Catechesis
is about forming a relationship. A relationship begins the very day, the very
moment, that God creates that child in his mother’s womb, before the mother is
even aware of that child’s existence.
Catechesis is not only about reciting the Ten Commandments and the Hail
Mary, although we absolutely should teach our children these things. However,
what we usually think of as “religious education” is merely the body, which
serves the purposes of the soul. The
soul of religious education is that relationship of love with God that makes us
desire to know more and more of Him.
None
of us women in the group on Wednesday had heard that idea before, although all
of us immediately saw it is true. We’ve
done things like have our toddlers blow kisses to Jesus in the tabernacle, sang
our babies “Jesus Loves Me,” and such, long before we ever thought of “Catechesis”
in the formal sense. It’s just
right. But it’s beautiful to read it in
such language as Cavalletti’s, confirming what we’ve already intuitively
grasped and expanding upon it, giving us the privilege to see just how deep the
love of God and a child can go.
Some
of the anecdotes were surprising to us, especially about children from
atheistic homes wanting to go to church and be baptized. I think the most surprising part was that the
parents went along with it! The book
doesn’t say, but we wondered how long those parents stayed atheists. Also the part about how well behaved the
children always were during and after Mass.
As hard as we try, that is not usually our experience!
We spent time discussing just how total
children are. They throw themselves
wholeheartedly into each and every little thing they do. And so trusting. What adult would allow someone to throw them
up in the air four times their height? Not
only allow it, but to think it great fun?
A big concept of these chapters is the essentiality of the child, meaning they go straight to the heart of
things with no pretense, no self-consciousness, not holding anything back. We think this quality of little children is
what Jesus meant when he said, “Unless you become like little children…” Little children want what Cavalletti calls
the “vital nucleus,” the most essential, complete truth. This is like planting a seed. All of the plant is there, complete and
present in the tiny seed, but of course it must grow and develop. Another analogy I found helpful was that of
St. Paul’s comparison of spiritual milk vs. meat (1 Corinthians 3:2). When a baby is breastfed, the mother’s milk
is the only food he gets. However, it is
perfect and complete in every way, easy to digest, meeting his every
nutritional need. So too should our
presentation of the Gospel be to small children.
I also shared a picture that my son
Anthony drew in the Atrium. It
illustrates the concepts in these chapters of children having a mysterious
knowledge of God. Here is his
explanation: "It’s a picture of God. He is
very very happy in Heaven. It is always light there. It's a city in
Heaven but I just drew God and the sun." I asked him about the three
people, and he said, "That's just God. That one is Jesus. (The green
figure in the middle.)"
We all felt a sense of peace from
reading these two chapters about our vocations as parents. By helping our children to come closer to God
by themselves, we are merely facilitating a perfectly natural and joyful
process. “Raising our children up for
heaven” is big responsibility that certainly will involve a great deal of
sacrifice and struggle, but it is the very nature of children and of God to
establish a relationship of love between them.
We do not have to force it to happen, and really, we should never try
because love cannot be forced anyway.
Obedience, perhaps, but never love.
Really our responsibility is to bring them to Jesus by bringing them to
the Mass, reading the Scriptures with them, and then getting out of God’s way.
As mothers often do, we veered away
from the book proper a little bit into practical applications of these
ideas. We talked about sitting up front
at Mass so the children could see and participate in what was happening. About encouraging spontaneous prayer by
asking our children, “Would you like to pray for anyone tonight?” or, “What
would you like to say to Jesus?”
Sometimes when we’ve done this we’ve been surprised by their responses,
like four-year-old Thomas saying he was thankful for “Jesus and Mary.”
We all thought it was a good idea to write
down these little moments of grace, so we could remember them ourselves and
also to share with them when they are older.
On the other hand, we don’t want to make a fuss over these things, lest
we damage the beautiful natural spontaneity and un-self-consciousness of
childhood. The last thing we want is
them trying to please us,
to be clever or show off how "good" they are. We should just
appear to take no notice, because in truth these things are perfectly natural
and not the result of any extraordinary goodness of our child. And then exult over them with our husbands
after the children are safely asleep!
