Atheist Raising a Believer

Sara Goldfarb Become a fan
Mom, attorney, and writer. Curlsgonewilde.blogspot.com.
Posted: 06/09/2014 3:21 pm EDT
Updated: 23 minutes ago

I'll never know for sure exactly how or when I became an atheist.

On the one hand, you could say my childhood left me with little choice. My parents, recovering hippies, maintained only the most mainstream of Jewish traditions in our house. Chocolate gelt was dutifully doled out at Hanukkah. I was unceremoniously stuffed into scratchy tights for the high holiday exodus from Westchester to my grandparent's apartment in Brooklyn.

I knew which holidays meant hamantaschen and when to expect only bagels and white fish. I came to look forward to (or dread) certain Jewish food groups during their respective seasons, but the educational buck stopped there. My brief brush with religious school came as quickly as it went when my parents asked me, "Do you want to go to school on the weekend, too?" and I all but laughed in response (who wouldn't?).

On the other hand, I'm a cynic by nature. When first shown the Ten Commandments, my parents asked if I knew what was happening when Moses parted the Red Sea. "Yep," I replied, "It's an advertisement from God." My brain stumbles when trying to connect the dots between pain and some larger plan or to make sense of the concept that everything happens for a reason.

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