Open to Life

As parents of 5 daughters, the second most common question we're asked (after "All girls?!") is usually, "Are you trying for a boy?" Our canned answer is most often: "No, we were thinking of going for a volleyball team." But if I were to tell you a desire deep in my heart, it would be to have a son, and to have a son who would grow up to be a priest.

After losing Baby Jude last fall, however, it has been a bit of a struggle to remain open to life.  Not just open with our actions, but also in our hearts. As I am sure is the case for many couples experiencing infertility or secondary infertility, risking hope and facing disappointment is a roller coaster that is really hard to ride.

But the practice of being open to life is a lot bigger than being willing to accept a pregnancy if it comes. It's being willing to let God surprise you with his answers to your prayers. It is a decision to live without a guarded heart, and instead cultivating an inner life that is ready to receive whatever gifts may come.

Enter Daniel.

While Matt and I were in Phoenix for the International Celebration of the Catechesis of the Good Shepherd we met an incredibly joyful young man who is absolutely full of life named Daniel.  He is a seminarian for the Archdiocese of Manizales in Colombia. Through an incredible chain of events, Matt and I have "adopted" this young man into our own family and with the help of Father Harris and Bishop Pates, we have received the extraordinary permission from Daniel's own archbishop and seminary director to have Daniel assigned to All Saints Parish for his internship this December!

 

I can tell you I never in a million years guessed that God might give me the gift of a "son of my heart" in the form of a seminarian from Colombia! But I also realize that to be surprised by the grace and Spirit of God, both my husband and I had to be ready and willing to receive it. 

With all the hard things and hurts that this life brings, it is tempting to build walls and protect our fragile hearts. But if we are ever to experience the power of God in our lives, we must be open. Only then will we be able to receive God's mercy and grace when He surprises us with the gift of abundant Life!

God's Blessing on you and your families this week and always,

Mandie DeVries, Director of Religious Education

Faith Formation Begins at Home is a weekly article I write for our parish bulletin and sometimes post here. It offers a perspective of the domestic church and the idea that forming the life of faith must begin and be sustained in the home.

And Now For Something Completely Different!

Serving as a catechist in multiple levels always gives a fresh perspective on child development (spiritual and otherwise), but this is the first year I've been in a Level I atrium alongside the older kids. After 7 years with the older kids, I could describe the transition back to Level I with six words:

"And Now for Something Completely Different!" 

This is probably because the 3-6 year old child has not yet moved into what Montessori called "the rational mind." They are still absorbing everything with no filter, and they can't necessarily verbalize what they need or what they are thinking. I have already had to use nearly all of my skills as a reverse hostage negotiator to help some of the 3 year olds get over the threshold of the atrium.  Never have I had to do that with 10 year olds!

At the beginning of the year, the catechists from the older atria are often smiling and going on about the fruit they are seeing with the children they serve, while the Level I catechists share struggles with spills, messes, and little children who actually get up and walk away during their presentations.

But there is the other side of the coin: one parent told a Level I catechist that her child has been talking about her all week and already loves her.  I don't think any of my Level III boys will get quite to that point, even after the whole year! Another three year old Level I child told his dad, "I didn't think I would like going to catechism. But I do! I really, really do!"

It's pretty easy to get a big head when you are a catechist for the youngest children, because they are so full of joy and love, and when they see you, they want to hold your hand and they seem so happy.  But that is the nature of the 3-6 year old child.  They love with all that is in them, and they want to feel safe, and protected, and cared for.

It is our work as catechists to be the "matchmaker" between these little children who have such a desire and capacity for love and the Good Shepherd who calls them by name and cares for them so deeply.

While the privilege of seeing an older child mature into a more adult faith is awe-inspiring, the spiritual development of the 3-6 year old child retains and reveals something to us that is totally mysterious and, in reality, completely different.

