“This is Jesus, His name is God.” This very well might be the cutest thing my niece has ever said. I mean, I totally get it; we have a lot of names for Him- Father, Lord, Holy Spirit, it’s totally confusing for little ones.
Growing up we went to church religiously; pun intended. We never missed a Sunday or a holy day of obligation. Most people skip mass on vacation, we were NOT those people. Plus, we went to catholic school so that meant religion class daily and school mass on Fridays. I’m proud of my parents for all the effort they put into our religious upbringing, even if in recent years it hasn’t stuck the way they would have liked it to. The nice thing is, because they created such a strong religious foundation for me, it has given me the security to explore different avenues of my faith.
I remember going to the Newman Center with my roommate in college and a group of us from our dorm getting our ashes on Ash Wednesday. I loved visiting the cathedrals in Europe and lighting candles. Catholicism has been and always will be a center part of my identity thanks to my parents. But now I am the parent, and it is up to me to decide in what ways I am going to steer my children.
I am a little relieved that my son currently attends a Catholic preschool, so I am not solely responsible for his religious training. I know they are working on ways to “be kind” for Lent because every now and then he starts rambling his list and asks funny things like, “And getting mold-o-ramas, is that kind?” Sure, buddy, why not?
The other night as I laid beside him, I said we should pray to Jesus. I gave an example and said something along the lines of, “Dear Jesus, thank-you for giving us a great day. Please keep my boys safe.” After which he prayed, “Dear Jesus, help us to be kind like God. Also, please don’t let us get eaten by sharks. Thank-you for catching fish.” Is there anything more precious than listening to a child talk to God?
Now that our oldest is four I realize we are standing at the crossroads of religion and parenting. In what ways are we going to pass down the faith and how will that shape him as he matures? Knowing that if we simply neglect to teach him something, we are making a statement all the same.
“Train the young in the way they should go: even when old, they will not swerve from it.”
Proverbs 22:6
As I go through my Lenten journey I realize, I am not just doing it for me but also for my sons. I owe it to them to model how to have a positive, productive, and genuine relationship with God. It’s easy to love God when things are going well but trusting God through the pain is much more difficult. In this uncertain world, faith is the most powerful tool in our arsenal. Just as our deity has many names, there are many ways to teach our children about Him, and personally I think the best is through the example we set.