Category: Parenting

Teaching My Children the Bible

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As a mother who is also a follower of Christ, I want my children to learn the stories of the faith I follow. Having grown up in the church and having been a children’s pastor, I also know that there are some pretty messed up ways that churches and families often go about teaching the Bible to kids. From the Aesop fablization of the Bible where gory stories like Noah’s Ark become just about cute animals and instructing kids to obey their parents and teachers to sword drills and programs that encourage binge memorization of verses in order to earn plastic jewels in a crown, children are rarely encouraged to enter into scripture and understand its larger story.

But it’s a story I want my children to know – with all its complexities and overarching narratives intact. While the superbly done The Action Bible has helped my comic-book obsessed daughter become more familiar with the stories, I knew that I needed to find other ways to help expose her to more than just the same dozen “safe for kids” Bible stories Sunday schools seem to favor. So when I saw all over Pinterest a pin about a Child Training Bible, I clicked on it out of curiosity. Something in me hoped it was an accessible way for young readers to piece together the complex history that is the Bible so they could better understand the story of God’s relationship with creation. It couldn’t have been further from that.

No, the Child Training Bible is a color-coded system (patent pending) that makes it easy for a child or parent to look up a verse when a child needs discipline. Asserting that the Bible is the answer book for everything in life, the system is described as – “All the things you work on to train your children tabbed and highlighted with a key in the front. Training topics include: anger, complaining, defiance, lying, laziness, and wrong friendships! So when you need the verses you can grab the actual Word and be able to quickly flip to whatever you need!!” I read that and had one of those fingernails on the chalkboard of my soul moments. The whole system was nauseating enough for how it disrespected the entire purpose of the Bible (and ignored the fact that only Jesus is called the Word of God), but then I started reading the reviews on mommy blogs online. Dozens of mothers were lauding the product as the perfect way to discipline and get their children into the word. I only found one single response that questioned using the Bible in such a negative way and then immediately read all the responses accusing that woman of hating the Bible and not truly being a Christian. It was heartbreaking.

Like I said, I think it is important to know the Bible and I desire for my kids to know it as well. I honestly find it disturbing that more and more these days committed Christians (even many of the classmates my husband and I encountered at our seminaries) have no sense of what is actually in the Bible. But systems like this that cherry-pick verses out of context for the purpose of using guilt to manipulate children into a certain set of middle-class American behaviors don’t help the problem. Neither do many of the other popular suggestions for “immersing oneself in the word” that I am seeing these days. Like the suggestions for the “25 (or 50 or 70) essential verses” one should put on post-it notes around the house if one desires ones family (or husband) to be transformed. Bible verses are not magical incantations that through exposure and repetition will change a person. Even daily reminders that one must delight oneself in the Lord or that God grants rest to the weary while possibly useful in helping one feel better about oneself don’t actually enter one into the story of the Bible or the more difficult way of living it calls people to live. And, unsurprisingly, I’ve yet to read one of those essential verse lists that acknowledge the communal (rather than individualistic) nature of being part of the body of Christ or that include anything about seeking justice for the poor and the oppressed.

I have nothing against memorizing scripture or finding encouragement from a saying or two from the Bible. I teach my children passages like the Beatitudes and expose them to music full of scripture. But I harbor no illusion that reading a daily devotion of two or three verses that deliver personal spiritual warm-fuzzies is in any form or fashion “being in the word.” Nor is seeing a verse on a post-it on your mirror, finding a warning verse attached to a TV or computer, or even doing a fill-in-the-blank “Bible” study. Using the Bible in such ways cheapens it and turns it into the Christian equivalent of a Magic Eight ball. The Bible is not an answer book, or a guide to raising children, or even primarily instructions for how to have a personal relationship with God. Yes, the Bible gives testimony to the way of life God desires, but a handful of out-of-context verses can never encapsulate the message of a story that the faithful have been trying to figure out for thousands of years. I want my kids to wrestle with that story, to understand the competing voices and ideologies within the Bible, and learn to work out their faith with fear and trembling as they respect the narrative enough to not reduce it to sound bites.

