Easter and other religious holidays (Christmas)
This post is not to offend anyone, to the contrary I want to explain my family's situation beforehand to make sure no one is confused or offended by it. I wish to never go through the discrimination my son and I experienced last year at an Easter egg hunt... But that story is for another day, another post. I figured I might as well post about this topic today though, as Easter is on Sunday.
My family and I will be participating in Easter activities, as we traditionally do, even though we are not of the Christian religion. As most of my readers know, I am Buddhist but my husband and son do not belong to any religion. My husband has his own scientific theories about our creation and our fate. We have not decided if we will raise Alan as a Buddhist or just raise him without a religion. The latter seems more appropriate to me, as even though I am a Buddhist I do not practice with a church. I do not believe in organized religion (I actually believe your relationship with your spiritual side and your diety should be private thus you should worship alone or with your family at most), and my husband feels the same way. We may have Alan participate in family meditation with us in the future, but I do not want to insist my religion on him, even as a child. Let me clarify before I offend anyone, I do not think that anyone else who believes in ANY religion is insisting their religion on their children. I choose to raise my son this way and respect everyone else for raising their children their own way. We are a family with two different religious views, and I believe my son has a right to experience both of them and choose which he would like to believe.
Now we do not celebrate the religious aspect of Easter (or Christmas) but the I guess "commercialized" part of it. For Christmas, we read stories about Santa Claus and celebrate family and give gifts and go visit Santa and decorate a Christmas tree and go to Christmas dinner and brunch but do not go to church or celebrate Jesus. For Easter, we read stories about the Easter Bunny and celebrate family and participate in Easter egg hunts and visit the Easter Bunny and go to Easter brunch with the family but once again do not go to church. My son has heard the religious back story to both Easter and Christmas (my parent's and siblings are Lutheran) when we have gone to Easter activities. We allow him to listen and learn, but we tell him its just a story to us but this is something that some people do believe. When he is older I will elaborate more on that but that is what we tell him now, even only as a toddler. He may not fully understand what I mean, but I get the point across to him. I respect the right of each person's own religion and will teach my son to do the same. We realize that neither holiday would exist if not for the Christian religion and the story of Jesus, and this is why we let him listen. Plus, I'm not going to take my son away from his family during the holiday just because they are doing something religious. That's silly. He loves my family, regardless of what religion they belong to, and so do I.
My wish is to simply celebrate the holiday with my son, husband and all my loved ones. And to not be judged for my religion, whether or not it correlates with the holiday's religion. I clearly am not judging you for what you believe in, could you kindly return the favor? I would not be saying and posting this, except for I got extreme back lash and hatred last year for being Buddhist and celebrating Easter. Really??? We're only celebrating the LOOOOOOVE<3 <3 <3 <3 <3 Can you be apart of it to? Please? :)
In other news...
Alan's art class went wonderful yesterday. We had a boy and a girl join him and we continued with our Springtime/Famous Artists theme and created a DaVinci-style Segmented Drawing (Similar to the Sistanine Chapel), Easter Bunny Ears, and Animal Drawing. Alan and the kids did great with their projects. They all behaved so well and followed directions, with help from their parents. :) Alan sat in between the two, and loved once again being center of antenttion. Hambone. :P Lon even got Alan to help him draw a kitty (which he kept calling puppy lmao) and a tree! He's getting really good at drawing circles and lines. He can also say almost all of his colors. The only one he has a hard time with is his favorite color: orange. Its a hard word though, so we still give him credit. :)
My family and I will be participating in Easter activities, as we traditionally do, even though we are not of the Christian religion. As most of my readers know, I am Buddhist but my husband and son do not belong to any religion. My husband has his own scientific theories about our creation and our fate. We have not decided if we will raise Alan as a Buddhist or just raise him without a religion. The latter seems more appropriate to me, as even though I am a Buddhist I do not practice with a church. I do not believe in organized religion (I actually believe your relationship with your spiritual side and your diety should be private thus you should worship alone or with your family at most), and my husband feels the same way. We may have Alan participate in family meditation with us in the future, but I do not want to insist my religion on him, even as a child. Let me clarify before I offend anyone, I do not think that anyone else who believes in ANY religion is insisting their religion on their children. I choose to raise my son this way and respect everyone else for raising their children their own way. We are a family with two different religious views, and I believe my son has a right to experience both of them and choose which he would like to believe.
Now we do not celebrate the religious aspect of Easter (or Christmas) but the I guess "commercialized" part of it. For Christmas, we read stories about Santa Claus and celebrate family and give gifts and go visit Santa and decorate a Christmas tree and go to Christmas dinner and brunch but do not go to church or celebrate Jesus. For Easter, we read stories about the Easter Bunny and celebrate family and participate in Easter egg hunts and visit the Easter Bunny and go to Easter brunch with the family but once again do not go to church. My son has heard the religious back story to both Easter and Christmas (my parent's and siblings are Lutheran) when we have gone to Easter activities. We allow him to listen and learn, but we tell him its just a story to us but this is something that some people do believe. When he is older I will elaborate more on that but that is what we tell him now, even only as a toddler. He may not fully understand what I mean, but I get the point across to him. I respect the right of each person's own religion and will teach my son to do the same. We realize that neither holiday would exist if not for the Christian religion and the story of Jesus, and this is why we let him listen. Plus, I'm not going to take my son away from his family during the holiday just because they are doing something religious. That's silly. He loves my family, regardless of what religion they belong to, and so do I.
My wish is to simply celebrate the holiday with my son, husband and all my loved ones. And to not be judged for my religion, whether or not it correlates with the holiday's religion. I clearly am not judging you for what you believe in, could you kindly return the favor? I would not be saying and posting this, except for I got extreme back lash and hatred last year for being Buddhist and celebrating Easter. Really??? We're only celebrating the LOOOOOOVE<3 <3 <3 <3 <3 Can you be apart of it to? Please? :)
In other news...
Alan's art class went wonderful yesterday. We had a boy and a girl join him and we continued with our Springtime/Famous Artists theme and created a DaVinci-style Segmented Drawing (Similar to the Sistanine Chapel), Easter Bunny Ears, and Animal Drawing. Alan and the kids did great with their projects. They all behaved so well and followed directions, with help from their parents. :) Alan sat in between the two, and loved once again being center of antenttion. Hambone. :P Lon even got Alan to help him draw a kitty (which he kept calling puppy lmao) and a tree! He's getting really good at drawing circles and lines. He can also say almost all of his colors. The only one he has a hard time with is his favorite color: orange. Its a hard word though, so we still give him credit. :)
This is on eof the many great things about living the US. There is no religion that you are forced to follow. I am a Chrstian, I attend church every Sunday but I am not a fan of organized religion. I am very lucky that my church is non denominational and very relaxed. They are clear that they do not consider themselves religious but that they are spiritual which is how I feel.
ReplyDeleteI do not think that celebrating the commercialized side of Holidays is wrong, infact I think even relgious people tend to celebrate the more commercailized side of it even if they dont want to admit it. I mean really...what do eggs at a church Easter serice have anything to do with Jesus? I hope you and your family have a great Easter no matter how you celebrate it! :)