Читать книгу God's Guide for Grandparents - Susan M. Erschen - Страница 9

Chapter 1

Obedience

It is 3:00 a.m. My grandchildren are spending the night at our house. My one-year-old grandson is sleeping peacefully in his crib. My three-year-old granddaughter is standing by the side of my bed, telling me she is still afraid to go to sleep. She has been awake for two hours now. I have tried everything. I have taken her back to her bed, assuring her we have no monsters in our house. I have lain on the floor by her bed, hoping she would not be afraid if I was there. I have let her climb into my bed, but she thought it was a grand time for whispered talk. We have played soft music, turned on an extra light, read three books by flashlight, and had more drinks of water than I could count. I even turned on a movie, hoping she would fall asleep to that. But now the movie is over and she is still awake and wanting to go downstairs and play with toys.

I explain to her — for the hundredth time — it is still nighttime and not playtime. I am reduced to begging. I plead with her to just go back to bed, close her eyes, and sleep.

“Grandma,” she replies with all sincerity, “I would really like to help you out, but I just don’t like sleeping.”

The Wisdom of our Children

“I would really like to help you out, but …” I have heard my son use those same words in response to my granddaughter’s whining for something he had told her she could not have. He and his wife both have a gentle but consistent way of letting the kids know they cannot always have what they want. I am extremely proud of the way they are raising their children. Yet, intentionally or unintentionally, we grandparents can sometimes get in the way of the parenting work our children are doing. We may fail to honor their wishes and obey their rules. This can be harmful to our grandchildren.

Because I attended a Jesuit university, I was required to take nine credit hours of theology. I took World Religions, Scriptures, and Theology of Marriage. Those courses had a big impact on my life. I remember the Theology of Marriage professor saying the best thing parents can do for their children is to love their spouse. Every child needs to feel his or her parents are good, wise, and lovable. If children see their parents as bad or wrong, they often tend to think something is wrong with them, too. They know they are closely connected to their parents. So, when we criticize, undermine, or contradict our grandchildren’s parents, we take a little piece away from our grandchildren’s sense of worth. This is not good. Grandparents should interfere in the raising of a grandchild only in the most extreme cases in which the welfare of the child is at risk.

Pope Francis emphasizes the importance of letting parents be right when he says: “It is irresponsible to disparage the other parent as a means of winning a child’s affection or out of revenge or self-justification. Doing so will affect the child’s interior tranquility and cause wounds hard to heal” (The Joy of Love, 245). If this is the pope’s advice for parents, it certainly would apply to grandparents, too. For the sake of the children, we must honor their parents in every way possible.

This may not always be easy. Our children’s marriages are not without challenges. The people they marry might bring with them different family traditions, expectations, worldviews, and beliefs. We must accept whatever the situation might be.

Young parents today work hard to do the best for their children. In this era of information overload, they sort through endless dos and don’ts. Their pediatricians give them lots of rules. Their friends give them advice. If they check the Internet, they quickly are overwhelmed with information “every parent should know.” Long gone are the days when you just referred to the index in Dr. Spock’s baby book or called your mom. Once our children sort through all this information, we must respect the rules they set down. Every young family has the right to set its own rules, just as we once set the rules for our own families. Although the new parents make the rules, they still want our support. A December 2015 Pew study found 72 percent of young parents hope their parents approve of the way they raise their children. Let us give them that approval and support.

A good example comes from a grandmother who spent an afternoon entertaining her infant granddaughter with soothing baby videos she found on YouTube. When the parents came home she was proud to tell them of this great discovery. The young parents were not thrilled. They gently told Grandma they did not want their baby exposed to electronic media until she was at least a year old. Grandma did as all good grandparents should do. She immediately apologized and promised to respect their wishes in the future.

Modern technology presents many new issues for parents and grandparents to discuss. Can grandparents post pictures of grandchildren or announce family events on their Facebook page? What kind of television shows, movies, and video games do the parents find acceptable? Should grandparents send out a photo Christmas card of their grandchildren? When is it okay for Grandma or Grandpa to text, phone, FaceTime, or Skype a grandchild? These and similar questions should be discussed — always mindful and respectful of the fact that the parents should make the rules, not the grandparents.

