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Parents as Resident Theologians, Session 2.
Yesterday was the second session of my new adult RE class. With last week's introductory stuff out of the way, this week's class felt much meatier. It was thought-provoking and fun.
We started by going around the room and saying our names and one awesome thing about our kids. I couldn't think of anything that applied to both of my kids, so I just said that an awesome thing about Alex is that her mind never stops working, and she comes up with ideas I never would've imagined. The awesome thing I would've mentioned about Colin is how good he smells. Then there was an opening reading brought by a group member, and as Becky lit the chalice we each in turn said our children's full names.
The focus of this week's session was children's theological questions, but because it's important to get your own thoughts clarified before you try to answer your kids' questions, we began with a discussion of religious language. On the left side of a sheet of paper, we made a list of terms we associated with our childhood experiences of religion. Then on the right side we generated a list of the religious terms we use currently. We circled words that appeared on both lists, underlined pairs of words that seemed to us to be different ways of expressing the same concept (such as "God" and "Spirit of Life," or "baptism" and "child dedication"), and crossed out words we have rejected. Then we compared and discussed the words we had each circled, underlined, and crossed out.
That led to some interesting discussion. I have always felt lucky that, in contrast to many UUs, I didn't come to my present religion because of past religious trauma. I come from a liberal, loving, social-justice-focused Protestant tradition, and words like "sin" and "hell" didn't appear on my list of childhood religious terms. But there were nevertheless words on there that I've rejected ("Father" as an identity for God, heaven, crucifixion, resurrection) and that I'll have to figure out how to address with my kids.
Becky made a couple of good points about religious language: (1) When we have a specialized term that we prefer to a more common term used in society, our kids are probably going to encounter the common version more often unless we make a special effort to use and discuss our preferred term. (2) Some words and concepts are painful to some of us because of past experiences - but our kids haven't had those experiences, and so the words won't have the same resonance for them. Keeping that in mind may make those words easier to discuss.
We moved on to a discussion of religious beliefs, and how you have to know what you believe before you can answer your kids' questions in a satisfactory way. This is harder for UUs because we are a noncreedal religion - there is no set of beliefs that we are expected to hold, and so there isn't a predefined set of answers to theological questions our kids ask. Also, because UU is a noncreedal religion, there might well be issues about which we as individual parents don't know what we believe. UU adults are usually comfortable with ambiguity and uncertainty, but children typically pass through developmental stages in which it's very important to them to be sure about things. We may like the idea of giving them explanations in the form of "some people believe X, and others believe Y," but our children are unlikely to find that satisfying. They want to know what we believe. An additional complication in UU families is that the parents may disagree on key religious issues.
Becky stopped us for an important footnote: we tend to think of ourselves as a bunch of special snowflakes exhibiting marvelous diversity of opinion, and Christians as a monolithic bloc with identical beliefs. This is selling Christians short; there are ranges of belief within Christian churches as well. One of the parents in the group challenged this; she thought ranges of belief occurred between Christian churches, but that people in the same church believed the same things. The discussion got derailed for a while into a debate about whether "cafeteria Catholics" (and similar) are practicing their religion in a valid way. It was a fascinating discussion, but probably beside the point for this class.
Eventually Becky wrenched us back on track, and had us stand up to do an exercise in which we physically placed ourselves along a continuum of religious belief. For example: "I believe in God" vs. "I believe there is no God," and "I believe in life after death" vs. "I believe there is no life after death." The fascinating thing to me was how broad a spectrum of beliefs there are just within this class. Every inch of the the spectrum was represented on almost every question.
We sat back down and each generated a list of three religious questions our kids have asked, or (for those with preverbal kids) religious questions we had as children. Alex has had tons of religious questions; the three I chose were "Where is God?" "Was Jesus a king?" and "Why did people kill Jesus?" Our lists of questions were combined into one big list. (My favorite: "Was Jesus a good guy or a bad guy?") We divided into groups of three to tackle answering them. "Because when your kids ask you a religious question, you need to come up with an answer FAST" each group was given a suprise question on a slip of paper and had about three minutes to come up with answers before moving on to another surprise question.
