Getting child excited for the faith

[elizabethanne3]

Hi all,

I have a headstrong 3 1/2 year old. I’ve recently tried bringing him to Mass again after taking a “terrible twos” break. He was super engaged with Advent, slightly into Holy Week, but now it’s a complete chore to even say our prayers or make the sign of the cross. What things can I do to get him excited about our faith without fighting with him? Today he whined through the whole Mass and refused to cross himself unless we could use holy water. Side note–convert to faith so I don’t have personal experience of Catholicism at this age.

 

[FrenzyJen]

We’ve had luck keeping being Catholic “fun” by celebrating the liturgical year in earnest. It doesn’t make sitting through church or dealing with lenten observances seem as bad when its all leading up to parties and feast days. Kids like being silly, and there’s a lot of ways to celebrate the church year in silly ways. My favorite resource in CatholicAllYear.com, but CatholicIcing has a lot of ideas as well. And when those resources have nothing good enough, I make something up!

As far as your toddler sitting through mass, I know this is going to sound like an awful idea, and I don’t know if its realistic with your lives, but I recently got so fed up with my toddler’s mass behavior that I decided we would just have to “practice” harder, and start going to daily mass until he got better at Sunday church. Lo and behold, he’s gotten complimented by strangers on his behavior for the last few weeks now. Try that if you can!

 

[LethalMouse]

Well, my experience in becoming practicing started more around my son being 6, But I can add what I can. The above mention of the feast days and such is great, Got some Alligator and having a “Dragon Feast” St. George’s for example. (Patron saint of scouts and my son is a scout so it works extra well) But I notice a certain “boringness” in the typical approach to Catholicism and really Christianity in general that even annoys me. I like to focus on a different section of it than many.

Much focus on saints that were living the monk/nun life and often were poor/sickly hardly speaks to fun unless you can truly wrap your head around the theology, and even then it gets a bit ummm boring. I like to focus on more fun aspects.

Focusing on things like Sampson and David from the OT is a help.
Sts. like Michael, George, Moses the Black, Joan of Arc, Ignatius etc… much more fun! at least to me and to IMO boys in general. Also, St. Patrick’s Day and a the real story of St. Valentine etc also can be fun.

Mass, well I find that to be a bit more complicated. One huge factor is how the parish does their music/ getting your kid into that. I go to more than one parish and depending on which one and who is running the music…sometimes I can’t sing along because my brain cannot make words that slowly…idk how to help a kid in that situation. Other times, I am loving it and it feels like good solid joyful praise to God.

I attend and am all about traditional hymns and such, not talking the weird stuff here, but how they tempo it can be great/awful IMO.

Then the usual kid incentive, Sundays if my son is good in Mass and CCD (CCD is never a problem, he loves it lol) we proceed to his favorite pizza place. I often get him a cheap $1 toy or book or something from the dollar store. So mostly he gets positive reinforcement. Only maybe twice did we skip pizza due to behavior, and one of them we went there but he couldn’t have any lol…cruel dad moment But that kicked in a few weeks of awesome behavior lol.

Oh and miracles, within the saints. I had a book of the saints that we read every night for about a full year and covered a saint of the day. Some/most did bore him to death, but ones who had prophecy and like Francis with the animals, those excited him due to the understanding that God can grant something more than a sickly monks life and suffering. Honestly, I try to focus on the earthly graces God has granted the faithful as that is much more palatable to a child IMO.

Oh and also, since we have the internet, getting him pictures etc. St. Bernadette for example can be a bit of a boring story for a kid, but the stuff from after her death and incorruptible images etc he thought were cool.

 

[pensmama87]

My five year old has had a really hard time with Mass. He went through a phase recently where every Sunday morning, he would say, “I don’t want to go to church!” At first my response was just, “Too bad, we’re going,” and I still think that’s OK, but I did (at a less contentious moment) ask him what he didn’t like about church. And it makes sense - he didn’t like having to be still, he didn’t like being disciplined for poor behavior, etc. I ended up telling him that sometimes going to church isn’t my favorite thing either (which is true, and I suspect is true for most people - we don’t always like doing things even if they’re really, really good for us ), and sometimes I’d rather just sleep or lounge around at home in my super comfy clothes. But, even though I feel like that, God tells us we have to go to church so we can be with Jesus, and so we go, and I’m very happy afterwards that I listened to God.

Since that conversation, my son has done a lot better. Practically, we do a “three strikes” system while at Mass, and as long as he doesn’t get three strikes we have a special treat with lunch afterwards. We try to arrive in plenty of time for Mass to start and we visit the statues and look at the windows, and afterwards we make sure to say hi to the priest, which makes them (DS1 and DS2 who is almost 3) feel special. I will have them help me fill our holy water bottles to bring home, and they get to be the ones who carry the bulletin home for us. They are allowed to fidget in the pew a bit as long as they are quiet, and usually they each bring a special book they only look at during Mass.

(By the way, Mass is really the only hard thing about the faith for my kids. We do evening prayer as a family and celebrate the liturgical year. There’s lots of desserts involved. )

 

[alphawoman]

At 3.5, I think living an active faith life yourself is the best way to teach a child. Don’t worry about forcing prayers or certain behaviours; what is paramount is communicating and modelling a personal relationship with Jesus.

My absolute favourite way to share Christ with my 4yo son is to attend adoration and meander around the church during off peak hours. Walk a few stations of the cross, admire the tabernacle, tell the stories behind your stained glass, collect prayer cards with pictures of the saints, light candles and say prayers for those in need, etc. Keep everything a loose narrative. Kids love stories, and they enjoy being able to identify with the feelings and needs of others. Teaching children that the way we live can be an offering is a powerful message. When children know that even the smallest acts can have immense spiritual power, watch them actively seek out opportunities to protect and support others. The gospel is lived, not confined to a book or set pedagogical schedule, so follow your child’s interests. I think many parents are surprised and impressed at the profundity of children’s innate understanding of God. God’s love is truly written on our hearts.

Way to go, by the way, for being such an ardent parent! Please be assured of my prayers!

 

[casslean]

I’ve recently seen quite a few “children’s missals” - could that be a way to be him engaged and entertained during Mass?

 

[mommy_k]

The above ideas are great-

For the month of. May, you can get a statue of the Blessed .Mother for your child’s room, and have your child find flowers from the yard and place them by the statue, new ones every few days.

Once the kids start in May, they usually want to continue all summer-or forever.

If the parish has a May Crowning-kid’s love that too.