Sometimes the rules young parents set down may not make sense to us. We are still called to respect them. Think of the ten lepers who were cured by Jesus (see Lk 17:11–19). The lepers asked to be cured. Jesus replied, “Go show yourselves to the priests” (v. 14). This command surely made no sense to the lepers. They could have argued. But instead they did as they were asked. Scripture tells us, “As they were going they were cleansed.” It was only when they obeyed Our Lord’s instructions that they were cured. If they would have stood around arguing with Jesus, they may never have been cured. Let us not argue when we are asked to do something (or refrain from doing something), even if it does not make sense to us. In fact, even if we strongly disagree.

Best practices in child-care have changed so much in the last generation that some hospitals now offer classes for new grandparents. If I would have taken one of those classes, maybe I would not have been shocked when my daughter-in-law fixed a bottle for my baby granddaughter with powdered formula and tap water from a public restroom. Sterilizing bottles is out. Swaddling babies is in. Regardless of the new rules, God calls us to honor and obey the parents in all things. No one knows the child better than they. In this way, we can help our grandchildren learn to obey their parents, their heavenly Father, and other authority figures in their lives.

The Will of the Father

God gave Moses the Ten Commandments. The first three cover our relationship with God. The next seven cover our relationship with others. The first of the human-relations commandments is, “Honor your father and your mother, that you may have a long life in the land the LORD your God is giving you” (Ex 20:12). Teaching our grandchildren this commandment is the perfect way to start passing our faith onto them. However, it will not be enough to just tell them, “Do what your mommy and daddy tell you.” We, too, must do what their mommy and daddy wish. Giving our grandchildren the idea it is okay to disobey is not okay at all.

Obedience is a virtue we usually think applies only to children and vowed religious. However, the Church says this commandment calls all of us to respect and obey all those in authority. We must be faithful Christians, law-abiding citizens, and good employees. If we do this, we generally have the Fourth Commandment covered. Except, now, there is a new sheriff in town. Our children — the parents of our grandchildren — are in authority over our grandchildren. That means they are in authority over us and our relationship with our grandchildren. We must honor and respect them. We cannot respond to their wishes with an “I’d really like to help you out, but …” attitude.

In his Letter to the Romans, Saint Paul tells us why obedience is necessary: “Let every person be subordinate to the higher authorities, for there is no authority except from God, and those that exist have been established by God. Therefore, whoever resists authority opposes what God has appointed, and those who oppose it will bring judgment upon themselves” (13:1–2). The authority God has established over our grandchildren is their parents. It is not us! According to Paul, if we decide to oppose that authority, we are opposing God.

Young parents make their rules based on new research and information. This is good. This is progress. It has been that way since the beginning of time. At the end of the creation story we are told, “A man leaves his father and mother and clings to his wife, and the two of them become one body” (Gn 2:24). Jesus reinforced this teaching,: “Have you not read that from the beginning the Creator ‘made them male and female’ and said, ‘For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh’? So, they are no longer two, but one flesh. Therefore, what God has joined together, no human being must separate” (Mt 19:4–6). We must not separate young parents by questioning the decisions they have made about parenting their children. We can give advice if — and only if — we are asked.

Pope Francis stresses the control God has entrusted to parents by teaching, “God allows parents to choose the name by which he himself will call their child for all eternity” (The Joy of Love, 166). If God, as the Creator, so completely respects the wishes of a parent, then surely we, as the grandparents, must do the same.

Obedience in the Gospels

The life of Jesus is a model of obedience for us. Mary was obedient to the wishes of God by agreeing to be the mother of his Son. As far as we know, her parents, Saint Anne and Saint Joachim, were not consulted in the matter. God did not send an angel to see if Anne and Joachim approved of Mary’s “yes.” Because of a decision entirely out of their control, Saints Joachim and Anne became the grandparents of Jesus and the patron saints of grandparents for all ages. Their feast day is July 26.

