Pete Wilgoren helps his eight-year-old daughter explore the complicated world of religion
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When people ask about religion I’d like to make a box for “it’s complicated”. I’m Jewish. My wife is Catholic. I have big questions about whether god exists. She’s certain god does. Maybe that’s why we’re such a good match. When we got married years ago, we knew religion would be something we’d deal with as our kids grew up. We had a Catholic priest and a Jewish cantor at our wedding. They’d never met each other before, but worked together to create a ceremony of inclusion which harmonized both faiths. But the questions about the kids remained. Would they be Jewish…would they be Catholic… Would they be something entirely different? One thing I knew for sure, I wanted them to be able to decide for themselves what they believed and why.
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photo credit: Flickr/Andrew C Wallace
As a child I asked my dad what he believed about God. He answered succinctly, “that’s between me and God and nobody else’s business. As a young adult, I revisited the question and he answered in the exact same manner. It perplexed me then, but now I am thankful for his ability to give me the room to find my spiritual path without his forcing his own upon me.