“I Don’t Believe in God”–When Your Kids Reject the Faith

I’ve been hearing from a lot of parents whose teens are rejecting their faith.  The stories are all terrifically painful but they tend to represent different variations on the following theme.

 

The other day my son/daughter was refusing to go to Church.  S/he told me that s/he doesn’t believe ‘all that stuff’ anymore.  We had a huge fight about it.  I don’t understand.  I never had any problems before.  When s/he was little, s/he loved to go to Church.   S/he was an altar server (lector, choir member)!  Why is s/he being so stubborn all of a sudden?

 

When teens fight you about Church, it usually has little to do with their actual beliefs about God or church.  Usually, a teen’s apparent rejection of his or her faith has to do with one of two things; a personal encounter with suffering he or she can’t make sense of or the breakdown of their relationship with you.

Teens and the Problem of Pain:

One of the most common reasons teens become resistant to the faith is because of a personal encounter with suffering that they can’t make sense of.

“I have a friend who says he’s gay.  The Church says homosexuality is a sin. I don’t believe all that stuff anymore.”

“My friend died of leukemia.  If there was a God, he would have saved him.”

“My parents are getting divorced.  They always went to Church.  They’re such hypocrites.”

Generally speaking, teens who are struggling with their faith for this reason tend to couch it in more philosophical terms.  “There’s so much suffering in the world.  How could God let all (those people) in (that far off place) suffer like that.  I can’t believe in a God who would allow all that.”

Even though their teens’ statements tend to be phrased as philosophical dilemmas, parents should resist the temptation to address the problem as a mere intellectual struggle.  For all their intellectual pretensions, teens–even teens in middle to late adolescence–tend to be more emotional thinkers than abstract thinkers.  Adolescents are in the early stages “formal operations” (i.e., philosophical, abstract thinking).  They are certainly capable of asking hard questions and thinking deep thoughts, but they aren’t all that good at thinking all the way through them.  An adolescent’s attempts at deep thinking tend to result in more brooding than brilliance.

Parents of kids who are struggling with their faith for these reasons would do well to remember that their children’s attempt to make this an abstract issue is a red herring.  There is always, always, always some personal experience of suffering or pain that is making the teen question the existence or relevance of a loving God.  The best response to this is to build you relationship with your teen, help him or her identify the specific, painful experience underlying the intellectual pretense of disbelief and–sensitively–work through that pain.  Sometimes this might require professional assistance.  The good news is that, in most cases, if the suffering teen encounters a loving, sensitive, effective parental response to their pain, their faith will come back online.

Loss of Faith as Loss of Rapport

The other most common reason that teens lose their faith is that they are angry with their parents and are looking for a way to hit back.  In my experience, this accounts for about 85% of teens who adopt an anti-God/anti-church posture (with the other 10% being a personal encounter with suffering and 5% being other factors).

In this scenario, teens often feel that God and faith are the reason their parents are overly strict or controlling.  They’re angry at their parents rules and, for whatever reason, they believe that those rules are a direct result of their parents religious devotion.  That said, the teen isn’t so much angry about the rules per se, as they are about the needs/wants they feel those rules jeopardize.  In other words, the teen feels he has certain needs that his parents don’t respect, and won’t listen to; needs that his parent’s rules forbid him from wanting much less getting.  As a result, he experiences his parents, his parents’ rules and, by extension, his parent’s faith, as obstacles to his growth, independence, and well-being.  This teen comes to believe that the only way he can be his own person is to reject–and even rage against–his parents faith–the source of the rules that are threatening his ability to grow up and be an independent person.

Again,  in this case, the  teen’s rejection of the faith isn’t really about the faith.  It’s a symptom of a deeper and very serious relationship problem between the parent and child or, perhaps, within the family itself.

Healing the Wound: Two Steps

Two things need to happen to heal this wound.

