Much like Santa’s December descent, the occasion draws long lines of children smaller and more innocent than mine to be channeled through the velvet ropes, pretty and primed. The Paas dye kits are overflowing the seasonal aisle at the supermarket, while the Manischewitz products stand proud among the ethnic foods. And I am stuck in the semi-annual quagmire known as Commercialized Christian Holiday vs. Solemn Jewish Observances. It happens in April, just like it does in December. And this year, spring’s holy days are right on top of each other. There’s no time to buffer between Easter and Passover, complicating for our kids exactly what it’s all about, and whether or why we do or don’t really celebrate some and not all of it.
I confess there have been times when I wish I had grown up with some religion. Just something to sink my teeth into. Someone, other than my family and teachers, on whom I could rely for supernatural assistance. My mother the scientist came to believe in a higher power at some point in her adult life, but I’m unsure what relation that power has to the Judeo-Christian God. Raised among atheists and anarchists on a commune in upstate New York, she’s not into Jesus. I know that. She’s never belonged to a church or a synagogue, though she enjoyed taking me to friends’ bar and bat mitzvahs, and since she’s become the Jewish grandmother of Jewish children, she looks forward to Passover and Hanukah. She and I are Jewish through the maternal bloodline, as prescribed by Jewish law. But we’ve always celebrated Christmas together. We never owned a menorah.
Not until I married my Jewish husband.
My childhood memories of Easter candy and Christmas trees are not the stuff of his youth. But we’ve managed to weave them into the modern texture of our family. “My Granny Flo is rolling in her grave,” he says, smiling to soften the truth of it, as if I’m forcing our children into shameful practices. We do it all. The seder, the Easter baskets, the menorah and the tree. Our children are accustomed to our light holiday lecture: “Our family is large and diverse. Different people have different beliefs and different traditions, and we’re lucky that we can honor them all.” Our girls, ages eight and six, seem to get it. Unlike most of their friends, they still believe in Santa, the Easter Bunny and the Tooth Fairy. They seem to believe everything we tell them.
The other day, in the car, my older daughter asked me, “So who came up with all this Easter stuff?”
She meant the eggs, the candy, and the visit from the bunny. I told them the strange and gruesome story of “that man Jesus Christ, from the Bible”: “You know that these stories are very important to a lot of people, right? Well…”
They didn’t like the part about the crucifixion. Nor did they accept the idea of the immaculate conception. I think the resurrection was more information than they could process. So I guess they’re where I want them to be with regard to religion. But I have to ask myself a whole lot of questions, and wonder if my mother had them too: Will they flounder in the atheist’s quagmire when they get older? What meaning will our mixed bag of holiday customs hold for them as they mature? Will any of it comfort them when we’re gone? Will nostalgia be enough?
