“What, then, will this child be?” (Lk 1:66)

The basic concern of every parent. What, then, will this child be? Specially if our child is delicate and sensitive and needs a little bit more attention then other children.

Have you got any idea how stressful it could be for parents to know something about God’s plan for him or for her? Think about Elisabeth and Zachariah: “even from his mother’s womb he will be filled with the Holy Spirit, and he will bring back many of the Israelites to the Lord their God. With the spirit and power of Elijah, he will go before him to reconcile fathers to their children and the disobedient to the good sense of the upright, preparing for the Lord a people fit for him.“ (Lk 1, 15-17); or about Mary and Joseph. This is your son and the Son of God, “he will save his people from their sin” (Mt 1, 21). Take care of Him. Prepare Him for the future. Prepare your son to His role.

What they did as parents? They did nothing special. Jesus spent thirty years in normal family life. No special schools for very talented children future Redeemer of the world! “He went down with them then and came to Nazareth and lived under their authority… And Jesus increased in wisdom, in stature, and in favour with God and with people.. (Lk 2, 51-52). Maybe this is a good advertisement for home schooling. 😉

How often do we think about profession, some important role. Can we prepare our child to be e.g. president of the country? What we think is important for the future of our children we will give them. The majority will think about education. As good as possible. The best kindergarten, the best primary school, high school, college, university. The better education we’ll give the better career they will have.

Others will think about giving them a good start in life through covering all the basic needs, like apartment with good equipment, car, some savings for nice vacations or other needs. And so…

Do we remember that our child is not ours. She or he is a miracle, a gift from God. Our child IF IT BELONGS to anybody, belongs only to God. Remembering about this is the most important “education” and “good start” for our child.

And even if our child becomes a president of our country or Apple or Google CEO, at the same time probably he or she will be a husband or wife.

So, what we really can do for the best future for our children is to help them understand and believe that he/she is a miracle, a wonderful gift from God, always loved and always worthy.

The other thing we can do is to show them how to protect our love in the family, how to respect a woman, how to take care of our relationship.

With prayer for you

Fr. Jay

Good News for mankind comes through announcing a new life – “You will be with child and will bear a son”. It was a message to the mother of Samson (Judges 13,7) and the mother of John the Baptist (Lk 1,13). Tomorrow the Virgin Mother will receive the same message.

God is a Father who loves life. He is the Creator of life because He is Love and He lives in a communion of persons. God is never alone. He is the Holy Trinity.

He shared with us the most serious role in which married people collaborate freely and responsibly with God the Creator- the transmission of human life (HV 1).

The great joy for parents, the future for this world. Any couple who become parents understand Advent – the time of expectation, the time, when the joy of birth is present before birth. We enjoy this coming time, we would like to have Christmas as soon as possible, even today, so decorations are ready and gifts already bought, but we know that we should wait. The Child will come when time comes. Not earlier, not later, just on time.
To prepare ourselves better for this time, we can pray for expecting mothers, for women suffering from infertility, for civilization of life. We can give today a smile to expecting mothers, maybe a small sign of help.

“O Root of Jesse’s stem, sign of God’s love for all his people: come to save us without delay!” (from Alleluia) 

“Ask the master of the harvest to send out laborers for his harvest”.

Why? “His heart was moved with pity for them because they were troubled and abandoned, like a sheep without a shepherd”.

The couples who suffer from infertility or lost a child during pregnancy know how difficult life is – they are troubled and abandoned. And the worst – there is no one who can tell them why.

God, who is the Creator of life, who gave couples “the extremely important mission of transmitting human life” (HV, 1) has never abandoned them. Neither those suffering from infertility, nor those unable to conceive another child. His heart didn’t change when He went to Heaven.

Today He reminds us to ask the master to send out laborers. You are among them. He touched your hearts and invited you to join His harvest. Through your work He wants to show that He takes care of the troubled couples and that He is near their problems.

Today you have finished the first step and you will soon start helping other couples. This is not only your mission. First of all, this is His. He is the Master, He is the Creator of Life, He is the Redeemer and He is the authority (and has the power) to cure every disease and every illness. Connect your knowledge with prayer and proclaim the Good News – “The Kingdom of heaven is at hand”.

„The most important thing in respect is looking. But looking at what? According to us, respect for other person consists in looking at everything they experience and in particular, paying attention to their feelings and needs. When you look at your child, you can concentrate on many things. You can look at their behaviour and assess it from your point of view: from the perspective of your needs and your criteria. But you can also try to look at the child from their own perspective, taking into account their needs and their feelings”. (Sura Hart, Victora Kindle Hodson, Respectful Parents, Respectful Kids 7 Keys to Turn Family Conflicts Into Co-operation)

And here we are close to what Benedict XVI wrote about:

„Going beyond exterior appearances, I perceive in others an interior desire for a sign of love, of concern.  (…). Seeing with the eyes of Christ, I can give to others much more than their outward necessities; I can give them the look of love which they crave. ” (Benedict XVI, Deus caritas est, 18)

Basia

One day I asked our children to prepare the table for dinner. I expected them to do it the way I normally did it with them. For me it has some importance how the table is made, which napkins are used and whether everything is well placed.

The moment they started I knew they didn’t do it “my way”. I managed not to criticise them but in fact I was a bit intrigued – instead of putting dinner plates first and then soup plates and arranging the cutlery, they put together the complete set for a concrete person in the kitchen, They chose everyone’s favourite plates and cutlery and emerged with a full set and put it on the table.