First, parents need to invest in the relationship. They need to make a commitment to regular one on one time with the teen–especially if the teen resists it.    They need to make this one-on-one time as pleasant as possible,  No lectures.  No lessons.  Better yet, do something that the teen is good at that you’re not.  Let them teach you something for a change.  Focus on being compassionate.  Sincerely convey that you are more interested in them than your agenda.

Likewise, parents need to make family life more enjoyable and more intimate and they need to reduce the conflict between them and their son or daughter by whatever reasonable means they can.  They also need to do a much better job picking their battles.  Scale back rules to cover the most important issues (e.g., basic respect, safety and order) and intentionally let almost everything else go–for now.  You can go back to  working on the other, less serious but still important ,behavioral and attitudinal issues once rapport has been re-established.

Second, parents need to look hard at how they might be able to help their teen meet the needs that have been inadvertently frustrated by the parent’s rules.  Increasing the rapport with the teen by spending more one-on-one time together, making family life more intimate and enjoyable, and picking battles will allow the teen to open up about what they need and why.  This will give the parent the opportunity to help the teen find godly and effective ways to meet their needs instead of just saying “no” all the time.  The more the teen feels the parent is invested in meeting their needs instead of frustrating those needs, the more willing the teen will be to see the parent as a mentor.  The restoration of the parent’s mentor status is what allows the teen to be receptive to the parent’s attempts to form the teens faith, values, and worldview.

The more effective you become at proposing satisfactory, godly, alternative ways to meet your teens needs instead of just shutting them down, the more you should see your teen be more receptive to God and the Church.

The Bottom Line

Just remember, if your teen is fussing about going to church, being faithful to your values, or believing in God, don’t assume it’s “just a phase.”  Address the problem behind the anti-religious posturing and you will see your teen’s faith flourish once again.

If you additional help to work through these issues, please check out Parenting with Grace:  The Catholic Parents’  Guide to Raising (almost) Perfect Kids or, for more individualized assistance, you can speak with a Catholic therapist by calling the Pastoral Solutions Institute’s tele-counseling appointment line at 740-266-6461.  Together, we can help your teen become everything God created him or her to be.

Coming Friday on More2Life Radio: YOU ARE SO ANNOYING! (Plus, Win a Free Book! Details below)

Coming FRIDAY on More2Life–You are SO Annoying!:  The Theology of the Body reminds us that we are all “unique and unrepeatable”  which sound great in theory, until you run up against someone whose “unique-ness” makes you want to scream!  Today on M2L, we’ll look at those annoying differences that put distance between you and others and help you cultivate peace with the people who drive you crazy.

Call in at 877-573-7825 from Noon-1 Eastern (11-Noon Central) with your questions about dealing with all the annoyingly different people in your life

Don’t forget to answer the question of the day!

Friday Q of the D:  (Answer to win!)—Everyone has certain pet peeves, things that others do that frustrate, annoy and irritate us.  Complete the following sentence, “It drives me crazy when people…”

*Win a free book!  Every day you respond to the question of the day your name will be entered in a radio drawing to win a free book from the Popcak Catholic Living Library (over 10 titles in all)!  Again, each day that you respond you will get another chance at winning a free book in the drawing held every Friday on More2Life Radio.

This is a great way to get that title you haven’t read yet, or get a book for a friend who really needs it!  Enter every day to win.  This week’s featured title is:  God Help Me, This Stress is Driving Me Nuts!  Finding Balance Through God’s Grace.

Winners will be announced on air and contacted by FB message following the drawing Friday afternoon.

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COMING THURS on More2Life Radio: Word Power

Coming THURSDAY on More2Life–Word Power:  What we say can build up or tear down.  Today on M2L, we’ll look at creating connection through communication, and how to respond when words just don’t work.

Call in at 877-573-7825 from Noon-1 Eastern (11-Noon Central) with your questions about communicating more effectively.

WIN A FREE BOOK!  (Details below).

