Catholic Dads » Family

Contented Parents

Dr Matthew Doyle — Mon, 07 Jun 2010 16:51:06 +0000

This article in the Times demonstates something beautiful about parenting. It is not written by a Catholic Dad, as far as I know, but it advocates a type of natural, relaxed, and down-to-earth parenting which I can largely identify with, but also which I see prevalent in Catholic Homeschooling Families. I think it demonstrates some practical sequelae of being happy with the way parenting changes a couple, and embracing being a new Dad rather than pining after the ‘good ol days’!

Here’s an extract:

I have a quiet little bet with myself. A hundred years from now, people will look back on us the way we look back on the Victorians and many will find it astonishing that we treated children the way we do. The more extreme parenting strategies appear to deny the fact that we’re parents at all. The aim is to get back to our normal, child-free lifestyles as soon as possible.

Do have a quick read; you may not identify with everything outlined in the article, but it stimulates ideas and makes me realise how much we have in common with hippy-guru parents! Being parents as God intended us to be.

Family, Politics and Religion–or not

FamilyMan — Tue, 10 Nov 2009 17:52:58 +0000

[Originally posted on Super(Catholic)Man.]

Recently, I posted a slightly snarky comment on Facebook regarding “10.2% unemployment” and “change”.

My sister responded with her own comment, which is decidedly further left than my own position. Now Thanksgiving is coming up and, as we do each year, we will all (my brother, my sister and her “partner” and all of our respective children, spouses and grandchildren) converge on my parent’s home for the hyper-calorie fest. There will be ham, turkey, scads of casseroles, a passel of pies and who knows what else to fill 48 hours of family fun.

What won’t be there? Religion and politics. Oh, I’ll be asked to lead the blessing at meals, but that will be my father’s token approval of my conversion to the Church. They aren’t an atheistic or agnostic lot, so that helps. But as long as we don’t cross those lines, we all get along just fine.

But when someone steps over the line, they really step into it.

So my new policy, beginning with last year’s ode to gluttony, was to reject any efforts to goad me broach these areas. No politics or religion. If they have a question, I’ll be happy to answer, but I won’t debate it or try to convince anyone of anything. It isn’t easy either–both subjects are near and dear to me.

This was a tough call. My kids love to visit the farm and make plans for “cookie week”–where all of the kids old enough to use the bathroom on their own spend a full week in December making cookies with their grandmother. My married children bring their kids and share their own joy from childhood. It is a special time for everyone.

[My folks are 69, so they are still young enough to handle the hustle and bustle.]

So you’d think my parents, siblings and I would be more like-minded.

My brother, divorced forever ago, and his kids come with his grandchild from his daughter, an unwed mom. My sister and her “partner” bring their boys, two great twin fireballs (anonymous donor, of course). Both of them represent living “proof” that these modern choices are just “fine”. Everyone is happy. Everyone is satisfied with where they are in life.

At first I thought that sharing all of this would be too much information, but then I realized that lots of families are like this. The only one uncomfortable is me. I’m the only “traditional” member of my family (out of my parents and siblings) left. I’ve been married for 27 years, 8 kids and 5 grandchildren.

I’m trying to let my example speak instead of my words. But sometimes the roar of silence is deafening.

I extended the policy to Facebook, and probably offended my sister in the process. I’m not willing to “poison the well” before I get dessert.

How do you handle these things in your extended families? Am I alone? Thank goodness we don’t have alcohol…

The Two Towers – Boy Wonder Returns!

Bill Donaghy — Thu, 11 Jun 2009 11:57:00 +0000

Yes, clearly I DO have too much time on my hands…. I’m a teacher who’s off for the summer. What’d ya expect? Enjoy the second installment of the Tower of Binky… the Two Towers! (Coming soon, Return of the Binky!)

The Tower of Binky!