I know this post is a bit of a rant. And I am sure there are readers who will call me a heretic and hater of the Bible for writing this. But as a frustrated mom, it is hard to find resources that help me encourage my kids to engage the Bible but that also don’t turn it into a shallow shadow of what it is meant to be.

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My Struggle Today

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My daughter came home from school recently with a worksheet that described life before and after Martin Luther King Jr. One side of the sheet had statements like “Before Dr. King African-American children couldn’t go to the same school as white children. Was that fair?” while the other side said “Now African-American and white children can go to school together. Is this fair?” The point was obviously an at home discussion about prejudice, but what it sparked with our daughter was a discussion about the concept of race itself.

Emma is just in kindergarten and in both preschool and kindergarten she has been one of maybe three or four white children in classes of 20-25 kids. Just going to our neighborhood grocery store or park is like attending a world cultures assembly. Needless to say, she is just used to everyone around her looking different. When she describes her friends at school, she never mentions skin color and instead differentiates her friends by the sort of hair they have. She knows and celebrates that different cultures have different holidays and types of food, but until now she has had little need to understand the construct of race.

So in discussing the world before and after Martin Luther King Jr. we had a hard time introducing her to the concept. At first we tried to explain that segregation meant that she wouldn’t have been able to be in the same school as her two closest friends (who happen to be African-American). She then wanted to know who had done something wrong to prevent them from all going to the same school. We tried to explain about skin color and race then, but she really wasn’t getting it. As far as she knows it is perfectly normal for everyone around her to have different colors of skin (and to speak with all sorts of accents), trying to explain that that didn’t used to be the case was beyond her 5 year old mind.

While I completely understand the need to teach the sins of the past so that they will not be repeated (and restitution can be made), I had to wonder if this lesson on race could do her more harm than good. If my daughter sees no reason why people would ever be different because of skin color, I don’t want to be the one explaining to her the alternative (and I completely realize here that this may be a dilemma only those in positions of cultural power wrestle with which adds a whole different dimension). As I faced this dilemma, I was reminded of the time I read her the (controversial) book And Tango Makes Three about a baby penguin that was adopted by two penguin daddies. The book that had adults all up in arms for presenting the existence of same-sex relationships to children was for her no big deal. To her a book solely about a penguin getting two daddies was boring – what others saw as extreme she accepted as normal. In that instance, I decided very quickly that I wasn’t going to try to convince her that her definition of normal wasn’t universal.

But I’m uncertain in this situation how to best guide her through these issues. I know I need to teach her truth and expose her to reality, but I don’t want to corrupt her heart by being the one to teach her about racism, bigotry, or sexism simply because I am speaking against them. I assume the evils of the world will make themselves known to her eventually, but I’d rather her think being kind and loving to all people regardless of differences is the normal way to be for as long as possible. But I am still left with days like today and school worksheets asking me to teach her about a great man by destroying what she thinks is normal. And I don’t know what to do.

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Children, Church, and God

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One of the joys of vacation Bible school (VBS) is watching what the kids take away from the week. Having such an intense daily experience where the kids get to “do church” and learn about God outside of the ways they normally do truly does affect their lives. My kids, for instance, have been singing the songs from the week around the clock. I hear my daughter singing to herself as she lies in her bed at night, and even my barely verbal toddler has got the “na na na” chorus down. These songs, these ideas, these themes are part of their life now even if they don’t fully grasp their meaning.

As an adult who knows that she will never fully understand her own faith or the ways God works in the world, I get that the kids will only partially understand what they are singing or what they are learning. But they are internalizing these ideas in a loving and safe environment. That is how God is working in their lives in the moment.

Of course, that partial understanding can be amusing at times as well. As my daughter sang a VBS song about dancing and singing for her king, I asked her who her king was. She gave me a weird look and after thinking for a moment said her brother’s name. She explained that he was the person she liked to dance and sing with so he must be her king. We had a nice little chat about God being the king of kings, but I was moved that at the age of 5 she grasped the joy and exuberance of worship that song suggests far better than most of us.

