“Don’t forget to leave a few carrots out for me Saturday night!” the Easter Bunny called out to my kids this morning as we left the busy children’s adventure park. The hubby and I smiled politely at the oversized Dr. Seuss-looking, hairy, white bunny and ushered our kiddos through the maze of over-active toddlers and frazzled parents laden down with coats, snacks and shoes. As we exited, each of my three children were handed a plastic egg, presumably full of springtime deliciousness. Once we hit the parking lot, my husband and I turned to each other and asked, “Since when did the Easter Bunny become Santa Claus?”
My husband grew up in a conservative Christian household. As the only son of a Pastor who was (and is) the Senior Bishop of their denomination, presiding over the United States of America in its entirety, my husband was a bonafide PK (Preacher’s Kid). He experienced Easter through the lens of a devout Christian, rejoicing in the great resurrection of Jesus Christ! Every year, he and his sisters were dressed in their very best Sunday’s best, donning new shoes, tights and freshly pressed hair. On Easter Sunday, they arrived to church early, ready to celebrate the miracle that occurred in Jerusalem centuries ago. Sunday School lessons centered on the death and resurrection of Jesus and how it was He who died for the sins of this small Black boy from the Southside of Chicago and how He returned on Easter so that he and his little knucklehead friends could have life abundantly. For my husband then, and even today, Easter is and always will be about Jesus. On Easter Sunday, church and the family dinner that followed, was a given. Missing church on Easter was simply not.an.option! Bedside Baptist was officially closed for worship on this Sunday.
For me on the other hand, Easter was all about: The Bunny! Well, The Bunny and The Chocolate and The Annual Family Dinner. I was raised in an agnostic home. My mother believed in a higher power and had reverence for cultural moral values but we did not attend a church (nope, not even on Easter). Without fail, however, each Easter Sunday, after my grandmother returned from her Catholic mass services, she and my mother would stuff me into some itchy, frilly spring colored frock (typically selected by my grandmother, as my mom and I shared the same disdain for lacey abundance). They would twist my legs into white tights and squeeze my feet into a pair of horrific patent leather Mary Jane-style shoe monstrosities that inevitably led to the fall that would cause said tights to be ripped and blackened by day’s end. I would be forced, begrudgingly, into my grandmother’s White Boat (an oversized, over-clean Lincoln Grand Marquis) and driven from one end of the city to the other for some ridiculously boring dinner at my grandmother’s favorite Greek restaurant. It was Easter after all, of course, we had to eat! What would a proper Easter be without some Spanakopita, Saganaki and an oversized glass of Mavrodaphne?
We each fondly reminisce on our respective childhood experiences of Easter Sunday and as a family we are excited to create some of our own memories which (hopefully) will be looked upon with the same fondness by our own kiddos as they age. That then brings me to the question of the weekend: The Jesus or The Bunny? What do we as parents get to teach these impressionable small people living in our house? I argue for a healthy dose of both. While I am excited for Sunday’s church services and the opportunity for our kiddos to participate in the Christian-based educational activities of Sunday school, I also cannot bring myself to correct my five year-old when she turns to me, plastic egg in one hand, bright red lollipop in the other, ear-to-ear grin on her pink-flushed face and exclaims, “This is the best Easter ever! I love that bunny!”
Easter, like all other religious-based celebratory holidays, Christian and non-Christian alike, can retain an element of both education and play. Maybe we can call it, faith-based fun? Like many parents from all walks of faith and belief, it is my husband and my responsibility to raise our children to be caring, loving, contributing members of humanity. This long weekend, we are choosing to do so by finding an intentional intersection between our faith and our fun.
How do you teach your kids about the myriad religious-based holidays? Have you found what you consider to be a ‘perfect balance’ for your household? What are some holiday traditions you and your family participate in?