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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]This thread is nuts.

I am Jewish. My DH was raised Catholic but is not agnostic/atheistic. I'd say at this point his Jew-curious. We are raising our kid culturally Jewish though she has been to Catholic church with her grandmother and I'm happy to expose her to her Christian/non-Jewish heritage as my DH sees fit. He has issues with his Catholic upbringing and the Church and is not eager to pass on those issues to his daughter, so that tempers it.

We do celebrate a version of Christmas -- we do a small tree (usually a live tree that gets planted), hang up ornaments that DD made or that DH's family have given us, and we exchange gifts on Christmas morning. We have also spent Christmas with DH's family but stopped because his mom is extremely religious and always wants to do a ton of events, including midnight mass and other things, and DH finds it to be too much and has chosen to instead spend Thanksgiving with them. This is fine with me as I didn't love the Christmas stuff, but I married a non-Jew so was also fine dealing with it. In some ways I think being Jewish made it easier for me to deal with someone else's Christmas because it's not competing with some memory I had of my own Christmas.

In terms of our Jewishness, I was raised reform and am more willing to update and be flexible on Jewish traditions and holidays. But Jewish culture and history are VERY important to me. DD went to a Jewish preschool that is associated with a reform congregation we continue to attend events with, though we don't attend synagogue weekly. We do quite a bit with the local JCC and we spend most Jewish holidays with Jewish friends so that DD can feel like a part of a larger community. My family lives far away so we don't see them on most holidays often but we have done Passover with them several times and when the dates work out, we will sometimes spend at least a couple days of Hannukah with them since it sometimes coincides with school holidays. My parents are really glad we're raising DD Jewish and definitely talk to her about our traditions and family history and it is meaningful to her and them. She has a Jewish first name she shares with two (deceased) family members. She will have a bat mitzvah and we are hoping to do it jointly with two other Jewish families we know through Jewish community events who will turn 13 the same year.

I don't think it's super easy to raise a child with a strong sense of Jewish identity in a mixed family, because I don't think it's easy to raise a child with a strong Jewish identity in our culture generally, because I think we live in a culture without a lot of grounded values. I think the biggest issue with Christmas is the fixation on gifts and material goods that runs counter to both my Jewish values and personal beliefs, which don't like so much waste and materialism. I like that Christmas often has a charitable focus and we try to emphasize that -- it is also very in keeping with Jewish values and I think helps temper the fixation on gifts and just... stuff. I don't think doing Christmas "to the hilt" is in keeping with Jewish values though as others have pointed out, it might not be in keeping with Christian values either. We just try to keep it in check and not have everything be about more and bigger. We focus on family and togetherness and deeper meaning.

I think navigating these issues takes thoughtfulness and that every family must find their own way. My partner is supportive so that helps -- we never even discussed him converting, but I think participating in Jewish traditions and hearing my family talk about it has made him feel a part of it in a meaningful way. I think he had very negative associations with religion because he grew up in the Catholic Church during the height of when all the pedophile scandals were coming out, and he was really bothered by how his church and his own family handled that, so he's skeptical of organized religion and I understand why. I think that also informs our approach, which is much more to focus on family traditions, underlying meaning, and less of a focus on formal religious practice, though we do some of that as makes sense for us.[/quote]
OP here. Thanks for the thought out response. All of the arguing on this thread has been ridiculous, but you gave me a few ideas. I hadn't thought about Jewish preschool or JCC involvement, both of which are great ideas. My DH sounds a lot like yours. He became very disillusioned with Catholicism and that is what drove him away from religion in general.[/quote]

PP here. JCC is definitely a great resource, especially if you are not super religious and may not be as involved at synagogue. I think one of the best things about it is that they have family and kid-focused events so it's been a good way to meet other Jewish families, since after preschool we've been in public school and there are just fewer Jewish families around, at least where we live.

And a Jewish preschool is awesome! Our program was wonderful -- the kids did Shabbat every Friday and then learned about Jewish traditions throughout the year. They'd have a day to dress up for Purim and did a bunch of stuff to make it really fun for kids. They did a much better job of teaching DD about many of the traditions and their meanings than I was doing. I really highly recommend looking for something like this near you if you can find it. [/quote]

Each of my grandkids took several classes at JCC.  We’re not Jewish!  [/quote]

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