Valerie Hess

Today is Ash Wednesday, the beginning of Lent for Western Christians. Lent is traditionally a time when fasting, prayer, and charitable giving are emphasized. With children, find a special Bible story book or a book like the C. S. Lewis “Narnia” series and read a bit from it every night. The forty days of Lent are a good time to cut sugar from their diets as you can use “because it is Lent” as the reason they can’t have a cookie or soda for a snack. Help them find a service project to do once or twice a week. Have them help feed the homeless at a local church or work in a food or clothing bank sorting donations. They could deliver a homemade card to a neighbor or someone who is in the hospital. The ideas are limited only by their ages and the opportunities around you. The important thing is to make Lent special by doing things differently from what you might do as a family the rest of the year. Developing good spiritual formation habits is so much easier when you are young and to start these kinds of traditions with kids now builds good spiritual habits for when they are older. Plus, when the whole family is involved, everyone benefits.

This is from Thomas Merton’s book What is Contemplation? pages 12-13: “The fact remains that contemplation will not be given to those who willfully remain at a distance from God, who confine their interior life to a few routine exercises of piety and a few external acts of worship and service performed as a matter of duty. Such people are careful to avoid sin. They respect God as a Master. But their hearts do not belong to Him. They are not really interested in Him, except in order to insure themselves against losing heaven and going to hell. In actual practice, their minds and hearts are taken up with their own ambitions and troubles and comforts and pleasures and all their worldly interest and anxieties and fears. God is only invited to enter this charmed circle to smooth out difficulties and to dispense rewards.”
Ouch! A good thing to ask ourselves as we begin the new year: what of this passage is true of me? And do I really want a deeper relationship with God or not? And if I do, what is one thing I need to change right now? What is something I need to work on changing in the days and months ahead?

At this time of year, it is hard for all of us, adults as well as children, to not get a severe case of the “gimmes.” The trick is to find a good balance in providing gifts for your children on Christmas so they don’t feel deprived or embarrassed around their friends while still keeping the perspective that nobody needs all the things they are presented with through advertising. Here are a few suggestions to help with that perspective in your family.
Emphasize as much as possible family traditions. In our family, we set aside a day to go either to the big city or to a special town in the mountains every December. We looked at the lights, my husband and I each took a child off by themselves to buy a gift for their sibling, and we ate at one of our favorite restaurants in those locales (one a spaghetti place, one a pizza place). Walking together, looking at the lights, listening to music and sharing a fun meal together is something my children come home as adults and want to do.
Have a daily devotional geared toward the family. Do it every morning at breakfast or at dinner. Make sure it is not too long and age appropriate. Keep the message of God’s love come to us in Jesus at the forefront of everyone’s thoughts.
Decorate gradually if you can. That way, there is always something to look forward to when the kids come home from school. If you can find a copy of Madeline L’Engle’s book, “The Twenty-Four Days Before Christmas,” that will give you a good idea of what I am talking about.
Make sure that as a family, you are intentional about helping the poor and neighbors in need. From adopting a family to serving meals in a homeless shelter, opportunities abound for children to see “the other side” of Christmas, the one not shown on TV specials. I used to tell my children the day after Thanksgiving that Santa would take one look at all the toys in their room and decide they needed nothing. This motivated them to help me go through all their closets and pull out toys and clothing no longer needed or wanted. Those items went to our church’s Deason’s closet to be given out freely to those in need. We also made sure they participated in a program where they bought a toy for a needy child and took it to the day-care center with the church youth group to spend time with that child in a fun afternoon of play and eating before giving that child (often) their only Christmas gift. It certainly kept my own children’s Christmas morning in perspective.
Don’t use Christmas gifts to appease adult guilt for not spending enough time with them during the year. Loading them down with everything and then some to make you as the adult feel better for all you didn’t do in the past year is sending a very bad message, i.e. material things can fill emotional holes. This is what leads to bad habits such as eating or shopping when you are feeling blue.
And finally, make sure to tell them regularly how much you love them. God loved us so much he sent Jesus to earth. Let your children grow up knowing that they are deeply loved by you and by God. This doesn’t mean you accept every behavior they present but it does mean that you love them enough to help guide them into becoming the people God created them to be with unconditional love and healthy discipline.
Merry Christmas to you all!

“Today is the anniversary of Kristallnacht, the night in 1938 when German Nazis coordinated a nationwide attack on Jewish homes, businesses, and synagogues. It’s generally considered the official beginning of the Holocaust. Before that night, the Nazis had killed people secretly and individually. After Kristallnacht, the Nazis felt free to persecute the Jews openly, because they knew no one would stop them.”
The above paragraph was from today’s “Writer’s Almanac,” a free-e-newsletter you can subscribe to through National Public Radio. The last sentence gives me chills; because no one protested about Kristallnacht, the Nazis knew they could publicly destroy the Jews because there would be no outcry from society. What would history have been like if the German citizenry had taken to the streets that next day in outrage and anger that their neighbors, the Jews, had been targeted in such a vicious way? And who today is experiencing their version of Kristallnacht, the beginning of their Holocaust, that I and the rest of the world are remaining silent about?

I just got back from a retreat with Roberta Hestenes. Powerful teaching! One point she made that will really stick with me is that Christians are called to change the world, not just survive middle or upper-middle class stress levels.