The Holiday Season as an Ex Christian in Musings

For the most part my day to day is not changed by me dropping religion. I now get Sunday as a completely free day but other than that nothing much is different. But Christmas is another story. While my family is very religious, we rarely pray over meals and though there are nativities scattered about we have never been too much about the “Jesus is the reason for the season” nonsense.

Nathan’s family on the other hand prays over family dinners, reads the Bible out loud before opening presents and this year both his dad and this grandparents gave impassioned speeches about how they want to make the Bible more of a priority and how they are all just so thankful each member of the family believes in Jesus and we all will see each other again in heaven.

I have to admit this was hard for me. I squirmed in my seat as I thought about how much it would break their hearts if they knew how I felt in that moment. Lied to. Like it was all a scam. I was sitting there feeling like Jesus wasn’t real and that reading the “Christmas story” in the Bible before we all open material gifts was silly at best.

It all used to mean so much to me. Every Christmas hymn. Every nativity set lovingly placed on the mantel. The moment to remember it as “Jesus’ birthday” and give thanks to him for sharing it with us.

Now? It feels more empty. Sure we have family. Gifts under the tree. More food than we could ever eat and even more love seeping into this holiday season. But as I’m grappling with my faith this year it was hard to keep from being bitter and cynical.

As the New Year rang in this week and Nathan and I finally found a moment to talk we aired out our feelings around this. His dad has sent him daily texts the past 4 days of 2020 prompting him to read the Bible along with him. His mom sent me the link to a Bible study she is doing and promoted me (and my sisters in law) to join her. We both confessed to each other how sad we feel for them. I’m sure they feel like failures because all 3 of the children they raised no longer want to make religion a priority in their lives.

It was a relief to hear that Nathan has come to a similar conclusion to me. That the Bible -might- be true. But there’s not enough evidence that it’s a book worth putting on such a high pedestal. The church with the way it puts so much guilt, hate, and oppression into the world is no longer something we feel comfortable supporting.

What’s the most difficult moving forward is that we know our parents will be disappointed in the way we are raising our girls. In our conversation we completely agreed that we won’t force our children into believing or not believing in anything. We won’t be going to church or reading the Bible in our house but if they want to go with their grandparents that’s a choice they can make. If they have questions I’m always open to talk to them. We want to raise them as critical thinkers and women who have their own minds and their own opinions. That’s our priority above everything else.

The hard conversations with our parents will have to come later as the girls get older. Nathan mentioned that we can’t be angry or bitter at our parents for raising us the way they did. They believed it was important. And we can’t roll our eyes at their disappointment either because if they believe we all will be going to hell and sending our kids there too because of how we believe. Well, of course they’d be concerned. Just because we have come to conclusions of our own doesn’t make them less than. But continuing in religion just because it would disappoint them to leave is not a good enough reason to stay.

I’m happy to be leaving the Christmas season behind having not attended one Christmas service and not singing even one Christmas hymn. But it is bittersweet. It might always sting a little thinking about baby Jesus and not feeling that same nostalgic, thankful way. But I’m happy to be on this journey of self discovery. And not being tied down to something that constantly made me feel guilty is so freeing.