THURS Q of the D:  (Two-Fer.  Answer one or both).

1. When you’re trying to talk with someone, what things do they do that make you feel frustrated or cause the conversation to break down?

2. What do you think makes good communication possible?

*Win a free book!  Every day you respond to the question of the day your name will be entered in a radio drawing to win a free book from the Popcak Catholic Living Library (over 10 titles in all)!  Again, each day that you respond you will get another chance at winning a free book in the drawing held every Friday on More2Life Radio.

This is a great way to get that title you haven’t read yet, or get a book for a friend who really needs it!  Enter every day to win.  This week’s featured title is:  God Help Me, This Stress is Driving Me Nuts!  Finding Balance Through God’s Grace.

Winners will be announced on air and contacted by FB message following the drawing Friday afternoon.

Can’t get M2L on a Catholic radio station near you? YOU CAN STILL HEAR US!
~ Listen via our FREE AveMariaRadio IPhone or Android App (Check your app store!),
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Can You Teach the Theology of the Body to a 10yo? Should you?

Catholic Patheosi, Elizabeth Husted Duffy, posts her suggestions on what a “true” sexual education out to look like.  I like and agree with all of her recommendations and I encourage you to check them out forthwith.

One point I thought could benefit from a little more reflection, though, is Elizabeth’s initial reaction to a call she received during a recent radio interview.  She says….

One mother called into the show wondering about how to present the Theology of the Body to her ten-year-old daughter.  My answer, or rather, my non-answer was that Pope John Paul II’s Theology of the Body was developed over a series of audiences during the seventies and eighties. It makes for complex and sometimes difficult reading, and many intelligent minds disagree on its practical application.  I think it might be a mistake to use Theology of the Body as a starting point for thinking about or talking to our kids about sex.

I would both agree and disagree with her point.   For example;  if you see TOB as a series of philosophical reflections on the nature of the person broken up into 130-ish segments and delivered over 5 years and intended for a largely academic audience, well, yeah.  TOB would be a terrible place to start talking to kids about sex–or anything for that matter.

This view of TOB is certainly correct as far as it goes, but I would respectfully suggest that it misses the larger point, and this would be where I have my limited disagreement with Elizabeth’s otherwise terrific post.

What Does it all Mean?

Pope John Paul II said that he developed TOB in an attempt to provide people with an “adequate anthropology.”  What does that mean?   Well, you’ve probably noticed that lots of people have lots of different opinions about what it means to be a healthy person, what it means to be in a healthy relationship, what it means to be authentically Christian, and even what it means to be authentically Catholic.  When Pope John Paul II said he wanted to present an “adequate anthropology” he meant he was presenting his answer to those questions.

If we accept that he knew what he was talking about, then I think that makes the case for why it is completely appropriate to ask the question, “How do I teach TOB to a 10yo?”  Or a 7yo, or a 4yo, or a baby for that matter.

Huh?

Well, again, if TOB is just a phenomenological reflection on both the Book of Genesis and the nature of embodied love, then TOB would be a tremendously stupid place to start the sexual formation of any child.  BUT, if the TOB simply uses this academic reflection as a launching off point to answer the rather profound but straightforward questions I mentioned above, then its exactly the place to start.  What parent doesn’t want their child to know what it means to be a healthy person, to be in a healthy relationship, and what it means to be an authentically Catholic Christian person?

TOB proposes to help parents answer exactly these questions.

TOB:  A Lesson Plan

Another reason the TOB is exactly the place to start the sexual education of our children is that it gives a parent the lens through which to apply all the other recommendations Elizabeth makes.  She is absolutely right to recommend teaching children the bible, the catechism, the rules, and being a good model of love in marriage.   But there are lots of different ways to do these things.  

For instance, there are many ways to read the Bible (a book of stories?  a book of commands?  a book that proclaims an angry God?  a book that proclaims a cuddly God? etc.).  TOB gives Catholics a very specific lens through which to read the bible (e.g., a book that reveals the evolving love story between God and his people; a story that begins and ends in nuptial union with God).

