From The New York Times-
We were standing
in line for meat pies at the Great Dickens Christmas Fair. The indoor
arena south of San Francisco had been transformed into Victorian London;
actors wearing top hats and crinolines roamed about wishing fairgoers
“Happy Christmas.” As we contemplated the menu — haggis or shepherd’s pie? — a noisy band of temperance advocates marched by hoisting signs that stated, “Gin is Sin!”
As my 9-year-old daughter watched them pass, her forehead knitted, and then she looked up at me with solemn hazel eyes.
“Mama, what is sin?” she asked.
The
merriment of the fair receded and I stared at her, my brain spinning
with the magnitude of her question. By failing to teach my child the
meaning of the word sin, had I somehow failed to give her a moral
foundation?
Sin.
That tiny word still makes me cringe with residual fear. Fear of being
judged unworthy. Fear of the eternal torture of hell. Fear of my
father’s belt.
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