I grew up Catholic. I went to Catholic grammar school and high school. We attended church almost every weekend. I know all the prayers and responses. The old school ones—I forget the new ones every single time. There is a rhythm in the Catholic mass that brings me comfort.

I think I’ve said before that Aaron and I had decided to not raise our children Catholic. He was raised Christian Reform. We settled on general Christianity taught in the home. For now. We’ve never really attended organized services. We talk about God in generalities and the golden rule. We preach kindness. But we don’t sit and read the Bible or anything. My kids have never really learned the stories.

At dinner the other night, McKenna was talking about her birthday and how it landed on Great Friday, April 7.

Ope!  Maybe we aren’t such good Christians after all. 

I explained it was Good Friday. Ever try to explain the persecution of Christ to a child who has ZERO context for it? It went something like this.

McK: But what is Good Friday?  Why is it so good?

Me: That’s a confusing answer. It’s the day Jesus died. 

McK: Well. That’s not good!

Me: He died to save all the people who believed in him. And even for those who didn’t. That’s why, as Christians, we call it Good. He had a follower in his group of 12 men who made a bad choice and told the people who didn’t like Jesus where he was. And they took him and Jesus died that day. 

McK: How did he die?

Me: He was actually hung on a cross until he died. It was very sad. That doesn’t happen now where we live. 

McK: And was his mom there?  And his stepdad? And his friends?

Me: 😳 His stepdad? 

McK: Yea. Didn’t you say that God was his dad but that Mary had a husband who wasn’t Jesus’s dad?  That’s a stepfather. Right?

Me: I guess you are technically right. 🤷🏻‍♀️ I know Mary was there. I don’t remember in the story if Joseph was. His  friends were there. They took Jesus and put him in a tomb. Like a cave with a rock in front of it. That’s how I always imagined it. 

McK: So then what happened? 

Me: You know how we celebrate Easter?  We celebrate that because three days after Jesus died, he woke up. On Easter. And he came out of the cave. It was a miracle. 

McK: You mean Jesus is a zombie?! 

Me: NO!  He’s not a zombie! 

McK: He was dead then he was alive. He crawled out of the ground. He’s a ZOMBIE!  

Me: 🤦🏻‍♀️ Not a zombie. A miracle. And he came out of a tomb—not the ground. 

McK: Then is he still walking around?

Me: No. After a while, he went to heaven. 

McK: So he died again?

Me: 🤔 Um. No. God just brought him up to heaven. 

McK: How did he do that?

Me: I’m not sure. But I always pictured it as a cloud coming down and bringing Jesus back up to heaven. 

McK: Like he stepped on a cloud and it brought him to heaven like a cloud elevator?  

Me: Uh. Kinda. 😬 And Mary, too. But at a different time. 

McK: Religion is very confusing. Do you think all that really happened or is that just a story? Because it’s really weird. 

Me: Since I’m a Christian I do believe it. But I went to school for a very long time in a school that taught about religion so it doesn’t sound weird to me at all. 

McK: Well it’s really weird to me. 

I get her point. There’s this dude who was magically born to a lady. He has a magical father and a regular stepfather. He was actually nailed to a cross and then put in a cave. Three days later he was a zombie. Then he went to see his magic dad on a cloud elevator before coming to get his mom on the cloud elevator. They still watch us all the time. We can talk to them even if we can’t see them and they don’t really talk back to us. Cool. Cool.

Naturally Aaron and I are in discussions to find a church to attend services. Maybe they can explain it better than I can. Because now McKenna is afraid of a zombie Jesus who is spying on her. So… I think I failed.