Bill Donaghy — Sat, 06 Jun 2009 09:19:00 +0000

Well, what can I say? Give me a half day of school and a free afternoon while Rebecca runs some errands… and you get this piece of cinematic diversion! Me and the Boy gettin’ silly! PS – There’s no need to tell me I have too much time on my hands, by the way. I’m a teacher and the school year just closed! So I do!! Stay tuned for me random antics…

The Accordion

christopher2 — Tue, 12 May 2009 00:54:00 +0000

I wrote this last summer but I thought “Catholic Dads” would be a good place to post it again. It’s about family and having a dad and being a dad; hope it’s not too long…

I’ve been thinking a lot about my family lately. I’ve been blessed with a large one. My wife and I only have two daughters but I have four much older brothers and sisters, which by today’s standards would be considered a lot. “Breeders” my parents might be called now, but it wasn’t so long ago that 5 children was fairly normal, especially if you were Catholic. My parents had 23 brothers and sisters between them. And including their spouses and the children they produced, the population stretches into the hundreds just counting from my grandparents.

Such a large group naturally produces a wide array of differing personalities, careers, and interests. There have been engineers, artists, firemen, coal miners, bus drivers, airmen, soldiers, and merchant mariners. Nurses, bankers, writers, world-record holders, a nun. Drinkers, smokers, and gamblers. Intellectuals, world-travelers. Heroes and rascals. Poets. Singers, musicians, great cooks, and bad drivers. Republicans, Democrats, socialists and conservatives. Roman Catholics. I had an uncle who was Joe DiMaggio’s accountant and sat on the groom’s side for his wedding to Marilyn Monroe. One survived the Battle of the Bulge. Another (may God forgive him) helped develop the precursor to the bar-code. The accomplishments are never-ending.Family.

And whenever two or three or 20 of them got together, life became much, much more interesting. Fireworks usually, but often too enlightenment. It was truly a privilege to have grown up around these larger than life peoples. My adulthood has been brushed and polished by their stories, experiences, mistakes, and successes. By their love – for life and for each other.

This populous bounty sprung from the Freeland and Shenandoah areas of Pennsylvania – coal country. A part of the nation that was truly developed by immigrants, mostly eastern European. In my case, Polish and Slovakian. Two cultures that worked and fought to become Americans – good ones – without much help from anyone but themselves. They relied on each other. They helped each other. They ate together, worked together, cried and laughed together. And they made it, most of them. And in the case of my family, most never left for long. They stayed close to where their roots were.

The reason I’ve been thinking about family so much lately is because of a faded blue box that’s sitting in my bedroom closet. Not really a box, but more of a suitcase with a piece of twine latched through its top. I just moved it there from the pantry in my kitchen where it’s been sitting for three years. You see, my father died from a head injury in November of 2004. He spent a few days in tormented critical care before a final attempt was made to save him under surgery. He never came out of the induced coma. He was 75. The man who spent his life giving and doing for others without accepting anything in return was finally forced to be on the receiving end of our charity. We took care of him the best we could, especially so my brother who had followed him into the Air Force. He died a week later with my scapular around his neck.

The blue case that’s now sitting in my closet is my father’s accordion. Everyone knew my father by his generosity but also by his accordion. It sat by his casket at the wake. It was one of only a few things I asked to have of his when he passed. A spent shell from the honor guard at his funeral, his rosary ring, his 1955 Missal, a book that was beside his recliner, and his accordion. This accordion wasn’t brought out often. Usually at holidays but always when there were family and friends. And he wasn’t the best player but that’s what made it all the more special. When he played, he was telling us about himself. Where he came from. What he loved. He was playing for us. It was his gift and it unites us all even though many of us are now thousands of miles away. It’s part of the family.

My mother died in February. A very slow and drawn-out fibrosis of her lungs and heart that began shortly after my father went. Little by little, the daily routines of her life were taken away and replaced with new ones. Ones that didn’t bring joy or satisfaction, but instead ones that were necessary just to make it to another day. All those little chores that we take for granted or do with a sigh had become impossible. Getting dressed. Doing laundry. Standing up. These gave way to rotating her oxygen tank, draining her lungs of fluid, and in the end, it was enough for her to just chew and swallow a bite of toast.

