I don't know how to put this exactly, but I am not a religious person. In fact, I don't do religion. I don't even like to speak of it. My beliefs are somewhat non-traditional. I don't follow any mainstream type of... well, anything.
Over the past year or so, however, I felt it was necessary to explain to Bugs that the holidays we celebrate have root in religious practices. In other words, Christmas isn't about Santa, and Easter isn't because of the Easter bunny. So, I have very carefully selected how I explain it to him. Example: "Christmas is a celebration in the Christian religions, and some people believe that Jesus Christ was born on this day." (I know I know, there's debate about when he was actually born, but he's 7, so Christmas can just be Jesus's birthday for now, you know, for some people.)
I don't want to tell him that HE has to believe it, but I also don't want to tell him that he shouldn't believe it just because his parents aren't into the idea so much. (OMG, I can feel the hate mail coming already.) But to be honest, I kinda thought he would get the idea that we are not religious and he would see things my way. Or at least ask questions about what my way is.
He hasn't.
He sings songs about how Jesus created the world and asks me all sorts of questions about how and why Jesus did the things he did. Like I said, I'm not so into the religions, so I don't have all the answers to his questions. So naturally I did what anyone would do, told him to call Grandma. Duh. My mom and I decided to get him a children's bible so he can learn the bible stories and hopefully have some of his questions answered that way. If that doesn't satisfy his curiosity, well, one step at a time for now.
Here is a picture he drew for his art fair at school...
I think it's really great that you're fostering his curiosity even though it's not a comfort zone for you. No hate mail from me and I'm one of those "some people" :D
ReplyDeleteI can't believe I never commented on this! I'm not a religious person either..at all..even a little bit. It makes me nervous. If Mac ever draws me a picture like that I won't know what to do!!
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