Parenting with the Gifts of Faith

Megan Cottam highlights five ways parents can raise healthy children with everyday faith practices.

As sociologists track the changes in childhood development and analyze some concerning trends of dis-ease, everyday Church practices can become a beacon of light. These five gifts of faith provide Catholic parents help to navigate stressful times. 

The Gift of Silence 

In a world of constant noise and distraction, our bodies struggle to process life. Anxiety increases, impacting our children’s health. Christ invites us into the silence.  

• Home Prayer Spaces: This is a place where any family member can go when they need silence. Simple prayer cards, a rosary or crucifix, and a comfy blanket can complete the space. A window nook, corner of a room, or even a space outside in nature are all great locations. 
• Before Mass: Arrive to Mass with your family ten minutes early. Demonstrate to your children that this is not “a time of waiting for the next thing” but an important period of silence to prepare ourselves for liturgy. 
• Adoration: Start with a few minutes in front of the Blessed sacrament and develop habits of seeking silence to listen to the Lord and what He is saying in your child’s life. 

The Gift of Mercy 

Trends of “cancel culture” and perfectionism place undue stress on our children as they fear failure, judgement, and abandonment. Our faith provides our children an unconditional place to return home and teaches them to extend mercy to others as well.  

• Examen: Based on Ignatian Spirituality, the simplest versions of this practice teach our children to walk through their days, accept their successes and failures, and work towards humility and repentance, renewed to follow Christ. 
• Sacrament of Reconciliation: Children need to see parents model apology and forgiveness, and discover the gift of the priest, in persona Christi, hearing their sins and still affirming God’s love. There is a restorative process to the sacrament that stands in contrast to the judgment of the world. 
• Works of Charity and Mercy: As we are forgiven, we extend mercy to others, based on their inherent dignity and not on any human measure of worth. Find opportunities to serve alongside your children, explaining that Christian motives are simple: We love one another, without exception. 

The Gift of Community  

The modern age is hyper-oriented toward individualism and at best organized into homogenous subcultures, denying us wisdom of “the other.” Our faith community remains a heterogeneous group with a wide diversity of skills and life lessons.  

• Sunday Gatherings: As we gather to worship or celebrate, we do so with all ages, abilities, cultures and backgrounds. Interacting with one another is within itself a gift. 
• Godparents: Our faith tradition provides built-in mentorship for our children, where they can seek answers to questions outside of their peer and family groups, and gain perspective from their elders. 
• Diversity of Expression: The Catholic Church contains worship with a wide range of sacred art, languages, cultural devotions, and music. By experiencing a liturgy at a church with a different expression of faith than your typical Sunday, you can expose your children to the many sacred ways to worship our Lord. 

The Gift of Ritual 

The constant push towards re-invention and rejection of tradition disrupts a natural rhythm to life. Our faith practices provide a healthy way to express our emotions in meaningful moments.  

• Milestone Celebrations: From the birth of a child to the death of a relative, there’s a liturgical celebration or ritual practice for every occasion of our lives. Our faith provides a roadmap to celebrate, mourn, and transition well. 
• Traditional Prayer: There are many times in parenting life where we lack the words to teach, comfort, or calm our children. It is in these moments when we turn to our traditional, memorized prayers for direction. We model for our children a coping mechanism for hard times. 
• Liturgical Living: Children crave moments to celebrate and special activities to differentiate from the day-to-day routine. Observing the feasts of our heroes, the saints, allows us this space to affirm the goodness of life with special treats, activities, and family time. 

The Gift of Purpose 

The gift of absolute freedom is an overwhelming reality for many of our children. Our faith guides our youth towards God’s will for their life and puts their free will into the context of discipleship and mission.  

• Spiritual Direction: Our clergy and trained spiritual leaders have open doors to help discern God’s will in our lives, helping to relieve the weight and anxiety of making difficult choices. 
• Co-workers in God’s plan: God calls us to a holy purpose from the moment of our Baptism. Even when our children feel lost, we can remind them of the promise of this gift and calling. 
• Leadership in Jesus: When Truth is paraded as relative, Jesus and his disciples provide us a clear path and moral compass for how we are to live, serve, and love in this world. We need not invent our own ethics but instead strive to live out Jesus’ teachings consistently in our lives. 

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Five gifts of faith provide Catholic parents help to navigate stressful times.  #CatholicMom

Which gift of faith are you most thankful for as you live out the vocation of parent? 

Copyright 2023 Megan Cottam
Images: Canva