So, my child is an atheist…Now what?

Rev. Jarrett Kerbel

So, your child has declared that they are an atheist. What do you do? Before you begin, remember the first words of the Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, “Don’t panic!” Why not panic? For many reasons including; 1. The happy news that your child is thinking about such matters in the first place, 2. The fact that you are not the first or only parent to experience this challenge, and, 3. The opportunity to engage your child in an ongoing conversation.

What I most often say in these conversations is simple, “I don’t believe in that god either.” The god our children reject is often a god worth rejecting. Like garbage in a sandbox, our kids pick up notions of god that have nothing to do with the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Secular culture and the culturally dominant strands of Christianity communicate a dominating, controlling, puppeteer God who is cruel, judgmental, and capricious.

The first step is to ask for their objections, take those objections seriously, and share how you respond to such challenges in your faith. In my household we allowed for atheism as long as it was not ignorant atheism. My kids were required to put in the effort and engage the subject. I would always say, “I will respect your position when you can keep up with me in a discussion.”

For example, I will ask my children: “Where did you get that idea about God?” “Does God have to be that way?” Then I will share that I have struggled with these objections too and here is where I came out. My child would ask, “Why does God allow suffering?” Excellent question is the immediate answer. Then you might say, “How might you design a different world? What would that be like?” The most important follow up question is this, “Are any of those forms of suffering more powerful than love?” And then, “What if God wants that world you designed too?”

We believe in a God who took the place of the victims of this world, the position of the most powerless, and felt the suffering of oppression, rejection, torture, and execution. Our God does not stand aloof from suffering but tries to remedy it from the inside through always faithful, never failing, unbreakable love. Our God cries out against the unjust suffering and pain of human self-destruction because our God feels it too. Our God does not impose this suffering. God gave us a good creation that a long history of abuse has made toxic and harmful to human flourishing. Our God has even experienced death and turned it into a pathway for renewed life. Everything we experience as an enemy of life our God has redeemed.

That is a long answer and not totally appropriate for kids. However, it is very important that parents and grandparents show the example of educating their faith if they wish to guide their children. Which leads to a crucial point; you are the adult and you are smarter than your child. You have more life experience. You can absorb their rejection of things you hold dear if you remember that you are helping this child mature and they have a long way to go.

It only feels like rejection of you because it is. Our kids need to reject us and betray us to get the separation necessary for individuation. Trust that they will come back and lay the seeds of that return by engaging them in a gentle, open spirit now. Faith is a gift from God. We cannot control its transmission, but we can give our children the formation they need to know the true God - and avoid the false gods - when the time is right.

Blessings,
The Rev. Jarrett Kerbel
Rector

Space for Conversation

The Rev. Jarrett Kerbel

"We need less religion, less politics, and more culture," said the Rev. Mitri Raheb when I met with him in Bethlehem this summer. For just this reason, the college he founded is devoted to nurturing art, dance, music, theater, poetry, and the culinary arts. His objective is to develop the bonds of civil society in the West Bank so Palestinians can become a unified people without resorting to religious or political extremism.

I heard this idea expressed by a number of Palestinian leaders including a young man in Hebron who had organized a co-ed 5k run. Predictably, the co-ed run had provoked a clash between more traditional Palestinians and more modernizing Palestinians. The young man took this in stride as the cost of progress. His goal was to carve out a secular space for civic activity that could build the health of his people.

Do we need less religion, less politics, and more culture here in the United States? Would a resurgent or newly conceived common culture mitigate the intensity of our political and religious polarization? I will not pretend to have complete answers to these profound questions but I do have some themes I would like to explore.

Over-confidence in religious beliefs is often named as a major contributing factor to disputes that resist resolution. The corrective is said to be a healthy skepticism and doubt of any value or assertion that comes from a religious worldview. Unlike Palestine, the United States has a long history of a secular civic space and we cast the fantasy that religion has nothing to say in this space. The problem is; how does a religious person leave their religion behind when making moral decisions that shape our common life through politics?

Professor Jeff Stout, recently retired Professor of Religious Studies at Princeton University, puts it this way: "The line between church and state does not run through the heart of a believer." I agree with Jeff - one of my intellectual heroes - and would add, "If I call Jesus Lord, how can he be Lord of only one facet of my life? Mustn't I seek to follow him in every place I make decisions that effect my neighbor?"

My answer to those who counsel doubt and skepticism in religious belief is to wonder why religion should be the thing we doubt most of all. When we are honest, we admit that we do not live each day doubting the values and beliefs that make our day functional. We believe our car will run without knowing the first thing about engineering. Really what we need is to simply be upfront about our commitments, wherever they come from, and contribute them as a way of enriching the moral discussions that form our life together.

Some will object that politics is corrupt and selfish and I want religion to be pure and transcendent. My gentle reminder is that we follow a God who took on incarnate life and battled sin hand to hand to the point of a sordid and disgraceful death. Perhaps we need to follow him into the muck and the squalor for the sake of love of neighbor and God?

If you're interested in further discussion around this topic, I highly recommend that you join us on Sunday morning, October 28, for Parish Forum at 9:15 a.m. Chris Satullo will lead us in the first of a two-part series on Conversations Across Differences. See you in the parish hall!

Blessings,
Rev. Jarrett Kerbel

Rector
Parish Forum - Sundays at 9:15 a.m. in the Parish Hall
Oct. 28: Conversations Across Differences
The common denominator in all of our communities is they are divided by differences of all kinds. How do you get people to discuss their differences and put their solutions into action? Our guest speaker at Parish Forum this week is Chris Satullo and he's an expert on the subject. Chris is the co-founder of the Penn Project of Civic Engagement and is a columnist for the Philadelphia Inquirer. He will demonstrate how faith plays as important a part of breaking down barriers as anything else does. Join us for the first of this two-part series this Sunday at 9:15 a.m. in the Parish Hall.

Chris Satullo

Nov. 4: Conversations Across Differences, Part II
This week Chris Satullo continues his discussion on how faith can play a role in slicing through differences we face in our communities in part two of this important series. Today he’ll discuss strategies to start conversations, arrive at solutions, and put those solutions into action. We can save the world one small piece at a time. Your first lesson awaits you at Parish Forum.