Likewise, there are many different ways one could view the Catechism (a book of rules?  a book of answers? a doorstop? etc.).  TOB gives Catholics a very specific lens through which to view the Catechism (e.g., a book the reveals the basics of our quest to understand the heart of God and his plan for humankind).

Similarly, there are many ways we could teach morality (a list of don’ts?, a list of reasons “God’s gonna getcha”?, a list of ways to be impure? etc.).   TOB gives us a very specific way of talking about morality (e.g., a call to love ourselves and others as persons instead of viewing ourselves and others as things).

Finally, lots of couples think they are presenting a healthy model of love in their homes (be strict? be indulgent? put kids first?  put marriage first? put work first?  use contraception? be providentialist? etc.).  TOB provides a very specific model of what love looks like (e.g., it is embodied,  dedicated to meeting the needs of the “unique and unrepeatable” other, and always images the intimate and extravagant nature of God’s love for us).

Teaching a 10yo TOB

Teaching TOB to a 10yo, or a 5yo or a baby doesn’t mean sitting them down and saying, “Repeat after me, child.  ‘The body and it alone makes visible that which is invisible…’ “)

Oy, vey.  I can’t imagine something more stupid or horrible.  Elizabeth and anyone else would be absolutely right to be allergic to that idea.  Fortunately, I don’t think that’s what teaching TOB to kids really means.

I would suggest that teaching TOB to kids means presenting the Bible as the love story between God and his people that begins and ends in union with him.   It means discussing the Catechism in a manner that conveys that it reveals the basics of our quest to understand the intimate heart of God and his loving plan for his people.  It means discussing morality, not in terms of rules and punishments and lines we may tiptoe up to but never cross, but as a guide to what it means to be truly loving to ourselves and others.  And it means presenting a model of love that is openly physically affectionate, ordered to meeting the unique needs of every family member, is extravagantly generous (and expects extravagant generosity in return), and is rooted in a life of both communal and individual prayer.

Anytime  parents do these things, they are teaching TOB to their kids.  TOB isn’t supposed to be a subject we study.  If that’s all it is, then it is useless even as an intellectual exercise.   As an “adequate anthropology”  TOB was always intended to be a message we live; the internal structure that guides our thinking, relating, and decision making as we live the gospel of Jesus Christ and labor to build his Kingdom (aka the “Civilization of Love.”)

TOB Not an Idea.  A Way of Life.

TOB’s power is not as an intellectual property.  It’s power is as a lifestyle that takes our narcissistic, disposable culture by the collar and shocks it into reality through both a stunning display of what real, self-donative love looks like and by bearing witness to the amazing ability self-donative love has to facilitate the flourishing of the human person.

And I do happen to think those are lessons that are worth conveying to a child of any age.

If you’re interested in how to make these lessons a reality in your family, I’d invite you to check out Beyond the Birds and the Bees:  Raising Sexually Whole and Holy Kids and for a look at what it means to build a family around the principles of the TOB, pick up a copy of Parenting with Grace:  A Catholic Parents’ Guide to Raising (almost) Perfect Kids.

Dirty Sex, Accidental Heretics, and the Cult of Purity

“But I am a worm and not a man, scorned by everyone, despised by the people”  (Psalm 22:6).