We all had time with her during her gradual decline. Mom wasn’t easy. One of my brothers would stay for weeks at a time taking care of her. One of my sisters broke her knee and tended to her from a wheelchair. A “saint-maker” is what they would have called Mom in her day. We watched her endure a personal hell. She said that when she was a child, she prayed to Jesus to allow her to atone for all the sins in her life before she died. She wanted to go straight to heaven. She died at home in front of my brother and sister, looking up at something above her, with her arms stretched out like a child waiting to be picked up.

One by one by one they disappear. My grandparents, aunts and uncles, my mother and father. A cousin died last month of heart failure at the age of fifty eight. Next will come brothers and sisters. They age, they go, and you can’t stop it. They can never be replaced. You pray that God’s grace is shining on them and you’ll get to see them again one day.

A lot of people like to think that life is a circle. It’s not. While it may be true that history repeats itself, and what comes around goes around, nothing is ever the same. Life is a straight line. You’re born at a point on that line and you die at a point on that line a little further down. There’s no going back. At first thought, it seems so simple and cold. But it’s not. It’s not, because there are other points on that line. Points where others are first beginning their journey, or ending it. Points that mark profound events in the life of a person, or even small personal ones. These overlapping segments are what make our short journey on this line so miraculously worthwhile. We get to share it.

We don’t often get to choose with whom or under what circumstance we share our life. Sometimes we’ll never even know how we’ve affected others. My father never knew that I would one day tell my daughter the story about how his wrist came to be so misshapen. How, as a little boy, he had broken his arm playing football when he was supposed to be out picking huckleberries for the pies his mother would sell. How, instead of going home to face the wrath of his father, he wrapped his arm tightly in his t-shirt and went and did his chore without ever telling anyone about his injury. How, forty five years after that, I would break my arm playing football when I was supposed to be home eating dinner. How he made me wait on the couch until he finished his mashed potatoes and peas before he took me to the hospital. And how these stories made my daughter understand that the little crick she had in her neck after sleeping awkwardly was not something that merited dramatics.

I look at that old blue case and it reminds me of my grandmother and her stuffed cabbages, French toast, and apple pie. It reminds me of tiny little compact cars that my father squeezed his 300 pound frame into. Of cigars, chess pieces, and poker chips, and American flags. Christmas morning. It reminds me of the loudest voice in church. It reminds me of my wife, who woke me up in the middle of the night a week after my father died and said “He’s here.”

When I received the accordion, it was my intention to learn to play it. To honor my father. To keep a tradition alive. I called around and found some wonderful people involved in the accordion community. Who knew there was an accordion community? A young Ukrainian immigrant came to my house to get me started. I had to relearn how to read music. And he pointed me to another older man that lived quite near me who was an accordion enthusiast. When I went to meet him, he had an entire room devoted to his collection – antiques, some of them, but mostly just a large collection of beautiful, colorful accordions. He grew up in Pennsylvania too, same age as my father, just a few more miles away. His wife works in the Bishop’s office. It was like meeting another uncle. I showed him the accordion and he pointed out a hole in the keyboard, some broken buttons, and a big tear along the bellows. It was going to need a lot of repair. But the shock came when I learned that my giant of a father had been playing a child’s instrument. It was made for kids, a starter instrument. I looked again at the skinny keys and tiny buttons and wondered how in the world did he ever get his fingers over them. He got this accordion as a child, learned to play it without a lesson, and for 60 years he never let it go. So far, I’ve left it as it is. If this old blue case can elicit so many memories for me, I can’t imagine what stirred in my father’s head each time he looked at it.

This old blue case is like a magic mirror for what it means to me to be part of a family. My family. It was my father’s accordion but it belongs to us all. I look at that old blue case and I don’t just think of my father. It points to everything and everyone on that ever-flowing line on which he lived. Because before he was my father, he was a son, and then a brother. He was my uncle’s friend. He was my mother’s husband. My daughter’s grandfather. All those fantastic people he shared his life with and all those who shared theirs with him come pouring out of that accordion box. Like music. And if it was my father’s choice, it would of course be polka music.

