I’ll admit that at first, the little voice in my head was screaming “Όχι!” when my husband suggested we obtain our children their Greek citizenship. At the time, my three sons were aged seven, eight and nine. Internally, I went back and forth with myself about the possible benefits and risks. Externally, we began to initiate the process.

My father, who was a first generation Greek-American originating from Kythira, strongly objected. His generation preferred to look firmly ahead and live out the coveted American dream, thanks to the sacrifices of his immigrant parents, who desired their children to be chiefly American citizens. Seeing his grandchildren obtain Greek citizenship would have signaled a turn back toward the fatherland. It forced me to think long and hard about codifying Greek identity for my children.

It was easy to come up with concerns. My husband had already been granted Greek citizenship through his father, who grew up in Larissa, Greece. The steps were more streamlined as he navigated the process. On the other side, my parents were the first generation born in America, and their parents were already deceased. That left me, personally, with the most difficult path to citizenship. If my sons were able to obtain citizenship and I could not, where would that leave me?

Despite my initial hesitancy to allow my sons to receive Greek citizenship, they strengthened their connection to Greece as a result of it.

Another major concern was the prospect of committing my sons to military service as Greek citizens. How could a mother not worry about her sons, who were at present playing with nerf guns and struggling to eat their vegetables, but might one day serve in the Greek army? Aside from the fact that proving each of them had lived in America their whole lives would technically waive their military requirement, the very thought of risking enlistment catapulted me into greater worries I was simply not ready to comprehend.

Still, the allure of providing a direct line to connect our boys through their ancestry via citizenship in the EU proved to be very enticing. Both my husband and I knew that securing dual citizenship would expand their options for where they could work and live later on. By giving them that option, we could provide our children the kind of freedom and global mobility we hadn’t been offered.

Most significantly, we could give our sons a tangible link to their ancestry. Although it would come with several legal responsibilities, we decided to move forward in the process. Our sons are now citizens of both the United States, Greece, and the EU.

Now we can look back at the choice we made and verify it was a good one. In the end, the decision to obtain Greek citizenship for our sons cemented within them a deep passion for Greek identity that we did not expect. In the subsequent years of their lives, they have visited Greece several times, attended church with vigor and learned the language of their ancestors.

Now they carry in them a strong desire to preserve and protect their heritage for future generations. In that regard, I encourage other parents to affirm their children’s Greek identity through citizenship.