMhow did i not know that you are moving? where the hell are you going?
Posted by: jennster at October 27, 2006 12:13 PMChurches may skeeve you, but I know you love books. Maybe start reading...and you'll get better grasp of what YOU believe. Makes it easier to teach your kids when you have your own solid foundation :)
Posted by: Angella at October 27, 2006 12:28 PMEverything I've read has pretty much put me in a foul mood. And its not so much the content as what people over the centuries have done and continue to do with the content. The whole business is very upsetting to me. As for what I believe, I'm pretty clear on that. I'm not concerned about teaching my children what to believe (I think that's a personal choice), but I am concerned about making sure they learn about what other people believe. But how to do that without having to get knee deep in literature that upsets me? That's the problem. Maybe I need a special religion tutor...
Posted by: Leah at October 27, 2006 12:34 PMI think it's important to realize what it is YOU believe in. If you believe in God but not religion, YOU will teach your children about God, not the church. They will make thier own mind up, just as you did.
Posted by: reddirtroad at October 27, 2006 01:02 PMWe're not raising our children with a religion. My husband grew up with Catholicism and I grew up with Lutheranism. We have friends who are Jewish, Buddhists, Baptists, Episcopalians, Catholic, you name it. Most people around here are Catholic. My son first heard about Jesus on the bus from a friend when he was in first grade. He came home, asked me about him, and I told him what I believe (that Jesus was a man who lived way back when, he taught people good things, and he was killed for his beliefs), and I told him what Christians believe (having grown up a Christian, that was easy). That talk led to the God talk and I answered his questions as best I could. I also made sure that he understood that he could believe whatever he wanted to believe. He believed in God for a while, but now he doesn't.
I'm not sure that you *can* prepare for stuff like this. The best discussions we have are the ones I thought we'd never have, like Jesus--who woulda thunk? We don't go to church! End of story. And then he asked me why I was buying tampons when he was about seven. At Target. In a really loud voice. We talked about that in the car. You just start out simple and they'll ask questions until they don't have any more.
I love that my kids are good, sweet people without having the spectre of an all-knowing, all-seeing being intruding on their everyday lives.
Posted by: candace at October 27, 2006 01:33 PMGandhi is spelled without the "h"-sorry, every time I see that it drives me up the wall. With the h in front of the g it means "smelly" in several Indian languages. I don't know why this seems to be such a common mistaken.
Posted by: monkey at October 27, 2006 03:12 PMFixed! I knew I should have looked it up...
I also love when I make a typo in the process of correcting someone. Isn't that always how it happens? :)
(But why the fake email? I'm really not scary, I promise!)
Posted by: Leah at October 27, 2006 03:17 PMDid I have a typo? I wasn't really trying to get a bitchy dig in so I don't particularly care if I did. I just see Gandhi's name misspelled the same way over and over...I think it's because Americans pronounce it "Ghandi" so they end up spelling it phonetically. I'm sorry if I gave off one of those drive-by troll impressions.
I added my contact information and blog addy so you can correct all my terrible run-on sentences :) (generally I don't add it because I'm lazy, not anything else). I've been reading you on and off for a while through Pantalones del Fuego, who I've known for...several years now I guess.
Beautiful pictures and great blog by the way.
Posted by: monkey at October 27, 2006 03:27 PMNo problem. We're cool.
Posted by: Leah at October 27, 2006 03:35 PMOh good, because being snide was not my intention. I realise it's probably just a phonetic thing for most people. I guess everytime I read it I just see "smelly" the way it's characteristically misspelled. I have no idea whether he was smelly or not-though one of my grandparents was involved in the Indian freedom movement and got to meet him. By which I mean march behind him and get jailed.
Posted by: monkey at October 27, 2006 09:35 PMOh good, because being snide was not my intention. I realise it's probably just a phonetic thing for most people. I guess everytime I read it I just see "smelly" the way it's characteristically misspelled. I have no idea whether he was smelly or not-though one of my grandparents was involved in the Indian freedom movement and got to meet him. By which I mean march behind him and get jailed.
Posted by: monkey at October 27, 2006 09:35 PMThat's a deep conversation for a kindergartner.
Posted by: Rhea at October 28, 2006 07:09 AMFirst, let me tell you they become of "thinking age" way before you would expect. I have very deep conversations with my 3 year-old about death, God, the afterlife, all of that stuff I didn't expect to discuss with her until she was much older. And she often asks really difficult to answer questions.
So I'm with Angelina, maybe reading is the best way to educate yourself and in response to your response about that, If I were you I would go to the sources to read, like the Torah, the Bible, the Qur'an, and any other religious texts you want.
Posted by: Mama Urchin at October 29, 2006 04:29 AMIt is a personal choice, but I hope it's not framed solely by Catholicism or Mormonism. Neither one characterizes Christianity as it's described in the bible (maybe a book you don't like, but it's been a best-seller for a long time).
Posted by: Texas T-bone at October 30, 2006 08:19 PMDon't even get me started on best sellers...
Posted by: Leah at October 31, 2006 08:33 AMI've commented on your blog (which I love, by the way) once before and this entry moved me to comment again. We were raised very much the same - in a suburb of Salt Lake, in the "anti-Mormon" camp, and I am now married to a felllow "anti-mormon." I live in San Francisco and we are not going to move back to Salt Lake. Have you come to any conclusions? It's scary for me too...
Posted by: Amanda at November 1, 2006 12:10 PMSalt Lake is a great place to visit and a great place to be from, but I don't think I'd ever consider moving back. The world's just too big.
Posted by: Leah at November 1, 2006 12:12 PM