As a final result we didn’t have the festive tableware but each of us could feel special as each cover said” It’s for you!”.

I felt how great a gift it is to have nearby someone loved and how important it is to say this to my nearest and dearest every day. This experience has become a motivation for me.

Greetings with my favourite mug,

Dorota

You hem me in behind and before, and You lay Your hand upon me.

(Psalm 139:5)

The way we touch God  is often a gesture of testing, checking on Him, putting our fingers into His side, and into His wounds. It is so difficult to believe in good intentions, in the promise, the love which does not dictate any initial conditions. On our part – there’s so much doubt, mistrust, and anxiety.

And yet He lets us do all that, remembering, who we are. And He does let us touch and find Him. But His gestures are so different from ours. He doesn’t check on us, He is not suspicious, He doesn’t keep the distance. “You lay Your hand upon me…” It’s the same gesture with which we calm down our children and express our proximity. Infinite acceptance and the desire to protect them – just because they are there.

Margaret

Photograph: source

I have mentioned before that waiting for a place in Bishop Carlos’ parish I stay in the family of Beatriz and Pepe. I participate in family life full of rituals like children going to school in the morning and their return, family dinner when we wait for Pepe to come back from work, plays and trips, doing homework and other duties.

I know this all so well from other homes that I visited during our meetings or programmes. But normally it was for 2-3 days and now it’s a bit longer. Ten days have passed since I landed in Mexico and there are another ten to go.

My favourite ritual has become the evening rosary. Of course, when we go somewhere, for example to a sanctuary of Mary, we pray on the way but if we are all at home, we meet together, preferably in the children’s room, when the kids are in pyjamas and ready to sleep. .

I remember all these homes where rosary is prayed with the whole family, every day. In the beginning it will always be difficult but slowly it becomes a wonderful part of the day that you look forward to. Can you imagine something more beautiful than a family that meet for rosary? It is so good to see a small daughter that falls asleep on her father’s lap during the prayer. We can lose so many grudges, purify so many desires. Perhaps we could continue with the rosary, even though October has come to an end?

With my prayers for you,

Padre J.

Our 10-year-old daughter stubbornly says “no” to my right and just request. It doesn’t help when I point to the generations of traditions of children listening to parents, or when I remind her of many parental “graces” granted on that day. Neither does the lifted brow, nor the list of consequences. It’s late, both parties are tired, we hit the wall – escalation is there. Two women of such different age, shouting out towards each other the sentences that hurt.

Later she cuddles up to me, all composed of worry and sense of guilt, and I tell her” “My beloved Daughter.” “Say that more often to me,” she answers. “Do I say that too rarely?” “Yes”.

And I wonder what a great Pedagogue He is. In our anger, shame, regret, sense of guilt and injustice tangled into each other – and in all our mission statements of “I’m never going to trust anyone” – He comes with the words: “My beloved Child”. He enters the trench we’re hiding in, the dark wardrobe of doubt and resentment, and He takes the grenade and the gun away from our hands, and wipes away the war paint of mistrust from our face. He disarms with His love. He encourages with His forgiveness. A gentle and patient Parent, who does not resonate the storm which takes us into possession. I would like to be able to act the same way. And I ask Him, please, say that more often to me, so that I was able to do the same.

Margaret

Kamila was born on August 25, 2013 and is the third daughter of Agnieszka and Rafal, whom Fr Jarosław (excuse me, now Fr Jay) tenderly calls “Brussel Sprouts”. They stand behind the organization of the Programs for the Development of Marital Relations in Belgium. Moreover, Agnieszka has helped me create the English version of this blog and recently she has been patiently translating the posts on her own.

We would like to offer our somewhat delayed congratulations from the bottom of our hearts and wish all that Heaven can give to Kamila’s whole wonderful Family!

And for all the parents, in particular those feeling the toil of parenthood, a little anecdote. Sue Hilgers told me once the story, in which their already adult daughter Teresa, reproached for some trifle by her Dad (she is known to be the apple of his eye), replied: “Wait, I’m the supreme gift!” 🙂 It was of course the quotation from Pope Paul VI’s encyclical – the document which inspired Dr Hilgers to develop the science of NaProTechnology: “Children are really the supreme gift of marriage and contribute in the highest degree to their parents’ welfare”  (Humanae Vitae 8).

So let our children hear it as often as possible. Let them wake up and go to bed with that news in mind. “You are a fantastic gift for us!”. “You are one of a kind!”. “You CAN do it”. “I’m happy to see you!” (not because I believe you’ll fulfil my expectations, ambitions and dreams).

Let the children be strong with our love, so that they don’t need to compensate it anywhere else. “Anywhere” may leave wounds for the rest of their lives.

Margaret

It is so different to run Programme 2, meant for graduates of Programme 1, who have come to know the ropes and know the dynamics of the Programme and of the trainers. It is all so much easier, also for the trainer who can make references to the content that has to some extent been worked upon. Some homework may not have been done :), but a lot of things have been put into practice.

Now we take a look at the vocation to become parents.. at this extraordinary dignity of spouses who cooperate closely with God Creator (Humanae Vitae, 1) in the mission of giving life. It is all happening when we celebrate the Exaltation of the Cross. Hre and there we do not concentrate on the cross itself but on the complete self-giving. In Programme 2 we can see the necessity of radical self-giving in marriage. The less marriage, the weaker the parenthood.

So now there is an opportunity to take another look at the marriage in the perspective of parenthood. There are 18 couples. The ones who really care. Please remember them in your prayers if you can.

From Wrocław

Father Jarosław