My group answered the questions "Who made the world?" "What happens when you die?" and "Is there a God?" (My reaction to the first one was that it's a scientific question, not a religious question.) "What happens when you die" is an interesting one for me, because although I know it's supposed to be one of the great all-consuming issues for humanity, I have never been very interested in it myself. It just doesn't matter much to me - it doesn't seem relevant to how we live our lives. But of course I need to be prepared for it to potentially matter much more to Alex and Colin.
So we answered and discussed our theological questions in our small groups, and then as a larger group we talked a little about which questions were hardest to answer. (I think we all agreed that the group who were handed "why do people do bad things" won the hardest-to-answer prize.) I pointed out that in some ways it's comforting to know that these are questions people have wrestled with for thousands of years. We need to have some kind of answer for our kids, but it's okay to let them know that these questions are incredibly hard and that no one has been able to resolve them entirely, in a way that satisfies everyone.
Our homework assignment: to notice and record questions our children ask that are either explicitly theological or have theological implications.
It was a great class. I'm looking forward to the rest of the sessions.
We started by going around the room and saying our names and one awesome thing about our kids. I couldn't think of anything that applied to both of my kids, so I just said that an awesome thing about Alex is that her mind never stops working, and she comes up with ideas I never would've imagined. The awesome thing I would've mentioned about Colin is how good he smells. Then there was an opening reading brought by a group member, and as Becky lit the chalice we each in turn said our children's full names.
The focus of this week's session was children's theological questions, but because it's important to get your own thoughts clarified before you try to answer your kids' questions, we began with a discussion of religious language. On the left side of a sheet of paper, we made a list of terms we associated with our childhood experiences of religion. Then on the right side we generated a list of the religious terms we use currently. We circled words that appeared on both lists, underlined pairs of words that seemed to us to be different ways of expressing the same concept (such as "God" and "Spirit of Life," or "baptism" and "child dedication"), and crossed out words we have rejected. Then we compared and discussed the words we had each circled, underlined, and crossed out.
That led to some interesting discussion. I have always felt lucky that, in contrast to many UUs, I didn't come to my present religion because of past religious trauma. I come from a liberal, loving, social-justice-focused Protestant tradition, and words like "sin" and "hell" didn't appear on my list of childhood religious terms. But there were nevertheless words on there that I've rejected ("Father" as an identity for God, heaven, crucifixion, resurrection) and that I'll have to figure out how to address with my kids.
Becky made a couple of good points about religious language: (1) When we have a specialized term that we prefer to a more common term used in society, our kids are probably going to encounter the common version more often unless we make a special effort to use and discuss our preferred term. (2) Some words and concepts are painful to some of us because of past experiences - but our kids haven't had those experiences, and so the words won't have the same resonance for them. Keeping that in mind may make those words easier to discuss.
We moved on to a discussion of religious beliefs, and how you have to know what you believe before you can answer your kids' questions in a satisfactory way. This is harder for UUs because we are a noncreedal religion - there is no set of beliefs that we are expected to hold, and so there isn't a predefined set of answers to theological questions our kids ask. Also, because UU is a noncreedal religion, there might well be issues about which we as individual parents don't know what we believe. UU adults are usually comfortable with ambiguity and uncertainty, but children typically pass through developmental stages in which it's very important to them to be sure about things. We may like the idea of giving them explanations in the form of "some people believe X, and others believe Y," but our children are unlikely to find that satisfying. They want to know what we believe. An additional complication in UU families is that the parents may disagree on key religious issues.
Becky stopped us for an important footnote: we tend to think of ourselves as a bunch of special snowflakes exhibiting marvelous diversity of opinion, and Christians as a monolithic bloc with identical beliefs. This is selling Christians short; there are ranges of belief within Christian churches as well. One of the parents in the group challenged this; she thought ranges of belief occurred between Christian churches, but that people in the same church believed the same things. The discussion got derailed for a while into a debate about whether "cafeteria Catholics" (and similar) are practicing their religion in a valid way. It was a fascinating discussion, but probably beside the point for this class.
