 |
| For us, the winter holidays are about all of the celebrations, not just ours. |
Dear New Mamma, I too live in an interfaith home, and I
joined with my husband when my children were 2 and 4 years old. I am invited to
speak every year on an interfaith panel in our area called "the December
Dilemma".
In short, my choice was to build our spirituality all year, and
our holiday family traditions around interior decorating choices that my
husband and I discussed, but since I was doing the "work", I asked
him to hold his comments until later in January when I would sit down with him
and say: "so, how was that wreath for you? Did you miss anything from your
childhood that we could add for our children?"
That way,
he felt honored and respected and our holiday traditions could evolve. No on
the spot conflict if I hung icicles and 5 pointed stars all over the dining
room ceiling.
 |
|
I
would like to go outside and see this on my birthday!
|
When it came to other families- relatives or not- I fielded a lot
of questions. My answer was always the same: No, my kids know what our beliefs
are, seeing your practices (house, tree, egg nog, menorah) will not confuse
them.
This is no different than my birthday, which is December 23.
I open presents whether they have no paper or Christmas paper or birthday
paper. It doesn't change the giving. We graciously show interest and
participate in anything anyone wants to invite us to or wants to share with us,
we offer to share with others- the color of the paper does not measure your
spirituality. In my opinion, spirituality has to do with your family's habits
most of the year, little to do with the holidays.
I should note that the families I meet at the December Dilemma
talk who have the worst trouble are controlling people themselves or have
controlling visitors and families. the Jewish child who's Christian grandmother
gives her a gold crucifix, the critical mother who gives ornaments to her
non-tree raising daughter. I advise a response which is gracious, but not
compromising one's beliefs as far as having a child wear jewelry not
appropriate for them. I wouldn't let my daughter wear lacy lingerie as a
princess dress if she were 5, no matter how pretty she though it was, but I
wouldn't make a fuss at the family dinner. I would just say "How
thoughtful" and put it in the car. Donate the jewelry to a convent and
change your plans next year.
Hope your new family grows crookedly but happy. Be willing to do
it wrong sometimes and you will have fun. the 4 year old is now 24 and she is
lovely.
regards, Hawk
