It is said that children do not bring a book of instructions on how to educate them. However, we always try to do our best effort so they grow up healthy and become proper and useful men and women.
When they are small we worry about their safety, their feeding, and all their basic needs. And we can not let our baby’s baptism go by. We contact the parish as soon as possible and do all we need to do so they can receive the initial Grace of our heavenly Father and can be called daughter or son of God.
Then come the school years in which we are always attentive so they can get good grades and not miss their classes. When they are in second grade, it is time to receive first communion. It is the time to go and contact the parish again to register for sacramental preparation. If we have not been taking our son to religious education classes, it will be two years before he can receive first communion. Sometimes parents find it totally absurd that the church requires so much time for children to learn about the faith, without thinking about the importance of receiving the Body and Blood of Christ for the first time.
When our children are in high school it is the age to receive the confirmation sacrament. We go back to the parish to register them, and again “it’s a two-year process” and we get angry with the church once more. Can we identify this pattern? Every seven years we go to church so our children can receive a sacrament, as if we had to renew a sacramental license. Would we do the same in terms of school education? Can you imagine what would happen if we started taking the kids to the first grade, then the seventh and later the tenth, and then asked the school district to give them their high school diploma?
They would laugh at us! So, why do parents not take the religious education of our children seriously? Have we ever thought about how we are preparing them for the eternal life?
Maybe we have never asked ourselves these questions. Or maybe we have not given them due importance. Our obligation as parents is to provide our children for their needs, to give them an education, but also (perhaps even more important) to teach them the faith. Influence them so they can have a relationship with the best friend they will have in life, Jesus Christ.
We have to create a domestic church where the center of everything we do is Jesus Christ and our faith. It is not just about taking our children to receive religious education each time they receive a sacrament. Going to church on Sundays as a family or meeting to pray at night or before eating are only the first step. They must receive a continuous religious education to learn what is morally correct and thus be able to face the difficulties encountered in life. In addition, the church is where they will find their ecclesiastical family, who will accompany, understand and support them for the rest of their lives.
Religious education is important not only for our children, but for ourselves. We are accustomed to send our children to church for their religious formation. Pope Francis in his book “Joy in the Family” reminds us that we as parents are the first educators of the faith in our homes and therefore, we must also seek faith formation ourselves.
Our ultimate mission is to guide our children the greatest gift God has given to know, love and respect their heavenly Father. So when we present ourselves in front of God, He will be pleased with us, saying:Welcome! faithful servant I entrusted you one of my children and you taught them to become good men and women.