God is working in these kids’ lives — often in ways we don’t plan or expect. Creating the space for them to experience God is, for me, at the heart of what it means to serve children. And often in helping create that space, the children in turn teach me something and draw me closer to God.

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Justice in Real Life

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I’m a mom.  I have diapers to change, groceries to buy, and lunches to make.  Between keeping up with the kids and paying the bills, most days I’m happy if I can squeeze in the luxurious “me moment” of a shower.  But as a follower of Christ I also know that I am called to love my neighbor as Jesus did – by proclaiming good news to the poor, freedom for prisoners, sight for the blind, and to set the oppressed free (as mentioned in Luke 4).  Seeking justice for others in these ways is at the heart of what it means to follow Christ.  It’s not just a call for some Christians; it’s for all of us – including us busy moms.

But it can be hard to figure out how I can be seeking justice for others in the midst of my chaotic life.  I read books by guys like Shane Claiborne and am inspired by how they have fully committed their lives to serving others.  Yet even as I am inspired by them, I know that I can’t move into a commune in the inner-city in order to devote my life to others.  It’s a great idea, just not very doable at this stage in life.  It’s frustrating that doing justice in this world often seems to fall into these all or nothing extremes.  Either one devotes every aspect of who they are to seeking justice or they opt out because they just can’t see how they can fit it into their lives.

But seeking justice doesn’t have to be an all or nothing thing.  Many of the most serious justice issues in our world today are actually intimately connected to our everyday lives and therefore can be addressed through simple everyday actions as well.  Those diapers I change and those lunches I make are justice issues connecting me to people all over the world – my neighbors who Jesus has asked me to love.  Even in my busy life as a mom, I can be choosing to serve others through these daily actions, seeking justice even in the everyday.

It took me awhile (and a decent amount of research) to realize these things, and even longer to start to implement them into my life.  The whole process started for me with a deliberate choice to only buy fair trade coffee.  I had read the stories that coffee farmers around the world were literally being cheated of their wages for the coffee they grew.  They could no longer send their children to school, and were struggling to even put food on the table.  Many of these farmers were being forced off their land simply because the price they were being paid for their work no longer allowed them to even survive.  Fair trade companies though choose to respect the dignity of the coffee farmers.  By purchasing fair trade coffee I know that the farmers were paid a decent wage for their work, allowed to have a say in how the coffee is grown, and were not abused or threatened as they worked.  Sure, it costs me a little more to buy this coffee, but I’m fine paying the full cost of my coffee instead of cheating the farmers of their wages so I can have cheap coffee.  My morning cup of coffee is a justice issue.

From there I learned how the clothes I wear often are made by children in abusive sweatshops, that the cell phone I use has connections to guerilla squads that terrorize and rape women, that the chocolate I eat was grown by children trafficked into slavery, and that the energy I use has destroyed communities in Appalachia and Nigeria.  My daily life connects me to people around the world, and often my choices inadvertently harm others.  If I wanted to seek justice for them, I needed to start by (slowly) changing habits in my everyday life.  As with coffee, I could buy things that had been fairly produced, seeking alternatives to oppressive systems.  But I could also use my power as a consumer to send letters to companies and the government telling them that I care about how those who produce the goods I consume are treated.   My everyday life would continue, but I wanted to make sure that even in the small things I choose to pursue the paths of justice and love

My life is crazy as a mom, and it would have been easy to think that seeking justice is one of those things I’d get around to one of these days.  But seeing the connections in my everyday life to worldwide justice issues changed me.  I realized that I had no choice but to start seeking justice for others since I was already so intimately connected with the injustices they experience.  It just took figuring out the small everyday ways that I could integrate justice into my life to start that journey.

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Playing Children’s Games as Spiritual Practice

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If I could choose how I would like to spend the perfect evening, it would be hanging out with friends with good food and drinks playing board games.  I love strategy games like Settlers of Catan, Carcassonne, and RISK, but I also enjoy fun group games like Apples to Apples and Balderdash.  For what it’s worth, a good round of Texas Hold’Em works for me too.  I enjoy the interaction, the intellectual engagement, and the general hilarity than ensues when friends simply have fun together.

