So I just got back from a retreat on the spiritual dimension of parenting at the local Catholic retreat center where I do spiritual direction. You know the type—Catholic through and through, complete with the pictures of Jesus and Mother Teresa, but when I asked about how they handle the Eucharist in regard to Protestants the sister said, “I’m supposed to give you the official teaching of the church, but this is a matter of conscience for each individual, to come as he or she feels welcome. And besides, [innocent face] I don’t know who’s Catholic and who’s not!” When she knows good and well that I’m a Presbyterian pastor.

Catholic nuns are a quiet kind of radical.

We live in very polarized times as a culture and a church. I say this because the retreat leader, a Christian ed staff person at a local Catholic parish who is also a spiritual director and retreat leader, said some things that really pushed my buttons, and she also said some really thought-provoking things that I am still chewing on. (Some of those are one and the same.) And I realized how rarely lately I have been around people with whom I honestly disagree. It’s not that I seek to avoid them; it’s just that the marketplace of ideas is huge enough that you can keep yourself quite busy while not ever coming in contact with anyone who challenges your worldview.

So this is something I want and need to work on.

Some things that instantly resonated with me:

• We were asked to write our “hopes” for our kids. (I actually had to do this for another parenting class and shared them here.) After some of us had shared our lists, she said, “OK, date those lists and keep them somewhere safe, and refer to them often. They are your assignment for yourselves.” She reminded us that we cannot give anyone what we ourselves do not have. So if we want our kids to learn empathy, we need to cultivate empathy in ourselves. If we want them to be curious and engaged in the world, we need to nurture that gift in ourselves.
• And the nasty little reality: we can’t give our kids those things anyway! The best we can do is model (and pray).
• During our introduction time, one woman found herself unexpectedly weeping when she talked about her son, who’s 14, and his process of “pulling away” from her and the family. The leader asked her what image came up with that welling of emotion. It took some gentle probing to get there, but I found that a very interesting way of framing the question. Images hint at stories, and help us get at a deeper place than the intellectualizing we normally do.

Something I’d never heard before, but was very interesting, came from the book Parenting from the Inside Out, which was one of the texts for the retreat. Kids who are “securely attached” to their parents are the ones who thrive (big duh), but according to the book, one of the most important keys to parenting is the parent’s ability to “tell her story in a coherent way.”

I’ve checked out the book from the library because I would like to read more about that, but we talked about the way many parents tell (and live) the story of their childhood. Usually it takes the shape of “don’t make the same mistakes I made!” Which is very well intentioned but communicates fear and anxiety, rather than a posture of trust and faith in our children and in the God who is with them.

That brings me to things I either squirmed over or outright rejected, but they have still been much food for thought because they get tangled up with stuff that I do believe:

The simple (but churchy) way of saying it is that she has a very high doctrine of God’s providence. “Everything is perfect,” which is a shorthand that I bristle at, but what she means is, everything is as it should be. Already. Now. And that’s intended to be a statement of faith and humility that frees us up to get beyond thinking about parenting as something we either get right or do wrong. We simply do not know the impact that our actions will have on our little ones. Something we see as a failure can be instrumental in a positive way we cannot envision.

I deeply believe that on one level, and on another level, cannot accept it. On the positive side, it got me thinking about people who work in really difficult social justice ministries. Most people who do it for the long haul make it because they are grounded in the peace of Christ that is “not as the world gives.” And it is from that place of peace that they are able to do their ministry, and to stick with it without getting discouraged. Yet something must also be agitating them to work for change. Things are as they should be, but part of that “should be” is that we work for justice and the betterment for all.

On the other hand, she told a story about a woman who was deeply depressed and abusive to her children over the years. She later hit bottom and experienced a profound shift, and is now a teacher and speaker that inspires others—and when she speaks to parents who have abused their children, they know she’s been there. She is also working very diligently on her relationship with her children, and there has been reconciliation there. In Christian terms, that is redemption, and we celebrate it.

But I stop short of saying that because of the profound work that she is now doing, that the abuse and heartache that she both perpetrated and experienced were part of the plan. I just can’t go there. A family of abused children is too high a price to pay.

At the same time, I know that theology works for some people—as Joseph says to his brothers in Genesis, after they sold him into slavery, “You meant it for evil, but God meant it for good.” Even Lance Armstrong has said, “If I had not had cancer, I would never have won the Tour de France.” And you hear this all the time from people who had cancer—that it is the greatest gift they have ever received.

More later; I have to go pick up the little ones right now!