Jesus, too, lived the virtue of obedience. After Jesus was lost in the Temple, “He went down with them and came to Nazareth, and was obedient to them; and his mother kept all these things in her heart” (Lk 2:51). If Christ, the Lord, can be obedient to his human parents, surely we can honor the wishes of our grandchildren’s parents.

Obedience is a virtue we see throughout the Gospels. At the wedding at Cana we see Jesus honor his mother’s wish that he intervene. More importantly, we hear the Blessed Mother tell us to obey. Mary speaks very rarely in Scripture. But her few words to the servers at the Cana feast are words for all of us: “Do whatever he tells you” (Jn 2:5). These words are the preface to every teaching and every command Jesus will utter in his public life. They are spoken to us, who are servants to God, as much as they were spoken to the servants at the wedding feast.

In her “Prayer for Acquiring Humility,” Saint Thérèse of Lisieux reflected on the many ways Jesus was obedient in his life and even today. Not only was he obedient to his parents, but he was obedient to those who tried, tortured, and killed him. And today he is obedient to every priest who utters the words of consecration at the altar. Saint Thérèse wrote: “At their word, you come down from heaven. Whether they advance or delay the hour of the Holy Sacrifice, you are always ready.”

His agony in the garden shows us that Jesus himself struggled with all it meant to obey the Father completely. Yet, he trusted in God and followed his will. If we are agonizing over decisions our grandchildren’s parents might be making, we can kneel with Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane and pray with all our hearts for God to change the situation. But we must not interfere.

The Power of the Spirit

Keeping infants away from computer screens is certainly not an agonizing rule to follow. However, it can be heartbreaking when the parents refuse to bring their children to the sacraments or to talk to them about God. As difficult as it can be, these are still wishes we must respect. Sadly, many grandparents destroy their relationships with children and grandchildren over such issues. Some have even tried to have their grandchildren secretly baptized. When we do this we are undermining the authority of our grandchildren’s parents and showing our total lack of trust in the grace of God and the workings of the Holy Spirit.

God gives children the graces they will need. Remember, he loves them even more than we do! Sacraments are powerful and wonderful signs of God working in our lives. Seeing a grandchild baptized or receiving holy Communion for the first time can bring a grandparent to tears of joy. However, God will still be in the life of a child who does not receive the sacraments. He will give them the grace they need. Remember, he loves them. The God who knocked Saul to the ground and converted him from killing Christians to being one of the greatest Christian leaders can surely touch the hearts and souls of our grandchildren. The sacraments of the Church are beautiful gifts through which God works in our lives. But God does not need them. We are the ones who need them.

Pope Francis warns us, “To raise doubts about the working of the Spirit, to give the impression that it cannot take place in those who are not ‘part of our group,’ who are not ‘like us,’ is a dangerous temptation” (Apostolic Journey to Philadelphia, September 27, 2015). To stress his point the pontiff quoted Jesus: “If you then, who are wicked, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will the Father in heaven give the holy Spirit to those who ask him?” (Lk 11:13).

So, let us pray to God to bless our grandchildren with the graces of the Holy Spirit. Let us pray to the Holy Spirit to guide young parents and lead them and their children to the graces he longs to give them through the sacraments of the Church. Let us ask Our Lord to help us respect and honor the parents of our grandchildren, so we can humbly accompany them on their sacred journey to raise our grandchildren.

For Reflection

1. What parenting decisions and techniques used by my grandchildren’s parents most impress me? Do I let these young parents know of my support for the good work they are doing in raising their children?

2. What can I do to help my grandchildren see that I respect and honor their parents?

3. Do I fully respect the right of my sons and daughters — both those by birth and by marriage — to make the rules and raise their children as they think best? If not, why not?

4. Do I believe God loves my grandchildren even better than I do? Do I trust he can overcome any obstacle in bringing these children into relationship with him?

A Grandparent’s Prayer

Heavenly Father, you have commanded us to honor fathers and mothers. Help me to honor and respect the parents of my grandchildren. Let me never do anything to undermine the authority you have given them over their children. Help me to model for my grandchildren how to be obedient to the wishes of those in authority over them. I bow humbly to you and to all those you have trusted with authority. Amen.