 

That said, I sometimes have a hard time playing children’s games.  There is something tediously mind-numbing about painstakingly making one’s way to Candy Mountain in Candy Land or getting caught in the endless up and down circle of Chutes and Ladders.  Building up my Cootie bug, filling my Hi Ho Cherry-o basket, making pairs in Dora Memory, or matching all the pictures on my Zingo card just doesn’t capture my attention.  But my four year old loves it all.

 

Granted it comes as no big surprise that the child of a couple of board game lovers would like playing them herself (and I admit, I was the same way at her age).  It’s just that, from the mommy side of things, playing those games for hours on end can get a little old.  Now, I love spending time with my daughter, but after the fourth or fifth round of Candy Land as I’m sprawled out on the playroom floor, I sometimes have a hard time keeping my eyes open.

 

But for my daughter, it never grows old.  Each time she builds a Cootie bug, she gets excited about getting to make an entirely new creation.  Each card she turns over in Candy Land holds the possibility of adventures – to whisk her away at any moment to exotic locales like Gum Drop Mountain or the Candy Cane Forest.  Each spin in Chutes and Ladders holds the risk of plummeting her downward and losing all she has worked for or the reward of immediate ascension.  In short, in her life ruled by the power and whims of others (mom and dad), these games hold wonder and mystery.  With every spin of the wheel she enters into a magical world of unpredictability and excitement (not to mention repeated trips to every child’s dream land – the Candy Mountain).  These games are full of blessings she can delight in.

 

So even as I struggle to keep my eyes open as we play yet another round of her favorite games, I realize that I could learn a lot from my four year old about being spiritually present.  When looked at through the right eyes, life is mysterious and full of adventure.  I get to participate in acts of creation each day as I cook entirely new meals.  I am whisked away to exotic locations when I simply stop and notice the beauty of the world around me.  I don’t need the Candy Cane forest when I can lie under the trees with my kids watching the leaves flutter and the clouds float by.

 

I am so used to the ordinary being, well, ordinary, I forget to find the wonder in it.  But seeing my daughter find adventure in what I found tedious reminds me to shift my perspective.  The world is unpredictable and exciting and full of all sorts of blessings I can delight in – as long as I allow myself to be present in it and allow it to be those things.

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Father’s Day Thoughts

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At a recent wedding I attended, one of the groomsmen toasted the bride saying that she was going to make the perfect wife because she had already demonstrated her ability to be her fiancé’s full time maid and wait on him and his friends hand and foot.  My husband later told me that he sincerely hoped that no one would say something like that about our daughter at her wedding.  As a pastor he knows that any marriage based on such unbalanced submission is on shaky ground.  But more importantly, as a father, he would be heartbroken to see our daughter’s exuberance, inquisitive nature, and passionate love for life reduced to a toast like that.

Granted, our daughter is four, so even the vague thought of a wedding is years away, but now is the time when who she is as a person gets shaped.  When the values we want to impart as her parents compete with all sorts of other messages telling her what little girls should be like.  Now, we have no problem with her playing at princesses and fairies or having a wardrobe of all pink.  The real dangers come with those who want to limit who she is simply because she’s a girl.  Messages that tell her that girls cook and clean in the background while the boys explore and achieve.  That tell her that her worth stems from being physically appealing to boys.  Or that tell her that her voice is offensive or unwanted by God.  And as much as we’d like to believe that such messages are a quaint thing of the past, we continually see them popping up in the most unlikely of places.  From Cinderella’s maxim that to be beautiful is to be good (and to be ugly is to be evil), to Snow White sitting around waiting for her prince to come, to Sunday school lessons that focus exclusively on the male heroes of the Bible, she encounters values that will restrict her sense of self.

