From the Mouths of Babes

My oldest daughter and I were out sweeping the deck off our kitchen this morning. The recent snow and wind storms had really made a mess of things. The weather was, of course, the typical Pacific Northwest Winter: intermittent rain and/or less than pea size hail.

A light rain began as we were finishing up. Emily said, "Daddy, do you know what rain is?"

"What is it honey?"

"Tiny kisses from God. Hundreds of tiny kisses that you can feel on your face when you look up."

I was astonished at the marvelous insight. I hadn't thought of that before. Rain can really be a blessing. In the Pacific Northwest though, some can think of it as a curse during the long, rainy winter. Myself included. But her comment really turned things on it's head.

"Where," I asked, "did you hear that from?"

"No one." She replied. "And the sun is a hug."

She went on to talk about what lightening, thunder, wind storms, and tornado's were. i.e. wind is blowing on his hot cocoa to cool it down. But the those weren't any where near as insightful as the rain/kiss and sun/hug insights she shared.

I'm really pretty thankful that I was able to hear that from her. I'm even more thankful, that I'm able to record these types of thoughts in this blog.

Blessings in the New Year to you and your families!

Tim

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Teaching my Daughters About Confession.

Lately, I've been thinking about planting seeds of information concerning the Rite of Penance with my oldest daughter.  She is still several years away from her first confession and I don't want to even dig deep on it yet.  I just want to get her oriented in the right direction so it won't be difficult for her.

Being the techno-geek that I am, I did a Google search on "teaching kids about confession".  Low and behold the second link brought me to this very nice blog called Watching the Flowers Grow.  Katie talks about an opportunity she had with her daughter in a blog title "Teaching the Kids About Confession".

Jen and I are trying to take advantage of opportunities like this as well.  Hopefully we are headed in the right direction.  Perhaps when situations like this do happen, we can drop hints about what Jesus and the Father think.  To quote Katie:  "Forgiveness is mine for the asking."  The Father wants us to ask for it because he wants us to be in right relationship with him and others.

When she does something to her little sister or misbehaves, we make sure she says sorry.  We are working with her to help her understand that she has to mean it when she says it.  And when her little sister does something to her, we try and make sure that she tries to forgive and let go of any anger she might have.  (Hmmm, sounds like something to talk about when helping the kids to understand the "Our Father".)

I'm adding this Watching the Flowers Grow Blog to my Blog List below.

Blessings to you all.

Tim

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The Nativity and the Martyrdom of St. Stephen

An interesting homilette concerning the dual remembrance of the Birth of Christ on December 25th and the celebration of the feast day of the first martyr, St. Stephen, on December 26th.

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Ton of bricks

Unfortunately, when reacting to stuff the kids do, sometimes I come down on them like a ton of bricks.

My wife has commented that I do go overboard sometimes. I guess I may get it from my father. But what am I to do? I guess I need to put things into perspective. They are good kids and behave a vast majority of the time. So are minor troubles that they cause worth coming down on them so hard? Especially since they are like sponges and likely to take my actions as an example to incorporate into their toolbox of behavior. Do I want them over-reacting like I do? No of course not.

What kind of lesson can I learn from the Father? Does God come down on me with punishment when I sin?  Of course not, through my sin, I am insulating myself from his grace. Sin is a conscious decision to not do the will of God.

But the difference between the two is that I know that I am sinning and am responsible for my actions and my children still have not developed that inner compass as to what is right, wrong, and appropriate.  So, while their actions could insulate them from our love (grace) it shouldn't because they haven't developed that compass.  Perhaps the adage "Yield, and be firm" applies.

What makes things worse is that they are learning this behavior from me.  I'm beginning to see it in how sometimes my older daughter will go non-linear on her little sister for the simplest things.  Much like I do.

All is not lost though.  I see how well she behaves in other situations and I can not be more proud.  She is becoming such a big girl!

I've started taking steps to reform my behavior and am working with my oldest daughter to control her behavior.  Hopefully working with them, we can roll back the clock on the behavior they have learned from me.

Pray for me.

Tim

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Inaugural Post!

Welcome to fatherhood and the Father!

I've been thinking about starting a blog concerning my faith journey and my journey in fatherhood. At times I can't help being amazed at the similarities between being a father and how that parallels our relationship with God the Father.

The idea of using a blog to help articulate my thoughts and insights has been rolling around in my thick head for a year or so. I even had the title in mind from the very beginning, so thank goodness it wasn't snatched up by someone else.

As you can probably see by the "thick head" comment, I'm probably my worst critic, so at times it may sound like I'm being too hard on myself.  However, things are always darkest before the dawn.  I think that only by being critical of myself, I will be able to see where I need improvement, and through the Grace of the Father, I will become a better father.

In order to understand where I am going, it is probably important for you to understand where I am coming from. To that end, what follows is a slightly edited version of a talk I gave at our parish in 2005. 