Finally, I look at that old blue case and I think what I will leave behind. What kind of memories am I leaving for my children? What have I done that my children will tell to their children? Will my children someday have an old blue case of their own to ponder over and make them feel part of something special? I hope so. I’ll probably never know, but it’s nice to think about.

"Be Empty and Stagnify"

Bill Donaghy — Tue, 28 Apr 2009 10:08:00 +0000

“Let me tell you why you’re here. You’re here because you know something. What you know, you can’t explain. But you feel it. You felt it your entire life. That there’s something wrong with the world. You don’t know what it is, but it’s there. Like a splinter in your mind… driving you mad.”

- Morpheus, The Matrix

The more deeply I delve into Pope John Paul II’s new sexual revolution (found in his teaching on the Theology of the Body) the more I come to realize the absolute insanity of the present state of things.

WARNING: The following words will either ruffle your feathers or unbind them so you can take flight.

Look objectively for a moment at the way the human body is treated today. Look at the magazine covers in your local supermarket, assess the value of the human person by spending 10 minutes watching television, and you’ll be tempted to believe that sex is a drug and we are all inextricably addicted. (Sex, that is, torn apart from its true meaning.)

We’re gorging ourselves on feelings and casting away our fertility. We’ve severed the life-line that is tied to the ship that is meant to take us home. The most God-like attribute we possess, that of generating a new human life, is stripped away from the sexual embrace. Something tells us that there must be more to sex than just feeling, bonding, pleasure, comfort. A still, small voice in our hearts whispers…. “in the beginning… it was not so.” There is a deep mystery welling up in this act that has always drawn us along, like the fragrance of the Orient in the Song of Songs. But our vision has beendisoriented. Our senses have been desensitized.

How and why did this happen? Who told us that separating the fruit from its roots would bring us true happiness? Let’s review…

1. In the beginning, God creates many different things to compliment each other and form one thing – the Universe; sun and moon, earth and sky, land and sea, then man and woman in His image, that is, in the image of the Blessed Trinity, that Divine Whirlwind of ceaseless infinite Love that made all things out of love. It’s a beautiful dance and an exchange of opposites that attract. To quote the old song – “You are the sun, I am the moon, you are the words, I am the tune…. play me!”

2. This play was the first word God spoke to us (nobody remembers this today!), He placed the man and the woman naked in a garden paradise. God’s first command to the happy couple is “Be fruitful and multiply!” Notice it does not begin with “Thou Shalt Not.” It’s actually more akin to “Let’s party!” God offered them the freedom to enjoy the Gift of one another as husband and wife; to love and begin a family of persons (just as God Himself is a Family in the Trinity).

3. Now this party is not, however, about a quick fix or some hedonistic indulgence. Through the sincere gift of self, the first man and woman enter into the mystery of that one flesh union that has literally spawned the human race (again, just as God’s generous Love generates the Universe). Adam and Eve’s embrace is a glimmer or a foretaste of that heavenly rapture that awaits all who love God. The Catholic Catechism says that in the “joys of their love, God gives spouses a foretaste of the joys of Heaven.” Amen! The gift is a total gift; free, faithful, and fruitful. It keeps the totality of the person (fertility and all) intact. Anything less would be a diminishing of love.

So far so good! But what happened? Well, there was one thing they were asked to respect and refrain from taking from; it’s the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil. If we grasp at that tree, we die.

Fair enough. God is the Creator after all; He’s the One Who alone reveals the Good and warns us of the consequences of not choosing what is Good for us. Good and Evil, God is showing us, are constants, objective realities as steady as the stars. They are meant to guide us. Good is what the human heart is made for, Evil is the dark hole left when Good is stripped away.

Was the Original Sin a refusal to trust this Truth? Was it an abuse of human freedom, a misdirected grasping at pleasure or power over the purpose of human life? Was it a failure to image God?

Today, across the boards we see the counter-sign, the alternate reality, and the twisting of the Truth we were made for all around us. God’s call to us to “Be fruitful and multiply!” has become a “Be empty and stagnify.”

