When Your Child Asks To Go to Church

I grew up in a fundamentalist home, where the Bible was read in the most literal ways. I left — ran away, in fact — from that home very young, and some years later, when I had my own children, I decided that I would raise them to be kindly humans, rooted in knowledge and thoughtfulness. I would not submit them to religious belief with its suffocating hold; it all seemed quite straightforward to me.

Out of nowhere, my second son at age five asked to go to church

I was flummoxed, and had to check my immediate reaction — an involuntary “no!” I asked him for time to think about his request. (Because after two sons loaded with questions about everything, I’d learned to say, “I need time.”)

No, his grandparents had not been “at work” on him. They had respected my choices with my children; this request was truly coming from him, and his curiosity. And I felt that how I handled it had to be reflective of how I was hoping my children would be in the world.

When I’d left home, I’d been very angry about how I was raised. I felt I’d been over-protected, and made to feel apart. I had eschewed the existence of God. By the time my sons were born, I was more agnostic than anything, and in truth couldn’t be bothered spending precious time to label.

But with his request, and my unwillingness to be reactive… well, I had to pause and do what I hoped for my children: be thoughtful.

That meant research

And asking myself what my fears were about. Because that’s what I was feeling, if I was honest. Fearful.

I was afraid that if my child followed some set of religious beliefs, I would lose him in some way that seemed significant.

I was afraid he might become painfully dogmatic — something I am uncomfortable with. And that made me sad — sad for “missed life.” In my own life I have seen my parents and siblings miss out — to my mind — on so much that is wondrous: art and travel and human exploration. A result of their narrow-mindedness. Narrow-mindedness that they prided themselves on. I’ve seen the Bible weaponized.

I’ve been the child that turned against the parents; was I about to relive that, with my own “turning against” me? I was afraid of that, too.

The faith division between myself and my own parents meant that I felt a loss of closeness; there was always so much I could not share with them. I was left feeling I had to protect them, from the realities.

I came to a decision

It was not easy. But parenting is hard. As with any connecting with another human being, there is a need to set aside one’s own ideas, to take a close look at an other’s ideas. We have these thoughts, about “having” children, about being parents, that we can somehow shape them. That we can be some kind of mini-God… oh the irony!… and create them in our own image. We couch it as saving them from what we have been through, we couch it as “caring,” but really, I had to ask myself:

Who was I to tell my child what he could or could not believe?? or before that: what he could explore even?

Choices

I was honest with my son, in the way that I had to be. And I’m sure someone else might deal with this quite differently; these parenting moments leave us each with facing our own truths. I had to tell him that to my mind the world is filled with many ideas, and if we go to one place, learn of one idea, we may miss something important. So I proposed that he and I either go to a number of different places of faith, or we could go to the Unitarian church, some miles away, to where they have a “Sunday school” program that examines differing faiths and traditions. My research had been to determine where might such a program be.

And so for almost a year we went into the city to the Unitarian church. It had a small congregation, as they typically do, and only one service per week, so we often missed for hockey or baseball practice. After some time, he stopped asking to go, his interest seemed to wane, naturally, of its own accord.

Years later

My three sons would now identify as atheist, ambivalent, and Christian. My youngest has come to be a believer, of his own accord. A much longer story. I now have to recognize that for some, faith can be life-altering and even saving. Right here on earth. If I’d denied him this path — not that I can really! he is a young adult — he would not be who he is.

I have had to let go of my fears and my anger. But it has taken a long time. I wish I might have been more open from day one. Being open as a parent, to your children finding their own footing, digging in to their own needs and questions, is critical.

At seventeen, I ran away from home to become who I was. I knew I had to. I realized that, more than anything, I did not want my children to feel judgement from me. And I can see that my youngest son’s faith holds the very thoughtfulness and openness that I was hoping for. Such human qualities can exist in places I did not know.

Home should be an open place, where all is on the table. The more that is learned of all the world around us — the visible, the invisible, the questions, answers, the acknowledging of mystery and possibility — the more we hold to create lives of joy and depth and healing.

Mostly, perhaps, I have learned it’s okay to be flummoxed now and again.

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This post was previously published on A Parent Is Born.

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