10 Tips For Surviving The Winter Holidays As An Atheist Parent

[rug]

Steph Montgomery
4 hours ago

The holidays can really suck. Between family drama, financial stress, winter weather, and trying to live up to everyone's expectations, they can be anything but "happy." They can be even more difficult to navigate if you don't believe in God. Add children to the mix, even the biggest Grinches might want to (or feel forced to) create some holiday cheer for their little ones. So, how do atheist parents survive the winter holidays?

It's not easy. Before having kids the holidays pretty much meant a flight home, pie, and wine. Sure, there was a little bit of family drama, the obligatory holiday gift exchange (which everyone secretly hates), Christmas parties, and avoiding the mall for a solid month, but honestly the most annoying part about Christmas was the constant stream of carols at the grocery store and on the radio.

Enter children.

Suddenly people want to take your secular kids to church and buy them 100 toys they won't use longer than a day. Your kids either believe in Santa, forcing you to play make-believe for a month, or are scared to sit on his lap, which makes grandma upset when she can't get a good picture. Half of their Christmas wish list is likely to be unaffordable, which makes Santa look like a cheap you-know-what, and makes you feel like a bad mom. Plus, there's always the added bonus that any holiday traveling is made seriously stressful by the addition of kids. Just when you think you are past the worst of it, your child comes home from school and asks you to tell them about Jesus. Parenting is hard.

https://www.romper.com/p/10-tips-for-surviving-the-winter-holidays-as-atheist-parent-23955

[dhill926]

1. K & R...

solid, common sense advice....for anyone...

[Igel]

2. Depends.

Two friends were both atheists.

One shrugged at Xmas. Not a problem. He didn't believe in God, but figured that lots of people have a lot of quirks others find annoying. Including him. He annoyed others and expected them to put up with his quirks; he had an obligation to put up with others.

The other went red-faced with fury at the first Xmas carol. Not because it was foisted upon him. He didn't like some kinds of music, but was able to ignore them. But a Xmas carol? How dare they impose on him like that? Meanwhile, he also had quirks and idiosyncrasies that others found annoying. "That's different."

It took the "I want to be offended" friend years to get over it, and it only really happened when he fell in love with a woman who liked Xmas and when because of health debt and unemployment they came to be reliant on his Xian mother who liked Xmas. Xmas and expressions of piety would have cost him the woman he loved and the two of them a place to stay and food to eat. He learned tolerance.


But it's not hard just for atheists. If you think that the entire thing is an unholy annual affair it's offensive in a different way. But still one that you have to learn to tolerate, just as others have to learn to bear the sight of matzo at Passover, hijabs, turbans, beards, skullcaps, little shrines to Ganesh or to Buddha at some restaurants. Tolerance is hard; intolerance is often easy.

[rug]

3. "Tolerance is hard; intolerance is often easy."