"I was baptized an Episcopalian and fell away from the denomination starting in high school and while studying to be an engineer in college. Part of the problem was the way secular society warps your sense of religion. Another problem was that although I went through all the catechesis for becoming confirmed, the stories from the Old and New Testaments did not seem relevant to this time in history or to me.

I married a cradle Catholic. Little by little it seemed I was pulling her away from the Church because I was so anti-Catholic and not very willing to go with her to Mass. In fact, I hated it.

But things started to change when we moved to the Pacific Northwest almost 5 years ago. I started toying with the idea of becoming Catholic to make my wife and her family happy. But because it didn’t feel right, I resisted that impulse. Jennifer and her family never did ask me to convert, nor did they apply any pressure. I have a feeling there was some intercession on her Mom’s part in the form of prayer.

I can liken the progress of my conversion to the turns of a key unlocking the door to my heart. Like most locks that haven’t been turned in a while, the process usually takes time and a few attempts. The first came with the extreme happiness and joy with the birth of our daughter, Emily, in March of 2003.

Then, another turn of the key came on a silent night a month or two later. While I was rocking Emily to sleep, I looked out the skylight in her nursery into the night sky and saw the moon and stars. It was then that I knew that there was a God. Only God could make the beauty I was seeing and allow me to feel the love I was feeling for this helpless little person swaddled in my arms.

A few weeks later, Jennifer’s Mom gave me some tapes from a Catholic Apologist named Tim Staples. It was from this that I learned how wrong I was in bashing the Church.

That summer, shortly after he came to the Parish, Father Rob gave us his now famous homily on the Loaves and Fishes. This Homily opened my eyes to the beauty and truth that is layered in the Gospel and is always there if we just open our eyes and dig a little.

What finally sealed the deal for me was seeing a preview of “the Passion of the Christ” in July 2003. Some loved it, some didn’t. Say what you will, but it affected me profoundly. But prior to seeing it, when I learned about our Lord's Passion in Sunday School or read about it in Scripture, it was very antiseptic. If you could imagine, it was what I would call very one dimensional. The preview of the movie, like a good homily or bible commentary quite literally brought the Passion of our Lord to life for me. It was through the brief images of our Lord suffering that I began to realize the depth of the love our God has for us. Our Father's Love suddenly became real for me.  When I realized how much love that Jesus had for us and how far I had strayed, I cried harder than any other point in my life and felt an extreme desire to become Catholic.

It was at this point that I called Sister Susanne and signed up for RCIA. During our discussion, Sister said something that I will always remember. She said that studies have shown that the spirituality of a child is fostered by the example of their father. “All the more reason for me to convert,” I thought at the time.

Since then I have gone through RCIA and was received into the Church in Easter 2004.

“Big deal, you converted” you might say. Well, let’s contrast where I was and where I am now:

• I am now pro-life, whereas before I was pro-choice. My pro-Life stance has been further reinforced by the writings and example of the life and death of John Paul the Great.
• I was previously very anti-Catholic and you can ask my wife that I frequently bashed the Catholic Church. I am now a Cathoholic.
• I regularly pray the Rosary v. bashing the church’s dogmas and traditions of Mary.

There are other numerous examples, but I think I have made my point.

My conversion has allowed me to see the world and this community through new eyes. I now can see or try to see the love and beauty of God in everything, and for that I am thankful. I take special notice of things and consider the fact that when I do see them, at that particular moment in time and from that particular point of view, God has managed to setup things up for me to feel the pleasure of his creation. Here are some examples:

• The bald eagle that perches on a tree along the shore of Lake Sammamish that I see every once in a while when on my way into Redmond.
• The view of Yosemite National Park from Glacier Point.
• The beauty and awe of the salmon returning home from the sea.
• I can see it in things as mundane as how great iced tea tastes with lemon.
• Because I am an engineer I appreciate the beauty inherent in math. Things like Pi and the Fibonacci numbers.
• The confirmation of forgiveness from the Rite of Penance.
• Most of all, I see the beauty and love of God in everything that my daughter does...even though she is in the terrible twos. But even then, there is beauty in the fact that she is learning to be an independent person.

Through her, I feel awe, luck, wonder, and I feel deep love. Through the love of our daughter I have come to begin to understand the kind of love that God the Father has for us. The love that is infinitely greater than our own capacity to love our own children. Even after dealing with an episode of the terrible twos, I even understand the love that the father has for the prodigal son.

For this revelation, I am thankful to God.

Some things have changed since then. I have lost some of my zeal for the faith. I no longer pray the rosary regularly, though I miss the peace it gives me. We have had another beautiful little girl. The push and pull of everyday life have tried to wear me down.

But it is my hope that among other things, this blogging exercise will help me continue on the journey and bring me close to the Father and his Son.

Pray for me.

Tim

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