While I as a mother can encourage her to pursue her dreams and to not listen to those messages, in today’s world fathers must also play a major role in challenging those limitations.  Daughters need not be told by daddy that they can be whoever they want to be and then witness daddy go watch TV while mommy cooks dinner and does the dishes.  Or overhear daddy tell others that they play soccer well “for a girl.”  Fathers, now more than ever, need to be aware of how they help shape the way girls view themselves as people and in relation to men.

My daughter, like many young girls, is a total daddy’s girl, and constantly seeks his approval and mimics his actions.  This special relationship provides fathers with the chance to encourage their daughters to develop into whole people.  In our home, we do our best to show our daughter that both mommy and daddy work, and cook, and clean, and change diapers, and take time to relax.  My husband plays dress up fairies as well as lightsaber duals with my daughter.  He doesn’t want to push her into the preconceived box of “this is the way girls are”, but encourages her to be herself and use her active imagination.  We are, of course, making many mistakes along the way, but I am grateful my husband is being the type of father my daughter needs in order to grow up not into a set of stereotyped expectations, but into a healthy and whole version of herself.

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Learning by Questioning

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As we make our way through Holy Week, I’ve been considering how best to discuss Easter with my daughter.  The apparently graphic lesson she heard at MOPS last week left her confused and fairly freaked out about death (gotta love the compulsion to evangelize toddlers…).  I want to connect her to the story, but to help her make it her own.  So I am liking the idea of exploring the Passover meal with her – especially the traditional aspects of the Seder that have the children asking questions about their faith.  The purpose of these question isn’t to receive some prescribed answer as in a catechism, but simply to ask questions of one’s faith.

I like this approach to learning about the faith.  I like that the children are encouraged to speak up and explore what they believe and the rituals of the faith.  They aren’t told to just be quiet and learn what the teacher wants them to know.  In the Seder tradition, there are no bad or wrong questions.  The child who asks the tricky or even the silly questions is not looked down upon, what is worrisome is the child who asks no questions.  Wrestling with faith or even attacking the faith are preferred to passively and unthinkingly going through the motions of faith.

My daughter is four, and is a chatterbox incessantly asking “why?”.  One of her favorite shows is Sid the Science Kid, a show about a preschool boy who each morning runs into a question he has about the world and then asks that question at preschool where the day is then spent answering his question.  She finds that fascinating, and loves the experimental approach they take to figuring out the answers.  I watch the show with her with chagrin.  No school (or Sunday school) is truly like that – allowing the inquisitive nature of kids guide the learning process.  While I understand the impracticalities of such a method, I wonder at what stage kids learn that questioning is bad.  Where absorbing facts, memorizing concepts, and reproducing them when asked replaces wondering about the world and wrestling with truth?  Even in Seminary my husband says the professors play the poor pedagogical game of having students parrot back the answer they want to hear.  Education has become about amassing information instead of learning to think.

So I want to tell the stories to my daughter and to enact the rituals of the faith with her, but I want her to know that those too can (and must) be questioned.  She shouldn’t just learn about her faith, she needs to live it.

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Violent Media and Children

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I recently picked up a copy of Parent: Wise Austin, a free publication tagged as “The Journal for Thinking Parents.” It’s a fun publication with slightly more alternative offerings – like cloth-diaper reviews and Montessori school ads – than typical parents publications. The feature article in the March 2009 edition is “Dining on Destruction: Does Violent Media Harm Kids?” by Sugandha Jain. I admit, there is nothing new about this discussion. Basically it boils down to asking whether or not playing at “violence, gore, and antisocial behavior” has a negative impact on kids. The article is full of all sorts of statistics – how much violence kids are exposed to, levels of aggression by age group, what percent of aggressive kids become aggressive adults. But what really struck me in the article was the requisite “dissenting opinion” section.

The argument for violent video games was twofold. First that violence is a good thing. Chris Crawford, a video game designer, said that for young boys “everything about their psychologies is oriented around establishing their identities through physical conflict.” He believes that it is healthy for boys to acknowledge this violence and that “too many mothers, in particular, attempt to suppress this … and all they succeed in doing is robbing their boys of their ability to become men.” So apparently if I don’t like the idea of my son (no mention of my daughter) playing at killing people then I am keeping him from becoming a man? Or at least according to the game designer who I am sure must also have a Ph.D. in child psychology, right?.

