A very difficult question. (thanks for posting it!) I was raised Jewish - I had my Bar Mitzvah and all that jazz - but since then I have strayed away from the religion. It is not that I hate Judiasm or anything like that - it's just that religion is not one of those places where I find my identity.
One of my parents is Catholic and the other is Jewish. Growing up, we celebrated all the holidays. I am so thankful for that because I don't know what my life would be like without Christmas. Not having to do with JC or any of that - having to do with Santa and gifts and caroling and the Christmas spirit -
that's what is important to me about Christmas.
My upcoming marriage will be nondenominational, as my fiancee doesn't identify with any religion either. (She calls herself an "agnostic pagan taoist with chi tendencies" but I'm not sure what that really means...maybe it's just a cute label.
)
We have discussed what we will do if we have kids in terms of religion. I wouldn't want to leave it out of my kids' life completely because I feel that for many, religion can be a way to find yourself - an identity, like I mentioned above. It didn't happen to me, although for a long time when I was in Hebrew School, I learned a lot and definitely took away some good lessons. I think I would probably open up Judiasm to my children when the time was right and see how they felt about it but if it wasn't their thing, I wouldn't 0force them to stay with it. But vanbeast, you're right - it's hard to judge at what age a child would find that identity. I have a friend whose child found himself through religion at about age 9, which I believe is when he started Hebrew School. Now, Judiasm shapes his life. I'm glad he has something like that he really relates to. Maybe that's not a bad age, but it definitely depends on your children and their development levels.