In the Catholic Patheos community, we’re having a continuing conversation on the nature of healthy vs. unhealthy perspectives on sex ed.  Calah Alexander offers a terrific post contradicting the false notion that sex outside of marriage makes one “dirty.”   She writes,

“Contemporary American culture, a culture that has so influenced other first-world cultures, is profoundly shaped by the heavily Calvinist-influenced Puritanism at its roots. Sex is dirty, according to common Puritan tradition, a dirty (but lamentably necessary) function of a dirty and depraved body. In Calvinist theology, the whole body is dirty, corrupt, depraved, and sin can never be removed. Forgiveness only means that Christ moves to stand between us and God, so that we look clean, although we never really will be. Snow covered dung-hills, that’s what we are. So sexual sins just make us even dirtier, even filthier, even more irreversibly ruined. This is the antithesis of Catholic teaching; even so, the mentality has shaped and molded our culture, which has shaped and molded us, to the point that professed Catholics will say, “Why is it wrong to make someone feel dirty or sinful if they have engaged in premarital sex (which is dirty and sinful)?”

 

Calah is absolutely correct and her comments cut to the heart of why Catholics need to avoid the unfortunate language that personal sin, in general, and sexual sin in particular “makes” us dirty.   I can hear the objections, and I appreciate the intention behind such comments, but the spiritual and psychological problems of this approach  significantly outweigh the hoped-for benefits.

The Accidental Heretic

One thing I have not read, so far, in the wider conversation on this issue, is that the idea that “we must keep ourselves pure” is actually not a Christian notion at all but quasi-Pelagian.   Essentially, Pelagius taught that Original Sin did not affect all of mankind and that man could save himself through his good works.  Pelagius lived a life of harsh asceticism in an effort to protect his purity.  His efforts were rewarded by his being denounced as a heretic.  Why?  Because our purity, our justification, is rooted in Christ’s saving work, not in our actions.  It’s true that sin separates us from God’s love and it is likewise true that that separation can make us feel dirty.  But because of Christ’s incarnation and his subsequent passion, death and resurrection we are not dirty, we are divinized.    Through God’s saving work, we are made, “partakers in the divine nature” (2 Ptr 1:4).    As Calah observed, Puritanism and Calvinism lack the courage to stand upon the promises of Scripture that proclaim us to be new creations and not merely piles of snow covered dung.  As 2 Cor 5:17 tells us, “So, whoever is in Christ is a new creation:  the old things have passed away.  Behold!  All things are made new!”

Purity:  You Can’t Lose What Isn’t Yours

What does all this have to do with sex?  The short version is that sin, in general, and sexual sin, in particular, cannot take away our purity because we cannot give away what does not belong to us in the first place.  As the psalm that began this reflection points out, on our own, we are nothing.  Without God, we are nothing.  But with God, we are everything.  Our purity is not dependent upon our actions.  Nothing we could do or not do could make us pure.  “Lord I am not worthy to have you enter under my roof…”   Rather, our purity is received as a free and unmerited gift from God, “…but only say the word and my soul shall be healed.”

Purity: An Unmerited Gift

Personal sin does not make me more impure than  I already am in my fallen state.  Committing sin simply impedes my ongoing process of purification.  It delays my healing. Without God, I cannot be pure.  With God, my basic purity cannot be lost.  If I sin my full purification (i.e., “theosis”  or “deification”) can be delayed, but my essential purity–which rests in the saving work of Jesus Christ and has already divinized all humankind, believers and unbelievers alike–cannot be denied by anything I could ever do or have done to me.

Fear Leads to Perfect Love?

The whole negative emphasis many abstinence education programs take is, in my mind, completely wrongheaded.  They want to say that it is important to avoid sex before marriage because if you don’t you will be dirty, you will get diseases, you may die.  This entirely misses the point.  Scripture tells us that perfect love casts out fear (1 Jn 4:8).  Sex ought to be about a celebration of a more perfect love.  It makes no sense to me to encourage people’s pursuit of a more perfect love by attempting to terrify them.

The Christian View of Sex:  A Positive Option

I think that we need to send a much more positive message.  I think the message needs to be that God has made each and every one of us to be so beautiful, so precious, so special, that we deserve the best, and sex in marriage is what’s best.  Sex outside marriage can feel good (and sometimes very bad), but regardless of how it feels in the moment, sex outside of marriage always, ultimately,  brings heartache, and pain, and a sense–in fact, an illusion–that somehow our value has been diminished.  By contrast, in the context of marriage–a relationship founded on public promises to live out a love that is free, total, faithful, and fruitful–we are empowered to celebrate all the good feelings that sex can bring in the context of a life that encourages health, wholeness, and happiness.

