An Unfortunate Sign

The sign I’m referring to, was a church sign.

It was Father’s Day 2019, and we were expecting our second child in August.

I had already aced the parenting thing for our first son…

Let me try that again.

I was trying my best to parent my first son and was nervously, but excitedly awaiting my second chance to not screw up the parenting thing.

There, that’s better.

A funny thing that I just learned about the other day. A 2016 study from Pew Research found that Millennial dads spend 3 times more time with their kids than the previous generation. That’s more time changing diapers, doing night feedings, banging your head against the wall when they won’t sleep or eat.

You know…all the things!

So, I guess you could say that I had the following positivities on my side: my personal love for children, my generational alignment and my desire to out-parent my father, who suffered from his own issues.

Maybe I’ll tell that story in the future.

Let’s get back to the sign.

Ahem…this sign in particular was a church sign. Not only was it a church sign, it was my wife’s church sign.

If I failed to mention this earlier, I’m an agnostic atheist, secular humanist, soft determinist, methodological naturalist and all around goofy character.

My wife is a United Church of Canada member…But you would never know it. She is very private about her faith. I would say that she’s more of a humanist because she puts her compassion for others, above her beliefs. I bet even a detective would have a hard time putting that one together.

She grew up in the church with a Sunday School so big, they all wouldn’t fit in a picture on the front stoop of the church.

When we met, I was an apatheist (didn’t believe, but didn’t care) and she was not preachy…so the differences didn’t really come up…until they did. After the wedding, when our first son was on the way. Whoops!

So needless to say, navigating the marriage and parenting in a mixed-worldview household has its challenges.

This sign didn’t help.

I know what you’re saying, get to the damn sign already. I will, I will…I just have to give some context.

Context provided. Moving on.

The sign…at my wife’s church…on Father’s Day:

FATHERS WHO KNOW JESUS KNOW BEST

Brace for impact…

I did the proverbial double take when I drove past. I abruptly took a sharp left around the block, drove a second time by the pastor’s house, and gawked at the sign again.

“Oh shit,” I said out loud, to myself.

Not knowing which phrases, if any, were going to trigger my wife into ditching the heathen.

I knew I had to bring this up to my wife. Not only was I shocked and appalled, I felt personally attacked by this glaring threat…from a building that takes up half of our town! It’s a huge church and it’s smack dab in the middle of our little hamlet. Did I mention I live in the Bible Belt of Ontario, Canada?

I had to find a way to tell her how it made me feel, but not hurt her feelings in the crossfire.

I chose the outsider test for an analogy.

“I noticed the church sign today said fathers who know Jesus, know best…”

She looked at me, almost frozen in place. I continued:

“That’s just their opinion…and to tell you the truth…I’m kind of hurt by it.”

Still silence. Still staring. Still.

“So, umm it would be like if we drove by a mosque and the sign said that mothers who follow allah, know best. How would you feel if you saw a sign like that?”

She got it.

She said she understood and that it was just a sign.

Phewf, dodged a rocket! But it wasn’t just a sign. Not to me. It was a statement, as in, a matter of fact…in their belief system. Is it even valid? I mean, if you take it at face value, it’s kinda saying that if fathers follow the teachings of Jesus, they would be better parents. But does that even make sense?

Was Jesus a parent?

Some Christians have a conniption if you ask if Jesus was married to, or even in some sort of romantic relationship with Mary Magdalene. “No no no, they were just friends!” They say. I guess she was just his sugar mama…as she funded his whole romp through Galilee. Or so it says in the gospels.

I guess it could just mean, in simple terms, that fathers are better parents if they belong to that specific denomination of Christianity’s outlook on Jesus, and listen to the stories of Jesus that their pastor tells them…

Maybe I just think too much.

The sign doesn’t really bother me anymore. It was more about how my wife would see me as a father, when her church is telling her how to see me.

The first 5 years of my marriage were learning how to dodge theological bullets.

These last 5 have been sharing mutual insight and steadfast understanding.

We have both grown in leaps and bounds.

I’m still kinda annoyed that organizations that claim to have the monopoly on morality can just post their opinions for all to see…but that’s what they’ve always done.

I’m hopeful for the day when religious institutions evolve with the times and post a sign saying something akin to:

PARENTS WHO TRY THEIR BEST ARE THE BEST PARENTS FOR THEIR CHILDREN

…Maybe I’ll just do it myself.