... well, technically anyway.
We are both atheists really, but were brought up in different faiths, sort of, not particularly forcefully at any rate. Me, Catholic, Mr Brown Protestant.
Given our actual beliefs match this has not been an issue, and society is not the same as it was, there's not the prejudice there used to be, thank goodness. There was no sitting down with our respective families and "breaking the news" as it were.
Anyway, 16 years on, we are still plugging away at it.
I'm listening to ABC Radio National's Life Matters program, all about "inter-faith" marriages and the whole Catholic/Protestant divide that existed in Australia.
My parents were a mixed marriage too, in order to be "allowed" to get married in mum's church, my dad promised us away before we were even born. If I were mum I'd just have not got married in the church, but these things mattered more back then I guess.
My mum's parent's marriage was also mixed, again all 100 of their children were brought up in my grandmother's faith, or they wouldn't have been allowed to marry in the church.
I'm not a fan of that particular church, I think it just a little bit evil.
Friday, October 16
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3 comments:
Things have changed quite dramatically over here as well. Chuck and I make up a "mixed marriage", which has rarely caused us any conflict. But we did decide long before we married how we would raise our children if we were fortunate enough to have any.
I'm grateful for all the good things my Catholic upbringing gave me. But I would happily give something of great value to lose all the negative things that came along for the ride.
In conversations with younger family members who have been brought up without any religious education or habits, I hear their ambivalence. Sometimes they feel they are outside "the norm" of being brought up as "something".
But as the world continues its religious strife it's difficult not to focus on the grief and the damage people have wrought over the centuries in the name of religion.
It seems to me the longer the succession of mixed marriages, as in your family, the less religious the unions become.
My mom converted from Baptist (ack!) to Mormon (triple ack!) in order to marry my dad. As a result, there is no church-going in our family.
Or is it just true that those of us who don't give a rat are safe to come out now?
Lee - religion seems to have a much stronger role in American society, while Australia isn't France (wish it was) it is pretty secular nowadays. Those brought up strongly religious generally feel the oustiders.
Cookie, I love that it's safe to come out as not - we'd have been burned at stake or somesuch not so very long ago!
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