Sex is not bad.  In fact, sex outside marriage is not bad, per se.  It is simply less good than sex inside marriage.  Sin represents our tendency to settle for less than what God wants to give us (or, in more classic terms, sin represents “a privation of the good”).  It is a failure to believe that we are worth so much more than what we are settling for. Sin does not make us less pure than we are.  It convinces us that we should settle for less than what God wants to give.  Rather than trying to tell young people that sex outside of marriage takes away our purity, we need to be sending the message that the purity we receive as a gift from God empowers us to expect the best from ourselves, our life, and sex.

By no means is this post complete, and I’m sure I’ll be blogging more on it as the conversation continues, but if you are interested in discovering the positive vision of Christian sexuality, I’d invite you to check out Holy Sex! A Catholic Guide to Mind Blowing, Toe-Curling, Infallible Loving  and if you’d like to communicate this positive vision of Christian sexuality to your children, I’d invite you to pick up a copy of Beyond the Birds and the Bees:  Raising Sexually Whole and Holy Kids.

 

Coming Wed on More2Life: The God Connection (Plus, Win a Free Book! Details Below)

Coming WEDNESDAY on More2Life– The God Connection:  God loves you so much!  He is reaching out to you in so many ways.   Today on More2Life, we’ll look at the ways we can draw closer to God and how to remove the obstacles that stand in our path.

Call in at 877-573-7825 from Noon-1 Eastern (11-Noon Central) with your questions about experiencing God’s love more fully in your daily life.

WIN A FREE BOOK!  (Details below).

Wed Q of the D:  (Two-Fer.  Answer one or both).

1. When are you most aware of God’s love for you?

 

2. What makes you feel disconnected from God?

 

*Win a free book!  Every day you respond to the question of the day your name will be entered in a radio drawing to win a free book from the Popcak Catholic Living Library (over 10 titles in all)!  Again, each day that you respond you will get another chance at winning a free book in the drawing held every Friday on More2Life Radio.

This is a great way to get that title you haven’t read yet, or get a book for a friend who really needs it!  Enter every day to win.  This week’s featured title is:  God Help Me, This Stress is Driving Me Nuts!  Finding Balance Through God’s Grace. 

Winners will be announced on air and contacted by FB message following the drawing Friday afternoon.

 

Can’t get M2L on a Catholic radio station near you? YOU CAN STILL HEAR US! ~ Listen via our FREE AveMariaRadio IPhone or Android App (Check your app store!), ~ Tune in live online at www.avemariaradio.net ~ or catch our archived shows via the M2L Podcast (also at avemariaradio.net)

Natural Family Planning and the Dignity of Women

(Here’s an advanced look at my next Family Foundations column).

The dignity of women is under assault like never before.  Thanks to the internet, pornography is more accessible than ever.  Young women, especially, are buying wholesale into the porn culture.  It’s become so pervasive that, surprisingly, many secular publications have recently been complaining about the negative effect pornography has had on relationships from a man’s perspective.  Men are beginning to report feeling put-off, intimidated, or even turned off by the behavior of women who have been “socialized” by porn.  One recent article in the London Telegraph decried the “striptease culture” we are living in and advocated measures that could encourage young women to discover their dignity.    According to a recent Reuters report, 30% of young adults have sent nude pictures of themselves to a boyfriend or girlfriend .  In fact, some studies show that among those who engage in sexting, women are almost as likely to ask for a nude picture of their boyfriend as they are to send a nude picture of themselves.