And empty we are. The results of the so-called sexual revolution of the 60′s surround us. Are there better marriages, happier relations, peace in the battle between the sexes? Is Life celebrated, family loved and respected, children seen as a gift and fertility valued as a woman’s greatest power? Quite the contrary. By grasping at pleasure apart from procreation, we have left in our hands only withered remains of the dream of happiness.

But there were two trees in that First Garden. Beside the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil was the Tree of Life. And God’s mercy invites us to rest beneath its shade. This is the fruit that lasts and the love that truly satisfies. And God invites us to it! Did not Jesus, the New Adam, die on this Tree to save us? Isn’t the Wood of the Cross the One Tree that has borne fruit for so many centuries? To this Tree of Life the men and women of our time are invited to “taste and see” and to “take and eat.”

This Tree alone can plant the seeds that will finally blossom into a Culture of Life!

My Sunday Best

Atom Heart Father — Mon, 13 Apr 2009 16:17:00 +0000

At the Easter vigil, I realized something. While I believe what we wear to church matters and reflects the dignity and solemnity of the liturgy, my dress clothes aren’t the most important things I wear to worship. It’s not the nice shirt, pressed pants, or tie that completes my ensemble.

It’s baby drool. Nothing else quite as well expresses my identity as a husband and father trying to work out my salvation with fear and trembling and help my family serve the Lord.

Real men wear baby drool in church.

The Spousal Mystery of Christmas

Rich — Fri, 26 Dec 2008 19:30:00 +0000

Christopher West of the Theology of the Body Institute has a nice piece on The Spousal Mystery of Christmas at his site which his linked here.

Christmas celebrates the marvels of the birth of the Son of God from the virgin womb of Mary. At Christmas pageants, at Mass, and in beloved Christmas carols we will hear the story told again and again this year: "The angel Gabriel was sent from God … to a virgin … and the virgin’s name was Mary. …And the angel said to her, ‘Do not be afraid, Mary, for you have found favor with God. And behold, you will conceive in your womb and bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus" (Lk 1:26-31).

Perhaps our familiarity with the story has numbed us to the breath-taking, astounding, incredible mystery that is Christmas. I’d like to turn to the mystical insights of a certain saint in the hopes of waking us up a bit to the mind-blowing reality we celebrate (or should celebrate) at Christmas.

Advent in the Little Things

John Jansen — Tue, 02 Dec 2008 19:02:00 +0000

A few years ago, my wife and I started making a conscious effort during Advent to celebrate it in such a way as to distinguish it from Christmas. (We had always had an Advent wreath, but we were looking for more.)

While I admit we have a long way to go in making this distinction at Haus Jansen, one of our family’s now beloved customs—courtesy of a suggestion from some friends of ours—is to adorn our Christmas tree during Advent with purple and pink ornaments exclusively. Come Christmas Eve, we take them down, and only then do we put up our regular ornaments.

And because they get to decorate the tree twice, our kids have come to love this custom we have in our home every year that begins during “pink and purple time”, as our five-year old daughter Teresa put it the other day.

We’re always open to suggestions, so I’d be curious to hear about any of the ways other families commemorate Advent.

[Cross-posted at Lunch Break]

Grace Before Meals – the website

Rob Kaiser — Wed, 19 Nov 2008 19:35:00 +0000

Hey, Catholic Dads. My sister brought the website Grace Before Meals to my attention. I think this is could be a terrific resource for families. Here is what it says about the site:

Grace Before Meals is centered on one fundamental concept: the simple act of creating and sharing a meal can strengthen all kinds of relationships. Founded by Fr. Leo Patalinghug in 2003, Grace Before Meals has grown from a simple idea to a worldwide movement, producing a book, blog and even a pilot for a TV show endorsed by PBS.

Research shows that having frequent family dinners can reduce the susceptibility of teens to risks like teen pregnancy, smoking, drug use and depression. And these benefits don’t just apply to traditional families or people with kids. Stronger families foster stronger communities, and that’s the goal we’re striving for–one meal at a time.

Grace Before Meals it part of SPQN - the same group that brought us The Rosary Army . Check it out, and share with us any of your thoughts and experiences.