Care and Feeding which I cannot summarize because I'm too angry at LW's neighbors

[jadelennox]

Why Won’t My Neighbors Accept I Don’t Want to Help With Their Egg Hunt?

Dear Care and Feeding,

We are a Jewish family with young children, and we recently moved to a neighborhood that’s full of families with kids, which has been great—we have all enjoyed getting to know our new neighbors. Recently, one of the neighbors texted me that the block does a street-wide Easter egg hunt, and everyone was going to decorate their houses and hide candy-filled eggs in their front yards for all the kids to find on Easter morning. I initially responded saying that it sounded like a lot of fun, but that we wouldn’t be able to participate, and I wished them the best. My neighbor then asked me to hide eggs and decorate our yard, even if our kids weren’t available to participate in the Easter egg hunt. So I explained: we’re Jewish; we don’t celebrate Easter—I hoped they would have a great time.

Well, now I’ve got two different neighbors telling me that “this is a secular event,” and “everyone does this!” and I “shouldn’t deprive” my kids of fun. Any suggestions for what I should do? I don’t feel comfortable decorating our home with symbols of a holiday that we don’t celebrate. And honestly, we’ll be way too busy hosting our out-of-town family for Passover that weekend to be simultaneously crafting an Easter egg hunt in our yard. Am I an Easter Grinch? I would happily let my kids visit a Christian friend’s house and celebrate Easter with them, but doing it at our own house seems strange.

—Not a Grinch!

Dear NaG,

I’m sorry you’re in this position. You’ve handled this very well so far, but perhaps not explicitly enough. I can’t fault you for that, and I assure you that your second response should have been sufficient, but apparently it wasn’t. I think at this point you are going to have to take it upon yourself to educate your new neighbors, explaining a little more thoroughly what it means to be Jewish—at least to the two who seem to have no idea. I’m not going to adjudicate the idea that celebrating Easter in this way is secular—I recognize that many families (including my own, since my daughter was raised with both Jewish and Christian holidays and traditions) to some extent divorce such celebrations from their faith and religious practices. But insisting that non-Christians participate in Easter, and that “depriving” their children of this means those poor kids don’t get to have any fun, is, if not antisemitic, antisemitic-adjacent. And since your first December in your new neighborhood is only eight months away, you might want to be proactive before these same neighbors complain that your house is the only one in the neighborhood without Christmas lights.

You don’t have to be didactic, or defensive. I know you want to feel at home in your neighborhood, and you don’t want this to become an ongoing problem for you or your kids. It’s enough to say that you appreciate their perspective on this holiday, but it’s not your family’s holiday—that at this time of year, Jews celebrate Passover, not Easter. You might add that while you appreciate their concern for your children, they can rest assured that your kids don’t feel the least bit deprived. (I recognize that this last bit of advice sounds a wee bit barbed. But so be it. I am irritated on your behalf. Feel free to skip this part if you are a nicer, more forgiving person than I am.)

Comments

[jadelennox]

I'm actually the tiniest bit torn on this one. For a lot of non-Christians from Christian (particularly non-Episcopalian Protestant) backgrounds, the insistence by people in other religions that Christmas and Easter are not our holidays comes across almost as an accusation that they're gasp celebrating a Christian holiday. I've certainly had atheist and pagan friends from Christian backgrounds feel extremely uncomfortable with that. Because (much of) Protestant practice in America has spent a few hundred years believing that it lacks ritual and that ritual practices are Papist, the idea that Protestant rituals exist is already uncomfortable for a lot of people. And while non-religious people raised in non-Christian religions or in Catholicism often understand that you can be non-religious while happily participating in cultural rituals, that's a more alien idea to many non-religious Americans raised in Protestant culture.

HOWEVER. Any empathy I have for the neighbors goes to shit when they insist neighbor hide Easter stuff in her own yard. That's not even cool if it has nothing to do with religion, but once you throw in a religious holiday that happens at the same time her own kids will be celebrating a different holiday that will disallow them from eating the candy themselves?

Flames. Flames on the side of my face.

[dine]

as a former Papist, this sort of stance is hard to understand. I know you're describing a real thing, but I can't quite wrap my head around how they cannot see that the seemingly non-religious Bunny & eggs are celebrating a Christian holiday, and not everyone does that

[jadelennox]

It took me years to understand it, because I grew up in a Jewish community north of Boston, which is to say I think I first met Protestants in high school. And even then they were the minority and the two I knew best were Episcopalian and Unitarian, so hardly representative of American Protestantism. (waves to J who I think is in this comm)

I seriously thought most Americans were Catholic (current, lapsed, or atheist children of lapsed) until I got to college. I used to offend people in college by asking "what are you?" and when they said "er, nothing?" I'd say "no but I mean what are you?" because at the time I'd never known a fourth-generation atheist child of Jews or Catholics who wouldn't understand the question and consider it a jumping off point for a narrative. It was like moving into a foreign culture.

[minoanmiss]

UGH. I am so, so sorry, LW. I apologize for my former religion.

[conuly]

It's not like there aren't tons of perfectly fun childhood Jewish things LW's kids (probably?) are doing that these people aren't, but LW's not going to badger them about it.

Though maybe they should, just for kicks.

[jadelennox]

There's a twitter account, JewWhoHasItAll, who does that as satire. I find it mildly amusing. Going to look I saw this one from February which read your mind and it cracks me up:

My gentile neighbor Anthony sent me an email saying he’s not Jewish and doesn’t celebrate Purim, apropos of our totally awesome, inclusive, fun annual neighborhood block party that I’ve been working hard planning.

