New Baby Advice

[Pontifite 7 of 10]

Hello old Phatmass friends, don’t know if anyone would know or recognize me. But I got an account here in 2006, when I was in 7th Grade. 
 

Some time has passed, obviously, and now I’m a homeowner with my first baby on the way. 
 

So...this is a place where Catholic folks can go for advice, so I’ll ask the room: 

 

Any tips or tricks of how I can integrate Catholic teaching to a little kid? Religious conviction in general seems to become less and less mainstream and if I don’t have those conversations with them young, then it may be an alien concept. 
 

Did anyone else have trouble bringing up that conversation with their first kids? What did you do to make it interesting? 
 

My parents got me excited to go to church because they would take me to get a Hardee’s Bacon Egg and Cheese Biscuit afterward. 
 

I’m trying to not use food as an incentive for my forthcoming  baby, but that didn’t work out when my parents did it for me (cause I’m really fat lol). 
 

So, in summation: hello old friends, glad to see the site is still up and running. Any tips and tricks you have to introduce alien concepts of spiritual devotion to my future child, that would be great. 

[Nihil Obstat]

Praying as a family should be a huge one, as well as keeping up a robust personal prayer regimen. Kids need to see their parents leading the way. They will see what you priorities are through how you behave, more than through what you tell them.

If the parents do not pray, or do not pray regularly, or with gravity and devotion, the kids will understand that "despite what we talk about, this is not actually that important."

Congrats on the life progress by the way. Moosey (if you remember her from the olden days) and I got married in 2013. We also bought a home and have a second child expected very soon.

[profer_lumen_cæcis]

+J.M.J.+

 

Deo gratias! Congratulations on the little one  May God reward you for your beautiful desire to raise a strong little soul for the Church!

 

The home is the domestic Church. A good and holy priest once said "If the idea of the separation of Church and state is so repulsive to us Catholics, how much more repulsive is the separation of the home and the Church." How true! Here are a couple articles about keeping the home, and the home life, centered around He Who matters most :

https://www.fisheaters.com/domesticchurch.html

https://www.fisheaters.com/homeb9.html

https://www.fisheaters.com/home2.html

https://www.fisheaters.com/home4.html

 

Hope these are helpful! Your family is in my prayers  And Nihil Obstat, your family is as well (congratulations!).

 

In His Most Sacred Heart,

Gertrude

 

[Anomaly]

It’s weird coming from me, an ex-catholic, but I’m not anti catholic. 
my family is very catholic.   I have lots of siblings and nieces and nephews. 
not all are still Catholic.   The ones that still are, the parents are most joyfully Catholic.  They didn’t threaten or demand, but lived happily as Catholics and always were open to flaws in how people lived it.    You don’t have to be perfect, but a real example of someone doing the best they can.  It will work out.    Have faith, lol. 
congrats on you life journey. 

Edited March 13, 2021 by Anomaly

[benedictaaugustine]

Look up Catechesis of the Good Shepherd!! It’s an amazing way of teaching young children about God that emphasizes how God and the child have a special relationship. It introduces the “Good Shepherd” to children around age 3 which is important because when they hit the age of reason around 6/7 if God is suddenly introduced as this “judge” who is judging right from wrong then it can be difficult for the child. Therefore it’s so good to introduce God as a loving father and shepherd BEFORE 6/7 so then the children see God as a loving father and can integrate that into learning about right and wrong. It also emphasizes the child’s free exploration of their relationship with God. You can train yourself in it, or find local programs. I know it’s also been very healthy and healing for adults too.

 

https://www.cgsusa.org

[chrysostom]

The first link from profer lumen caecis is great - doesn't have to be all of those things, just pick a few tangible things that you can personally find joy in which can be "scaled up" to a famliy level, so to speak, and make it part of your own life and growth in faith.

If it were me I would strongly advise memorizing some lovely hymns and chants and making them part of the day. Kids will soak the joy and beauty in, that will render these things not alien but make them feel at home.

Edited March 15, 2021 by chrysostom

[MIKolbe]

On 3/13/2021 at 12:44 PM, Pontifite 7 of 10 said:

Any tips or tricks of how I can integrate Catholic teaching to a little kid?

As someone who has made many mistakes as a Dad and has many regrets, model the faith for your children. You know how the Lord is slow to anger and rich in kindness? Model that.

 

You know how His mercy and love endures forever? Model that.

 

You see Christ crucified out of love? Model that.

 

Strive to model your faith, not just teach it or preach it.

 

I am so happy for you! I will remember you in prayer.

[fides' Jack]

I'm so blessed and thankful to have a wife who makes this easier than it is for most!

The biggest thing is daily prayer, which can be done no matter where you live.  Each of my kids received a full 4-volume copy of the Liturgy of the Hours when they received their First Communion.  It actually really helped our oldest who was struggling with reading at the time.  He didn't understand everything as he read it there, but it forced him to read it, anyway, and his reading in general greatly improved.

Of course saying a rosary everyday is greatly beneficial, too.

