Fighting the Good Fight

So, yeah. T in the car on the way home said, in English, "Today was the worst day of my life."

Which usually turns out to be nothing. She's said this before, on numerous occasions. But I'm not about to dismiss it - I ask, "Por qué, mi amor? Qué pasó?"

And it turns out that, in addition to another event later in the day of less consequence, this is what happened:

Sitting around their table at Kindergarten today, one little girl said, "Raise your hand if you believe in God!"

T was the only one who didn't.

And all the other girls yelled at her.

"What?! You HAVE to believe in God!" "God does so many great things for us!" "The whole world is because of God!" Etc., etc., etc.

And T said that she answered, "Well, everybody gets to make their own choices." Which sounds exactly like the sort of adult-toned speech-parroting that she's so incredibly good at.

And when they still didn't leave her alone, T went and talked to her teacher, who told her that, sometimes, when people are being mean, you just have to ignore them.

After T went to bed, Janneke and I talked, and Janneke, who's been much more on the warpath with this particular issue lately than I have, said that she wanted to talk to the teacher about it. And I think that's probably the best move. Doing nothing is not something we want to do - and talking to the parents of the other kids isn't exactly what we want to do either. But we do want to make sure that there's no anti-anti-religious pile-ons happening, either. I would love to have the teacher explain, in no uncertain terms to these kids, and if need be, to their parents, that belief in God does not make a person good, or nice, and non-belief in God does not make a person bad or mean. I find myself quite insistent on that point, suddenly: We must insist in all classes that atheists are equally valid, nice, and moral. Make that known. And if parents have a problem with it, they will have to lump it. Because this is a public school, and all beliefs, and non-belief, deserve - and will get, by thunder - equal protection.

T absolutely does not like being the odd duck. She asked, as we sat in the driveway, doors to the car open, I not quite arisen out of the driver's seat, she still buckled in in back, whether it was OK for her to believe "in the good God". I said she could believe absolutely anything she wanted. That no matter what she ever decided to believe, we would always love her, and she would always be our little Grugrita.

It concerns me - somehow, Q never got any flak. Or the flak he got was something he could bat aside. T, though, was hurt by the whole interaction. I wonder if I was sufficiently Ward Cleaver for her...Hard to say. She went to bed pretty happy, so maybe I did OK.

But, of course, what should happen tonight before shower time but T comes up to me, smiling shyly, to show how well she's memorized the Pledge of Allegiance.

With "under God" right there in the middle of it.

I smiled and congratulated her effusively, even as Janneke and I locked eyes and grumbled.

There's fights out there, if you want to fight them. And maybe we do...but maybe T doesn't. And maybe she shouldn't have to.