Association Of Catholic Bloggers

Are you doing "the Nineveh thing"?  I've come up with a plan just for kids to participate, too. Read all about it at Veils and Vocations !  #nineveh90  #kidscandoittoo

The tradition of giving and receiving gifts at Christmas time is a bit of a double edged sword – lots of good things involved, lots of parenting challenges as well. Lots of things I don’t want:  I DON’T want Christmas gift giving to become the focus. But  also I DON’T want our kids to miss out on a fun tradition that, done in moderation, can teach a lot about the meaning of both giving and receiving. I DON’T want to break the piggy bank and live like a pauper for the rest of the year because all our money went into gifts. I DON’T want to end up with a house full of toys and “stuff” that gets excitedly used for a few hours, starts more than a few fights and ultimately ends up lying around tripping people. I DON’T want our kids to set high expectations, or feel entitled to getting the latest and greatest each year. Lots of things I do want:  I DO want my kids to experience the love behind the gifts they receive from friends and relatives. I DO wa...

Advent now comes and goes nearly unnoticed. The only thing worth of recognition between Halloween and Christmas is Thanksgiving, and even that has started to take a back seat as major stores start “decking the halls” and major TV stations start putting on Christmas movies in late October and early November. Advent, a delightful period of quiet waiting and anticipation for the coming of the child Jesus passes by largely forgotten. My husband is a Maronite Catholic. Any of you familiar with Eastern Catholicism may have heard that the Eastern Catholic rites follow a different liturgical calendar. Most major feasts, like Christmas and Easter, fall on the same dates, thereby emphasizing the unity of the Church, but other feasts and the general cycle of the liturgical seasons differs. Since we’re a mixed family (I’m Roman Catholic), I like to joke that we can opt for the longer Advent (Maronite calendar) and shorter Lent (Roman Catholic calendar). In all seriousness, though, I deeply...

Gratitude is attractive. The grateful person tends to be happier, healthier, and more satisfied with their own life. They have an easier time forgiving others and helping others. They worry less and are less likely to get depressed or stressed. Sounds pretty good, right? Who wouldn’t want to be grateful with that description? But gratitude doesn’t just happen over night. After becoming a parent, I quickly realized that while it’s relatively easy to teach a child the habit of saying “thank you”, it’s much harder to help them develop the  virtue  of gratitude. Gratitude is more than a habit. It’s more than a good desire. Gratitude is a relationship. We are thankful  for  things, but  to people. In order to have an open and grateful heart, a person must have strong relationships. For Christians, the ultimate foundation of all gratitude lies in a relationship with God in which we realize who we are and who God is, and recognize all he freely gives us. Grat...

If you’re active in parenting social media groups and the blogosphere, you know that we talk a lot about ways we can be more patient with our kids, more kind, more balanced. We talk about ways to get over anger and stop yelling. And all of this is important. The next time I have a rough week with the kids, I’ll probably be reading more such tips. At the same time, there’s a different perspective I think we need to consider once in a while. Sometimes, it seems like we can place too much pressure on ourselves and, collectively, on each other, to be perfect.  Basically, if you take a look around at parenting pictures, stories and tips, we’re often telling each other in subtle ways that to be good parents, we need to be happy most if not all of the time. And, we’re sometimes saying:  when you’re not happy, try not to show it. The basic logic here is that we want to be fair and kind to our kids. We want to be strong for them. We don’t want to react hastily or for the wron...