Jesus Christ, the true Catechist, reminds us to pay attention to how His love grows in these little ones:  
"The kingdom of God belongs to such as these. Amen, I say to you, whoever does not accept the kingdom of God like a child will not enter it." Luke 18:16b-17

And again,

"Whoever receives one child such as this in my name receives me." Matthew 18:5

May God Bless you and your family,

Mandie DeVries, CGS Catechist and Director of Religious Education

Interested in learning more about Catechesis of the Good Shepherd? New formation courses are beginning all the time!  Check out www.cgsusa.org to find a course near you.  

Handles

For a three-year-old, getting through Mass on Sunday can be quite the challenge. Some people, recognizing this difficulty for the young child, elect to wait until the child is older and can understand what is going on before bringing them to Mass on a regular basis.

Yet, when the time comes to get ready for First Communion, you'll often see that fidgety 6-year-olds and children who are learning the rules of this quite foreign experience are put off with crayons and books so that they will be less distracting to the rest of the congregation. Around the age of “you’re too old for that stuff” we’ll sometimes see kids who are prone to long bathroom breaks, or who sit with a less-than-interested expression, as though they are being forced to do something they loathe. After a while, parents say, “Well, I can’t force them to come” and we don’t see the kids at all anymore.

A recent pew study found that after 8th grade, ¼ of youth stop coming to church at all, and by the time they are graduating college, less than ¼ remain.

But there is another way.

Much like language is assimilated much more easily by the youngest child, a child who attends Mass as a baby and toddler is far more likely to experience the Mass as a native—to develop the prayerful attitudes through practice—than to see it as a foreign, impossible thing.

But just bringing a child to Mass doesn’t make them know the Mass! They can’t enter into something that isn't made accessible to them. Just as we repeat and practice and encourage language and physical development, we must help the child get across that hour on Sunday in a way that gives them (and you) joy! I like to think of these familiar moments as “handles.” What are the moments that a child can grab on to and understand that helps him or her participate more fully in the Mass?

In our Catechesis of the Good Shepherd program, we offer the young child (3+) “handles” in the form of:

· Prayer language—like the Amen, Alleluia, and the Sign of the Cross
· Familiarity with the objects of the Mass—like the three-year-old who pointed out to his mom,  

“Mom! Father just poured wine into the chalice!” 

· Knowledge of gestures he can do and see like genuflection, epiclesis, and offering
· Reverence—a growing ability to be silent and focused in the presence of God
· Community—the young child loves to be loved! When he comes and sees those who are his friends and those who have come to love him, Church feels like a place of love and friendship.

Of course, you don’t need to wait until your child is three to start doing and teaching these things! Parents are the first teachers of their children, and our parish CGS program can be a great asset to you as you seek to help your child grow in his love and reverence for the Mass. It is my hope that we see more engaged toddlers, children, and teens in our parish every year. They have much to teach us about their great spiritual potential if we will take the time and make the effort to help them participate as fully as they can in the Mass each week!

Note: Atrium lists for our CGS program that serves 3 year olds – 6th grade are being put together right now for the coming year! You can find more information about our programs and sign up ONLINE! Check it out on our website www.dmallsaints.org under Faith Formation. We look forward to welcoming your child(ren) this fall!

Catechist Prayer Group

Dear CGS Catechists and Assistants,

I have so much I want to share with you after a blessed week in Georgia for the Level I Formation Leader's Training Course.  Among the beautiful gifts I received last week, one of them is a new and clear perspective about prayer and the work of the catechist.

As you know, when we prepare materials for the atrium, it is a further opportunity to reflect on the beauty of the presentations we will offer to the children.

It was a surprise to me that one of the seasoned formation leaders did not let her participants even BEGIN writing an album page without first working directly with the material for a sustained period of time.  God makes himself present in the tangible--He uses stuff to teach us about Himself!  The catechist, through his or her proclamation AND the material she prepares, makes present the mysteries for the children and for him/herself, even if in a hidden way.  We must take time with the physical material in order to understand what is hidden!

I invite you to consider joining us for our prayer/material-making sessions from 2-5 or 6-9pm on Wednesdays this month.  It will be a time of fellowship, creativity, and, yes, prayer.  If you cannot join us, don't worry! We'll have plenty to do that we will invite people to take home for personal or family prayer time.

Hope you are having a blessed summer!