Eventually Becky wrenched us back on track, and had us stand up to do an exercise in which we physically placed ourselves along a continuum of religious belief. For example: "I believe in God" vs. "I believe there is no God," and "I believe in life after death" vs. "I believe there is no life after death." The fascinating thing to me was how broad a spectrum of beliefs there are just within this class. Every inch of the the spectrum was represented on almost every question.
We sat back down and each generated a list of three religious questions our kids have asked, or (for those with preverbal kids) religious questions we had as children. Alex has had tons of religious questions; the three I chose were "Where is God?" "Was Jesus a king?" and "Why did people kill Jesus?" Our lists of questions were combined into one big list. (My favorite: "Was Jesus a good guy or a bad guy?") We divided into groups of three to tackle answering them. "Because when your kids ask you a religious question, you need to come up with an answer FAST" each group was given a suprise question on a slip of paper and had about three minutes to come up with answers before moving on to another surprise question.
My group answered the questions "Who made the world?" "What happens when you die?" and "Is there a God?" (My reaction to the first one was that it's a scientific question, not a religious question.) "What happens when you die" is an interesting one for me, because although I know it's supposed to be one of the great all-consuming issues for humanity, I have never been very interested in it myself. It just doesn't matter much to me - it doesn't seem relevant to how we live our lives. But of course I need to be prepared for it to potentially matter much more to Alex and Colin.
So we answered and discussed our theological questions in our small groups, and then as a larger group we talked a little about which questions were hardest to answer. (I think we all agreed that the group who were handed "why do people do bad things" won the hardest-to-answer prize.) I pointed out that in some ways it's comforting to know that these are questions people have wrestled with for thousands of years. We need to have some kind of answer for our kids, but it's okay to let them know that these questions are incredibly hard and that no one has been able to resolve them entirely, in a way that satisfies everyone.
Our homework assignment: to notice and record questions our children ask that are either explicitly theological or have theological implications.
It was a great class. I'm looking forward to the rest of the sessions.
no subject
You know, it may be noncreedal, but I've been getting a strong impression that, at least at a local level, there are definitely sets of beliefs that you're expected to hold. And if you don't, you're either unenlightened, gullible and/or fearful (and so susceptible to The Man), or just plain malevolent.
no subject
no subject
I know that's not an official UU position, but unofficially it feels awfully pervasive.
no subject
I may be wrong about this - I hope not - but I think that much of the social creed operates on the level of assumptions and not on the level of actual rejection. I hope that when people are called on the assumptions they make, or when you express a differing opinion, they are willing to listen and think. I understand, though, that no one wants to have to battle all the time, and that when enough of those assumptions/incidents pile up you can wind up feeling too alienated to want to bother with arguing.
The Christian thing, yeah. I certainly noticed it when I identified as a Christian at our church. It seems to be somewhat cyclical, in that there have been times when there has been a much more organized and vocal Christian presence - I used to belong to a Christian covenant group, for example. And John Manwell provided a good Christian perspective.
I understand that a lot of UUs come in damaged by prior experiences in Christian churches, and that they have definite sore spots where Christianity is concerned. But I'd like to think that we have a responsibility to work to get past that, and see American Christianity for the complex and diverse and mulitlayered thing that it is.
The thing that I struggle with the most about being a UU is the idea that the First Principle ("affirming and promoting the worth and dignity of every person") applies to everyone, no kidding, no matter how alien I find their perspective, no matter what they've done, no matter what they believe. I work hard at the First Principle, and often fall short. It's difficult stuff.
no subject
I think the problem for UUs is that many of us constantly define ourselves against a Christian example (I fall into this too.) "more tolerant than" "less strict than," etc. But in order to do that, we have to limit Christianity to just one very narrow thing. I think we see again and again that that's no good for anyone and can actually be radically unfair. And it--obviously--puts the UU Christian in a frustrating place.
Regardless of what church we go to, I think we all have to work at being the people we want to be.