My bigger issue was with the other argument for violent video games – that there is no evidence that links violent media and violent behavior. While I could dispute that argument, my main concern is that that’s not really the point. For so long this whole debate has been framed as to whether or not playing violent video games will cause kids to join gangs or do a school shooting – as if those personal acts of violence are the only issue at stake. What I would rather see the debate focus on is in what ways playing at violence as children makes a person immune to systemic violence. Sure they may not pick up a gun and go on a rampage, but do they become more apathetic to others doing just that? Would we be perhaps more offended and outraged at the killing of innocents in the war in Iraq or the genocide in Darfur if we were not so accustomed to doing such things in the nursery so to speak? Individual personal violent acts are somewhat rare in “polite” society (whatever that means), but condoning systemic violence is almost expected. Could that be the real legacy of violent media?

I’m not saying that I don’t struggle with this or that I think violent media should be banned. Just that I think the issue is far more complex and far-reaching than the arguments generally imply.

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Book Review: Mama’s Got a Fake I.D.

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So I don’t think it’s much of a secret that I have some serious issues with the typical messages the church sends to moms. I refuse to accept that my entire identity is wrapped up in my children – that my only calling in life is to serve them. I love my kids, I (generally) love taking care of them, but who I am is so much more than them. But it’s hard to question those messages without being accused of being a bad mom. So that’s why I loved  Caryn Dahlstrand Rivadeneira’s fantastic new book Mama’s Got a Fake I.D. (WaterBrook Press). Caryn has provided a resource (for moms and dads and well, anyone who has to relate to moms ever…) that helps get past some of those false messages and affirm moms’ true identity in God’s eyes. And she does it with humor and encouragement throughout.

I found myself reflected on the pages of this book. I know I have tried to pass off my fake id – attempting to fit into a one-size-fits-all motherhood mold. Caryn pointed out though the hypocrisy in encouraging my kids to develop as unique individuals while I gave up my identity at the motherhood door. That’s not the sum of who God created me to be, and if I want to truly follow him I need to claim my full identity. Moms shouldn’t feel guilty to be themselves, explore their gifts, and follow Christ. Caryn affirms that it’s okay to be more than a mom, be upset at the stupid ways our culture treats moms, and admit our frustrations as moms. She affirms that we are not alone in dealing with the loneliness and loss of self that plagues the modern American mother. And that people who think that moms have all the free time in the world are just clueless.

But at the same time, this book provides resources in learning how to be content as a mom. This doesn’t involve striving to be someone you are not (including the perfect domestic goddess mother). It doesn’t limit mothers or try to strip them of their God-given talents and identity. But it does involve learning to be grateful for what we have right now – being thankful in all circumstances. But this is a contentment that also doesn’t allow us to be held back by perceived limitations or our own insecurities. But to simply allow ourselves to be affirmed in who we truly are – and extend that affirmation to others. It’s a call to moms to discard our fake ids and to question the expectations placed upon us (often by ourselves). This isn’t about being selfish or self-consumed, but about being real. Being ourselves is just far healthier, more spiritually authentic, and provides a better example for our kids anyway.

So this book is seriously great. And I am excited for it’s potential to help moms throw away those fake ids and the identity crises that motherhood provokes. Many of us need that reminder – or more importantly, that permission – to be who God created us to be. So I highly recommend that you read this book. Moms need to read it for sure – but so do dads, and non-parents, and pastors, and moms group leaders, and everyone else. Until the false identity messages are overcome, moms will have a hard time finding ways to fully serve God. This book can help dismantle those false messages, and give moms the encouragement we so deeply need. So go buy the book – give it to all your friends, pass it out to your playgroup, give it to the church library – it’s a book that needs to be read.

(and btw – the book cover actually isn’t hot pink, it’s a nice shade of red.  Just thought I’d mention that for all of you who are like me and hate women’s books that are pink…)

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