Help Your Kids Keep the Faith

Amanda Woodiel suggests 33 strategies for raising teens and tweens in the Catholic faith. 

Someone recently asked me how to instill a Catholic worldview in tweens and teens when the culture so rigorously opposes it. Here’s what we’ve attempted to do with our five children aged 9-17 (three teens and one tween):  

Build Your Relationship with Your Child 

• Always treat your child with dignity. We should do that for all human beings, but it is so easy to be a little slipshod with the people you live with. Do not yell at them, do not lay down unjust consequences, don’t make power plays just because you can.  
• At the same time, you’re not their friend and you will answer one day to God for your parenting. Have high but fair standards, but also be merciful and patient. 
• As much as possible, have fun with your kids. Be funny more than dour. 
• Figure out each one’s love language and occasionally be intentional in speaking that language.  

Build Your Family Culture 

• Observe the rhythms of the week: Fridays are for penance; Sundays are for feasting. 
• Celebrate liturgical seasons as a family. Celebrate individual baptismal birthdays and namesake days (or patronal feast days). Usually this is just a dessert in our household, but that’s enough to make it special! 
• Post saint quotes in the house. 
• Leave Catholic books and magazines lying around. We subscribe to Catholic Answers magazine; it does the heavy lifting in apologetics. 
• Watch Catholic shows or listen to podcasts yourself in common areas — they’ll listen in if they want. Share what you learned at the dinner table. 
• Speaking of that, eat dinner as a family as much as possible. Obviously, no screens or headphones should be allowed at the table. 
• Serve others: Take meals to people in need, or do yard work for the elderly, for example. Show your family that the faith is about making the Kingdom of God present on earth in a way that is authentic to you and attractive to their desire to change the world. 
• Model life-giving human activities and occasionally insist upon them: getting outside, making music or art, playing games, cooking, or reading books. 
• Always know why you are saying yes or no to something. Arbitrary rules are frustrating to all of us. Occasionally you might have to say something like, “There is a reason, but I can’t tell you at this point because it was told to me in confidence. But it’s best that you don’t ride along with so-and-so right now.” If your kids have learned to trust that you love them and have reasonable reasons for what you decide, they’ll more willingly oblige. 

Be Vigilant About What You Let into Your Home 

• The number-one piece of advice I give to all people who ask: do not allow YouTube on any screen except a central TV.  
• If you don’t want your children on screens all the time, you cannot be on screens all the time. We allow one hour per child per solemnity (that’s every Sunday plus several others), but believe me, this gets stretched (watching sports and family movie nights don’t count, for example). 
• Screens should not be allowed in personal spaces at all (not even your own bedroom). Screens are not meant to divide us so that we are each alone with our screen. No one is going to thank you for this right now — but one day, they will. 
• Use content filters, of course, but also passwords for smaller, portable devices.  
• When you give your child a phone, check the content on it regularly and let them know you will do so. Check the history on tablets and computers as well.  

Surround Your Family with Great People 

• I’ve heard that the way people who deal with money are taught to recognize counterfeit bills is to give them real bills to handle over and over again. The same is true of the Catholic worldview and faith. Give them the authentic thing in as many forms as possible, and they will recognize it when something isn’t quite right. 
• Invite families to your house regularly, even if your home isn’t spotless. 
• Invite priests, particularly young, vibrant ones, to your home. 
• Send your kids to Catholic summer camps like Damascus (I can’t recommend this one enough!).  
• If possible, send your kids to a quality Catholic school or homeschool them. We started by homeschooling ours but realized that they need friends beyond what we can give them. We drive 45 minutes each way to go to a classical Catholic school with daily Mass and are considering moving there. Our grave responsibility to parent them the best we can impels us to make this big sacrifice. 
• If possible, start a small group for teens.   

Build Your Relationship with Your Tween/Teen (some more) 

• Try to spend one-on-one time with each tween and teen on a fairly regular basis. This isn’t easy to do when you have a large family. At one point, when it was possible, my husband and I took turns once a week taking one child out to Adoration at our parish and a small outing (like a donut). That dissolved with the advent of multiple sports schedules, but we can still get an occasional ride in the car alone. Car rides are a great place to connect, especially with boys, because you aren’t looking at each other eye to eye. 
• Teens often open up late at night, like at 11 PM when you are exhausted and just want to go to bed. Quench the impulse to shut it down and try to listen without yawning. 
• Watch movies with them that are age-appropriate and ask them casual questions: “Who do you think was the hero?” or “Do you think he was right to kill that guy?” Try not to sermonize if the answer isn’t the same as your own. The point is to actually get to know your child and what she thinks. 
• Muse aloud about the movie you watched or a real-life situation, such as, “I wonder what would’ve happened if he had gone back home.” 
• Tell stories and share stories. There’s a reason why Jesus preached in parables! You don’t have to hit them over the head with the moral of the story either.  
• Let them overhear you praising them aloud to your spouse or other people.  

Pray 

• Pray as a family every night. It might feel weird at first. Start with a simple prayer and work your way to more. We have seven people in our family, so each person gets a day of the week in which to lead prayer. 
• Pray for your children on your own: at Mass and in your devotions. Pray Scripture for your children. 
• Tell them you are praying for them when they have a test or other big event (and do it!). 

If this list seems overwhelming to you, pray over it and pick one thing to start with — the thing that is most realistic to accomplish or the thing that you think would bear the most fruit. Start with that and take one step at a time. We’re still working on a couple of things on this list ourselves! 

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Copyright 2025 Amanda Woodiel
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