 

NFP:  Challenging the Culture of Use

In light of all this, is there any more prophetic way to engage the culture than to promote Natural Family Planning?   At the beginning of the sexual revolution, women were told that the key to overcoming male oppression and gaining power in relationships was to “embrace their sexuality.”    The problem is that this phrase is deceptive.  The secular vision of embracing one’s sexuality is allowing oneself to be viewed and used as an object and the more one does this, the less power one really has. The more one embraces this attitude, the more used, lonely, and powerless one is likely to feel.

But NFP promotes a vision of sexuality that is worthy of embracing; a vision where the body is a gift; a vision that believes men and women are first and foremost sons and daughters of God; a vision that understands that sex is not merely recreation, but a re-creation of the promises a couple makes on their wedding day to spend their lifetime together creating and celebrating a love that is free, total, faithful and fruitful.

As with most things worth doing, NFP isn’t easy.  It requires sacrifice and struggle.  It can be helpful, though, to remember what we are sacrificing and struggling for.  I would never want my wife to think that she was anything less than my partner, my best friend and my equal.  In my mind, those things are worth fighting for.  If NFP is a struggle, it is only because I must sometimes struggle against those fallen aspects of myself that want to make me treat her as something less than my partner, my best friend, my equal.  The challenge of NFP is a challenge worth taking up because it asks me to consider whether or not I am truly approaching my wife in love.

Likewise, for the woman, the challenge of NFP asks her to embrace her dignity.  Charting her signs helps her get in touch with how wonderfully she is made (Ps 139:14).  It helps redeem the dignity of her body in her mind.  It helps her assert her dignity to herself and to her husband by giving her the vocabulary she needs to articulate her physical, emotional, spiritual and sexual needs to her husband in a way that is virtually impossible without NFP.  It gives her a way of embracing her sexuality in a manner that doesn’t objectify her, but rather, sets her free to be loved as a person.

The most famous line from the Theology of the Body is that “the body, and it alone,  is capable of making visible what is invisible, the spiritual and divine. It was created to transfer into the visible reality of the world, the invisible mystery hidden in God from time immemorial, and thus to be a sign of it.”   NFP promotes the dignity of women by empowering them to know and respect their body and see that body as a sign of who they are–persons deserving of love.

 

Dr. Greg Popcak directs the Pastoral Solutions Institute, an organization dedicated to providing marriage, family, and individual counseling services by telephone to Catholics around the world.  He can be reached at www.CatholicCounselors.com or by calling 740-266-6461 to make an appointment.

Coming Tues on More2Life: Relationships First! (Plus win the Book of the Week–Details Below)

Coming TUESDAY on More2Life– Relationship First:  Summer is a time for regrouping and putting first things first. We’ll look at what it takes to make sure your most important relationships are getting the best of you, instead of what’s left of you.

Call in at 877-573-7825 from Noon-1 Eastern (11-Noon Central) with your questions about putting the people you care about most–first.

WIN A FREE BOOK!  (Details below).

Tues Q of the D:  (Two-Fer.  Answer one or both).

1. When do you feel closest to your loved ones?

 2. In the course of your week, what usually stops you from being as close to your loved ones as you’d like?

*Win a free book!  Every day you respond to the question of the day your name will be entered in a radio drawing to win a free book from the Popcak Catholic Living Library (over 10 titles in all)!  Again, each day that you respond you will get another chance at winning a free book in the drawing held every Friday on More2Life Radio.

This is a great way to get that title you haven’t read yet, or get a book for a friend who really needs it!  Enter every day to win.

This week’s featured title is:  God Help Me, This Stress is Driving Me Nuts!  Finding Balance Through God’s Grace.

Winners will be announced on air and contacted by FB message following the drawing Friday afternoon.

Can’t get M2L on a Catholic radio station near you? YOU CAN STILL HEAR US!
~ Listen via our FREE AveMariaRadio IPhone or Android App (Check your app store!),
~ Tune in live online at www.avemariaradio.net
~ or catch our archived shows via the M2L Podcast (also at avemariaradio.net)

But Aren’t All Kids Different?

