Though I had long since left home, I always felt that my mother had this default setting where she treated me like a nice nine-year-old son. Of course, I didn’t mind, mothers are like that. I celebrated when marriage seemed to add a few years of maturity in her estimation, but it wasn’t until I became a parent that I graduated to adulthood in her eyes. Donna’s arrival in 1995 ushered in change for everyone around me. From that first day that marriage turned into parenthood, I got that overwhelming sense that ‘you are no longer your own.’ Fatherhood is an amazing journey. It has taught me things I would not have otherwise known. I joke that the reason I stopped preaching loudly was because I noticed that the louder I spoke to my children the less they seemed to listen. Fatherhood taught me that to pattern God’s love is to have faith over action, and integrity over words. It has also taught me to remind my children that 99% of all the childhood fun they enjoyed was generated by their mother. I remain challenged in that area—though I was swept along by all the joy. I have unflinching love for my children. I want nothing but the best for them. And the best is only defined in spiritual terms—everything else is subordinate. Seeing my children go into adulthood has made me realise that, just as I had to come to grips with Jesus and his Church, so do they. There’s no such thing as inherited faith. I pray that for the rest of my days our Father in Heaven will remain my guide to better fatherhood. Where I have fallen short, I pray for forgiveness and wisdom to improve. Fatherhood by its very nature is a shared experience—the better fathers get, the better it is for all the earth. “Lord, raise up godly fathers that truly reflect your image. Amen.”
0 Comments