How should I respond?

— Jew Who Has It All 🇺🇸 (@JewWhoHasItAll) February 16, 2022

Some responses I’ve already ruled out:

• You don’t have to be a stick in the mud.

• You don’t have to make a food or toy donation if you don’t believe in charity.

• Yes, yes, I know, you’re a gentile, you keep talking about it.

— Jew Who Has It All 🇺🇸 (@JewWhoHasItAll) February 16, 2022

[conuly]

Purim has always seemed like such a fun holiday to me, too - something for kids, something for adults.

But as it's already over, perhaps LW should just stash some random matzo around their yard and wait for the baffled complaints.

(Or not. Liability, much?)

[goljerp]

perhaps LW should just stash some random matzo around their yard and wait for the baffled complaints.

While I like the snarkiness of that idea, matzah would turn to mush pretty quickly if it's out too long. There are plastic eggs that one can buy, and put matzah into... but that goes back to the "don't have time for it" aspect. (And, maybe it's just me, but I always worry I don't have enough matzah before Passover. That's probably why I bought way too much this year. After Passover's over, well... this video is a cute video which gives an idea of what my feelings might be.)

[conuly]

Oh, it was a totally snarky non-serious suggestion. No worries.

[goljerp]

I figured you weren't serious. I found myself identifying way too much with the LW. I am way behind on my own personal Passover preparations, and the idea of spending hours for someone else's religious stuff right now is getting to me. Yes, I'm procrastinating right now by writing this response, but that's my (poor) choice. :-)

[gingicat]

I hope that at least one of the neighbors reads C&F and sees this.

[librarygeek]

I'd probably put up a sign that we search indoors for a specific cracker this time of year, but I hid plagues in the yard for outside fun!

Then get bags of plastic frogs and crickets and get my kid to hide those for the neighbors. 🤷‍♀️🐸🦗

Yes, I'm Jewish too, was one of the few Jewish kids in the school district from 1st through 8th grades, and only in high school were many more Jewish classmates. 😂 Greek Orthodox Christian kids and I were sharing that the holy days didn't exactly coincide with what most people expected, and dolmas, baklava, hamantaschen and charoses were all tasty 😋! Fortunately, about a third of the teachers were Jewish and teachers never made me participate in holiday crafts or music. However, our music book was trying to be inclusive, had "Henei Ma Tovu", and I was so excited to have everyone singing that with me each year. I wrote English words to it for our 6th grade graduation theme and we did that as a round.

[cereta]

If I lived in that neighborhood, both I and my kid would find the "plague hunt" hilarious

[librarygeek]

One part of my brain wanted to include Halloween blood capsules too, but the generations of ancestors yelling at me about no need to encourage a new blood libel decided that wouldn't be a good idea.

Seriously, plagues yard props could do double duty for Halloween. Welcome to Pesach, let's reduce our celebration by the suffering of the Egyptians. Pour out 10 drops of wine while reciting the plagues.

I'm the firstborn, the wise child, and named Aviva in Hebrew, as the names of the festival are Chag haPesach, Chag haMatzot, and Chag HaAviv, festival of spring. I go a little over the top for its multifaceted observance. 🔯🤷‍♀️🐸🦗🩸

Jesus Christ. Pun intended.

[cereta]

Look, I think the question of Christmas as a secular holiday is open to debate, but Easter? No. I don't doubt that many people who are not particularly religious, or religious at all, celebrate it, and in particular celebrate the parts (eggs, bunnies) that were appropriated from pagan religions, but almost anything beyond that (pretty dresses for girls, that kind of thing) slides into "one of the two days of the year we go to church" territory. That's particularly true if you get into the time leading up to it. Lent, and particularly Holy Thursday, Good Friday, and Holy Saturday are very specifically religious. Observing them is very different from having an advent calendar with only secular imagery.

If LW were just non-religious, this kind of pressure would be rude. When they belong to a religion that specifically precludes the celebration of Christian holidays, and has its own holiday on the same days? No.

If they can, LW needs to identify someone on the street who seems at least vaguely capable of grasping this and use them as an ambassador to the others.

Re: Jesus Christ. Pun intended.

[jamoche]

Usually the same days. Sometimes it's a lunar month off. The local Safeway had to be told that they'd put the Passover stuff out a month early and should not have taken it down after Easter. To their credit, they put it back.

Re: Jesus Christ. Pun intended.

[cereta]

Well, I was speaking specifically of the LW, who says they'll be hosting people for Passover that weekend.

[didotwite]

I've been kindly invited, lapsed Protestant, to a Passover Seder. It was all about the kids. Table decorations they'd made for the plagues. Kids doing the readings and the oldest daughter leading prayer. Teaching us about the foods and ritual.

It's not their job to educate the neighbors, at all.

Watch them trying to get a Muslim family to hang out eating candy in the daytime as well. 🤦‍♀️

[conuly]

Candy which, being jelly beans, is no more likely to be halal than it is to be kosher, no less...!

[greenygal]

Even if there were genuinely no religious component to the situation--if, I dunno, the neighborhood had a summer event where people hid plastic dinosaur toys in their yards for kids to find, and put up dinosaur decorations--it would still be okay for LW to say "Oh, that sounds like fun, but we won't be participating, thanks!" And this is not that situation, so seriously, LW's neighbors, knock it off.