~Mandie 

Catechist Humor

Who Forms Whom?

I'm blessed to be writing this week's article from a Formation Leader's Training Course in sunny (and maybe a little muggy) Georgia.  As I've sat and listened to some of the most illustrious names in the Montessori and Catechesis of the Good Shepherd worlds, I am struck by the mysterious and simultaneous gift that the child is for us: he is both our student and our teacher.

We are always thinking of how we can better form our children, raising them up in the faith we love.  Parents spend much time learning how to care for their child, and preparing for the work of teaching them all they must know to be happy, healthy, and wise when they are grown. But which of us could completely become who we were made to be without the influence of a child?

Who else but the child can teach his parents to forget themselves and to pour themselves out for love? Who can teach us patience in the way a child can?  Who can teach us wonder like a child who discovers a little bug or a violet in the middle of a grassy yard?  Who can teach us to slow down like the child who cannot hurry? Who can teach us joy like the child who lives fully in the moment, and gleefully enjoys every touch and smile and look of love from her parents?  Who else can show us what it is to choose to forgive and love without limits those who are poor, those who are rich, those who are old or young? Who can teach us about true beauty except the child who sees to the heart and finds beauty in everyone who loves him?  Who can teach us to love without limits or conditions like the child who is love?

Our Lord said, "Unless you turn and become as little children, you shall not enter the Kingdom of Heaven." Learning to meet the needs and honoring the values of the children in our lives are a built-in exchange of formation between the child and the adult. Without the children in our lives, we may never discover who we are made to be. But we must listen to them, and we must be humble enough to learn what it is they are teaching us.

"I give praise to you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, for although you have hidden these things from the wise and learned, you have revealed them to childlike. Yes, Father, such has been your gracious will."  Matthew 11:25-26    

It’s Going to Get Worse Before it Gets Better

Sometimes a life lesson hits you over the head at the most unexpected times.  For me, it was at my sweet 10 year old’s piano lesson a few weeks ago. 

Emma was feeling pretty good about a Frozen piece she had been practicing when we went to her weekly piano lesson and she showed her teacher.  I watched Ms. Becky as she listened carefully and circled a few places in the book toward the beginning of the piece, then put her pencil down and settled in to enjoy the rest of Emma’s song.  She smiled and praised my daughter for her hard work in figuring out how to play the piece.

“But,” she turned slightly serious, “there were several places where your fingering wasn’t right and the rhythms weren’t played as written.  It still sounds very good, but if you want to master this piece, you are going to have to UNLEARN a lot of what you’ve already taught yourself. I would be willing to help you and to keep working on this, but you may just want to keep playing it the way it is, because it sounds pretty good.  It’s your choice, but if you want me to help you get better, you’re going to have to get a lot worse, first.”

I watched my daughter as she thought about the option her teacher laid before her:

1) Present good versus future great, with a ton of work in the middle, or

2) Sound just fine to most people and avoid all the work and pain of unlearning and relearning. 

I couldn’t help but think that this question is also laid before us in the spiritual life.  Most of us have friends and neighbors who think we’re “pretty good people.”  I mean, to the untrained eye, we may seem like we have it together in our marriage, in our family, AND in our spiritual lives.  But the Lord does not give us just a cursory glance,

“I the Lord test the mind and search the heart,
to give to all according to their ways, according to the fruit of their doings.”

Jeremiah 17:10

He asks us the question: are you willing to settle for being “okay” or do you want to do the hard and hidden work to “be perfect, just as your heavenly Father is perfect”?  Matt 5:48.  When we work on our virtues, we oftentimes have to unlearn our bad habits, things that might be crutches for us and help us be our “okay” selves, but keep us from who we are made to be.  If we decide to really try to become the “best version of ourselves” we are likely going to find that we get worse before we get better.

My daughter didn’t think about it for very long.  “I want you to help me,” she told her patient teacher.  She now has many more hours of practice ahead of her, and I get to hear “Let it Go” about a hundred more times than I would have, but I am proud of my little girl. I hope it is just one of many such choices in her life to choose to do the hard and often hidden work to become the best she can be.