Keep the Faith--and Feed Your Kids’ Souls
Dear Vicki: Am I a bad parent for not emphasizing the importance of religion to my kids? I always went to Sunday school as a child, but my husband and I are so tired by the weekends that getting up for a 9 a.m. service is as unappealing as cold oatmeal. Not only that, we were raised in different religions and we don’t know how we would worship as a family.
--COMMITTED TO
THE DAY OF REST
Dear Committed: Sundays come way too fast, don’t they? And after a week of work and school, and a Saturday of accompanying my kids to softball games, dance rehearsals and tennis lessons, a Sabbath morning in bed sounds pretty enticing.
Let’s start with the “where to go” question. Same-religion marriages are becoming rare in big melting-pot cities like L.A. When many single people meet and fall in love, they discuss religion only as it pertains to where they will hold the wedding or who is to perform the ceremony. Often the discussion of spirituality is put on ice until they have kids, but nothing thaws that ice quicker than the birth of babies.
That’s when those of us who are already devoted to a faith are inspired to double up our commitment to a temple, church or mosque, and when those of us who, up to that point, had tended to our spirituality by reading the funnies on Sunday morning start to feel that we owe our kids a bigger religious legacy than “Peanuts” (as holy as I think Snoopy really is!).
When my husband and I experimented with churches, his seemed a bit too formal and rigid for me. (Besides, I didn’t know any of their hymns.) But my church was too friendly and folksy for his taste. My Brooklyn-bred mate told me it reminded him of “Hee Haw,” so it, too, was nixed. That left us with a lovely church that had a little something for everybody, and where I knew at least a couple of the songs.
As my kids have gotten older and joined the sleepover circuit, they often end up on Sunday mornings with some family other than my own. I love it when that family invites my kids to tag along to their place of worship. Since we moved recently, we are again looking for the perfect house of worship, and if my kids find it first--well, that’s just fine with me.
As for your other concern--that you and your husband are too pooped to pray come the Sabbath, whichever day of the week that might be--I hear you! And guess what? It’s exactly that kind of overbooked, multi-tasked, soul-deprived life we lead that makes finding an hour or two a week for humble contemplation so essential.
For heaven’s sake (pun intended), what does a life mean without some spiritual context and tradition? Without it, we are just running around in circles without letting our hearts and souls sing. I’m not preaching here; I haven’t been to church in two months.
Still, I’ve watched how intently my own kids have watched me when I pray or sing in church, and I know they have a spiritual hunger of their own. We owe it to ourselves and our kids to take a time-out from ordinary life to think about the extraordinary. You may do that in an early evening temple visit, an Wednesday afternoon walk in the park or a half-hour sit-down together with some sort of prayer or grace.
Don’t be bullied by church or synagogue schedules, but do find a way to introduce your children to heaven. It’s their right and your privilege.
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Vicki Iovine is the author of the “Girlfriends’ Guide,” a columnist for Child magazine, and new parenting correspondent for NBC’s “Later Today.” Write to her at Girlfriends, SoCal Living, L.A. Times, Times Mirror Square, L.A., CA 90053; e-mail GrlfrndsVI@aol.com.
