What’s in your kid’s college fund? Or are you putting all your efforts into rearing a bright child who will ace the SATs and get scholarship offers? Whatever your plan, the thought of college tuition raises fear in the hearts of many parents. How to pay? The Morlino family has one solution. “Everything we’ve been […]
It’s a troubling fact today that many Catholic children don’t know the basics of the faith. Many come to religious instruction in parishes without knowing how to make the Sign of the Cross or recite the Our Father or Hail Mary. Teaching children growing up in a secularized world, catechists and teachers can’t assume that […]
Whether it’s through his exhortation “Be Not Afraid!” or the deep insights contained in Theology of the Body, Blessed John Paul II has had an enduring impact on families and fathers. John Paul, who led the Church into the new millennium, will be canonized April 27, along with his predecessor, Pope John XXIII. Over the […]
A few days before Easter our clan would gather around the dining room table, cover it with newspapers, and get dirty. Or rather: colorful. Lots of little fingers got stained purple, pink and green while dipping hard boiled eggs into cups of die. The more artistically inclined among us would draw crayon designs on their […]
It was a rainy, inside day, so I went to the craft boxes to see what I might find. Cereal boxes—perfect! I generally try to save cereal boxes for just such occasions when you find yourself unexpectedly confined indoors—you can do a million different projects with those things—and today, with some markers and scissors, construction […]
Dawn Eden is the author of My Peace I Give You: Healing Sexual Wounds with the Help of the Saints and the 2006 best-seller The Thrill of the Chaste. A victim of childhood sexual abuse, the Catholic convert tells of how getting to know saints who suffered abuse of various kinds has helped in her […]
Last month, in a Letter to Families, Pope Francis asked families to pray for the success of October’s Synod on the Family, when bishops, priests, religious and lay experts assemble to consider the “pastoral challenges of the family in the context of evangelization.” So that the synod may have a better picture of the problems […]
When Chaunie Marie Brusie faced an unplanned pregnancy in her senior year of college, she didn’t know where to turn for help. Now an obstetric nurse, married mother of three, and founder of TinyBlueLines.com, she is working hard to make sure that other young women have resources to help them cope with this unexpected and […]
As Catholic parents we all want to see our children grow in the Faith, overcome their temptations, and ever approach sanctity, but when John and Jane are screaming at each other over who is going to get the stuffed monkey, we might wonder how they are going get there. Rather than telling them to share, […]
When we first started hammering out details for this series, I got really excited. Then, I saw the word homemaker used repeatedly. Not really knowing much about the word, I looked up the definition and found: HOME·MAK·ER [hohm-mey-ker] noun 1. a person who manages the household of his or her own family, especially as a principal occupation 2. a person employed to manage a household and do household chores for others, as for the sick or elderly. Origin: 1885–90; home + maker Can be confused: homemaker, housewife (see usage note at housewife). Usage note 1. See housewife. HOUSE·WIFE [hous-wahyf or, usually, huhz-if for 2] noun, plural house·wives [hous-wahyvz] 1. Sometimes Offensive. a married woman who manages her own household, […]
Electronic devices are everywhere. We know about the negative effects of too much TV, but now kids are watching videos in the car and accessing games and social media on computers and mobile devices. There was a time when kids would snuggle up with a good book to read or have their parents read to […]
The case of the Pennsylvania woman who claims to have murdered at least 22 people makes me sad. Perhaps it should make me angry, but primarily it makes me sad. And worried for other such children who become prisoners of the occult. Miranda Barbour, 19, has been charged with the November 11, 2013 fatal stabbing of 42-year-old […]
If there’s a crisis in Catholic marriage and family life today, the solution will come not solely from the higher echelons of the Church. The active involvement of faithful couples will also be needed. That’s the view of a lay official of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB), looking ahead to the synod […]
When we mothers see our children suffering, the slip off the cliffs of despair can be easy. When Pope Francis tells us, “Let us never lose trust in the patience and mercy of God” (April 7, 2013), the trust doesn’t exactly overflow. Mercy would be nice, Lord; how about a cure please. But we are commanded […]
If we want our children to become saints, they will need to hear the call of God — a vocation to holiness that applies to all of us. But how will they be able to hear that call if their lives are full of noise? In our digital age, young people have more noise and […]
Fatherhood is likely to be a central part of the discussion when the world’s bishops gather at the Vatican this October. Pope Francis has called an extraordinary assembly of the Synod of Bishops to consider the “Pastoral challenges for the family in the context of evangelization.” He also has asked bishops to meet in 2015 […]
Have you ever found a really good series of kids’ books, something the kids love to hear read aloud and to re-read on their own (or for our kids, to leaf through and look at the pictures again), but wished that there was something more in them than a light adventure story? I love reading […]
Why should your family have sacred rules and what should they be? Those are the questions Tim and Sue Muldoon set out to answer in Six Sacred Rules for Families: A Spirituality for the Home (Ave Maria Press, 2013). As the Muldoons state, “Rules keep everyone on the same page; rules help us plan for […]
Even those who have a great relationship with their own mothers can appreciate how the mother-daughter bond colors the way they parent their own children. Suddenly and without warning, we begin channeling our own childhood soundtrack in recipes, songs, and other traditions — for better or worse (“Because I SAID so…”). In Mothering Without a Map: […]
Modernity isn’t sure whether children are a burden or a blessing. The percentage of childless couples in the U.S. has nearly doubled since 1980. The cover of Time magazine recently bragged that increasing numbers of couples are remaining childless by choice, because they subscribe to the philosophy that having it all means not having children. Let’s face […]
Each time I make something for dinner that one or both the children don’t like, the familiar refrain resounds: “Tell us the story of the baked beans!” When I was about six or seven, my mother made homemade baked beans for dinner, which I refused to eat. After an hour of watching me poke at […]
Can women have careers without neglecting their children? Can women have children without neglecting their intellectual gifts? In short, can women have it all? My mother taught me that the answer was no. She quoted former U.K. Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher fondly and often: “A woman can have a great career and a great marriage. […]
During a recent coffee meeting with a friend, he said, “You seem to have your act together on the fatherhood front. What’s your secret?” I was taken aback because I don’t think I have my act together at all. I don’t mean that out of false humility. I pray every day to be a better husband and father […]
People ask me what I teach my kids about evolution. The answer is, “I teach the science, but not the ideology.” The Evolutionists say, “You are failing your kids as an educator!” No, I’m teaching my children to keep a view of reality firmly in place, the very first thing a scientist ought to do. The Creationists […]
