March letter
February 23, 2008 by Dan
I know a man who teaches at a North American university. His wife, who brings up their children and has put her own career on hold, meets many forceful, career-orientated women who ask her what she does. Over the years she has prepared a ready response: “I’m socialising two homo sapiens into the dominant values of the Judeo-Christian tradition that they might be instruments for the transformation of the social order into the kind of utopia God wills for human history. What do you do?” Apparently she usually gets a fairly humble response: “Oh, I’m just a lawyer.”
Mothering Sunday (2nd March) gives us the opportunity to give thanks for those who brought us into the world and to offer our support and prayers for those entrusted with bringing up the younger generation. As the American woman intimates, there are few greater responsibilities and challenges than equipping children to live purposeful and rewarding lives, and the love and security of the parental home is central to that. Numerous surveys link parental care to childhood behaviour. But they also show some worrying trends. A U.S. survey reports that fathers spend on average 37 seconds a day talking to their young children, while some of those children will spend 54 hours a week in front of the TV. Where are their values likely to be learnt?
One thing that we would love to do at St. Andrew’s is increase our support for families with pre-school children, both by appointing a Families Worker and through enhancing the activities we offer. It is great to see that the crèche on Sundays has outgrown its room, and that Noah’s Ark on Fridays now fills that Abbey Hall to capacity, with spin-offs into Ark’s Angels and Christianity Explored. These are great foundations to build on.
“Children’s children are a crown to the aged, and parents are the pride of their children” says the book of Proverbs (17:6). (Note that it is children who are to be proud of their parents rather than the other way around!) That says to me that within the family of the church all are to take an interest in and rejoice with one another across the generations. Social pressures tend to encourage us to mix just with those of our own age and outlook, but from the time of the first Christians the church has aspired to cross every human barrier with a welcome and love for one another which echoes God’s welcome and love for us. For these small children to feel from earliest days that the church is a place where they can feel at home and a community that cares is a great gift we can offer. Thank you to all who give their time to help our children experience something of God’s love and care.