Outside of daily prayer with the family, make sure you have your own personal prayer time every day - and make sure the kids see you praying alone every once in a while.

I recommend taking your whole family to daily Mass as often as is possible.  That might not be possible until your kids are older.  Until then, find time for yourself or for your wife to go to Mass alone, multiple times per week.  Receive the sacraments as often as is possible.  If you can do weekly confession, do it.  Do an examination of conscience daily.

Outside of that, live the liturgical calendar - this is an area that my wife pretty much takes care of on her own, and she does a fantastic job.  She has decorations for a number of different feast days, and happily decorates for a day or two and then takes it all down.  She has a cookbook of different foods for different feasts (i.e. she makes shawarma for the feast of the Holy Family).  Lots of purple in Lent/Advent.  

She's also the primary homeschool teacher.  She grew up going to a Baptist school, and she's passing on a lot of the training she received there for learning the Bible to our kids.  They're currently memorizing all the books of the Bible in order, via song.  They're also memorizing different passages for different occasions (apologetics).  They know more Bible stories than I do at this point!

Do the enthronement to the Sacred Heart and the Immaculate Heart.  In addition to the prayers to do so, it also involves setting up a space in your home that is dedicated to your prayers.  We have a separate room in our house that is used every day, throughout the day.  We call it the chapel.  It used to be just the prayer room, but we were fortunate enough to have a priest actually say Mass in our house mid-last-year, and now I think it can be called a chapel.  Make a chapel in your own house, and make it a priority space.  Collect lots of sacramentals and fill this space with those and holy books.  In there, we have a cabinet that serves as a kind of altar (it was used as an actual altar), but that serves as a place to hold items that belong to the saint of the day.

I handle the catechism portion (they do get some of the basics in homeschool, as well), and take the kids to their religious ed classes.  The lockdowns kind of changed our approach to a lot of this, but I am making sure our kids have the Baltimore Catechism memorized (we're doing that entirely at home), and that they understand what they're memorizing, as much as is appropriate for their age.  In their religious ed classes, I personally sit in until I am confident that I trust their teachers to pass on authentic Church teaching.  I've had to correct teachers before.  Usually it's enough that I can bring individual concerns to the pastor, and ensure that my kids understand why something is wrong.  Unfortunately, there are very few parishes where I would feel comfortable leaving my kids to learn on their own (we did eventually find one - but I still sit in the adult area to listen to classes for adults).  I would say, as cynical as it sounds, the vast majority of parishes will teach heresy multiple times to your kids while they're doing sacrament preparation.  It's absolutely necessary for parents to be extremely involved in this entire process.  Even otherwise-conservative parishes still suffer greatly from very poor catechesis, mostly because the teachers themselves don't really understand Church teaching, but are enthusiastic about getting involved.

Lastly, we currently live in the age of attachment.  If you want any of this to affect your kids, you'll need to keep them detached from worldly things.  Not too much TV time, not too much video games, etc....  Let them see that Church is the most important aspect of your lives, and tell them why it is.  Make friends with other conservative Catholic families, and make friends with different conservative priests in your diocese.

I will end by just saying that we don't have all this down, either.  One of the biggest struggles for us is family prayer time.  We're often very tired at the end of the day (the most common excuse, probably), but at the very least my wife is able to do LOTH with them at different points during their school day, which seems appropriate.

[chrysostom]

Also, I recommend putting glowsticks in the bathtub and turning off the main lights. Should make for a very entertaining time for your little one. Then sing "Row, Row, Row Your Boat" only about 10,000 times. You'll *ahem* love the song even more by the end.

[MIKolbe]

15 hours ago, chrysostom said:

Also, I recommend putting glowsticks in the bathtub and turning off the main lights. Should make for a very entertaining time for your little one. Then sing "Row, Row, Row Your Boat" only about 10,000 times. You'll *ahem* love the song even more by the end.

In this vein, make *sure* you get a chicken dance elmo in 3 years. Make sure it is played all the time and that you memorize not only the song, but the dance as well.  If you are lucky, the song will stick with you forever.  

I just hope your chicken dance elmo does not get accidently lost. 

 

[Norseman82]

The first thing is to make sure you and your wife (I assume you are a male?  If not, then your husband) BOTH give good Catholic example in your daily lives so that your child sees that as the norm to live by.   

[Didacus]

From my extensive experience as a parent the best advice i can gove with regarda to babies is this;

The less they eat, the less they poop.

 

So if you want to save on time and diapers, take head of that advice.

(I'm told it works for husbands too but i never tried it at that level)

[PaxCordisJesu]

On 3/15/2021 at 11:10 AM, fides' Jack said:

but at the very least my wife is able to do LOTH with them at different points during their school day, which seems appropriate

Haha I though you meant Lord of the Rings when I first saw this!

[fides' Jack]

2 hours ago, PaxCordisJesu said:

Haha I though you meant Lord of the Rings when I first saw this!

In all honesty, that too.

"Ok kids, who are the valar?"

Edited August 19, 2021 by fides' Jack