One of the challenges of being a “parenting expert” is that you often find yourself arguing that one type of parenting is superior to others despite the fact that all children are, in fact, different and need different things.

How is it possible to do this?  Isn’t it over-reaching at best or hypocritical at worst to argue that one style of parenting is better than others while at the same time acknowledging that all families and children are different and need different things?   Well, not to get all Bill Clinton about it, but it kind of all depends on what you mean by “different.”

For instance, it is true that everyone has a different personality, but it is also true that, as different as we are, we all share a common humanity.  What we share ought to make it possible to say that certain things enable every person to function at his or her best regardless of our very real and important differences.

Let’s take the focus off people and talk about one of my other favorite things; ice cream (YUM!).   Now, ice cream comes in lots of different flavors, and those flavors are really important, but there are certain ingredients that make some brands of ice cream superior to others regardless of the flavor those competing companies produce.

In the same way, thanks to developments like interpersonal neurobiology (the science of how relationships actually affect the way our brains develop and function), which, since it is dependent upon neuroimaging, is more science than philosophy, it’s possible to say with some confidence that certain ways of raising children tend to allow those children to reach their fullest neuropsychological potential even while allowing for wide differences between personalities.

For instance, we’re able to see that being a loving, intimate, empathic, interdependently social person is what is actually normal for the well-functioning human brain–just, incidentally,  like the Theology of the Body says it is supposed to be.  Both Interpersonal Neurobiology and the Theology of the Body assert that every human being ought to be able to experience those qualities to the full because they are both essential and foundational to our humanity.  Personality then builds upon those traits in a secondary but still tremendously important way so that while each of us can be fully human, we can all still be “unique and unrepeatable” (to use a TOB term).

The point is, when I say that self-donative parenting approaches (aka Attachment Parenting) are superior to other forms of parenting, I mean no disrespect to the very obvious and real differences of each child that every family has to contend with.   What I do mean is that that this style of parenting is actually being shown–by neuroimaging studies–to best facilitate the formation of the brain structures responsible for the fulfillment of every child’s basic humanity.  Personality will develop on top of that.  Of course, parents need to be sensitive to the differences each child’s personality brings but attachment parenting strategies are more likely to give you the healthiest neurological/basic human foundation that allows you to raise a healthy, well-adjusted, well-formed, child regardless of that child’s particular personality traits.

Every child is different but regardless of those differences every child has a basic humanity that needs to be formed and nurtured.  I believe that the research from both theology and science show that attachment parenting practices are the best tools available to hel parents do that job.

Coming Friday on More2Life: Giving & Receiving–Finding the Balance

Coming Fri on More2Life– Giving and Receiving–Finding the Balance:  As Christians we’re called to be self-donative–heroically generous–to others.  But there are still times it’s ok to say “no” to requests.  And we do have a right to make sure that our needs are met as well.  Today on M2L, we’ll look at finding the balance between giving and receiving.

Call in at 877-573-7825 from Noon-1 Eastern (11-Noon Central) with your questions about those times when you feel like you’re having to give too much.

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Thurs Q of the D:  (Two-Fer.  Answer one or both).

1.   When are you most likely to feel that you’re giving too much?

2.   For some people, telling others what they need is easy.  For others, it’s really hard.  What is it like for you to let others know what your needs are?

*Win a free book!  Every day you respond to the question of the day your name will be entered in a drawing to win a free book from the Popcak Catholic Living Library (over 10 titles in all)!  Again, each day that you respond you will get another chance at winning a free book in the drawing held every Friday.

This is a great way to get that title you haven’t read yet, or get a book for a friend who really needs it!  Enter every day to win.  This week’s featured title is:  The Life God Wants You to Have:  Discovering the Divine Plan When Human Plans Fail. 

Winners will be contacted by FB message following the drawing Friday afternoon.

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