My 6 year old son is masterbating

[dontknow]

because he isn’t sinning. I’m not saying to take it lightly, but there are a few misguided folks here who are insinuating that this poor boy is sinning and should be punished harshly. This is just ridiculous.

It is what it is for a matter of such for a 6 year old kid. Treat it the way you would any other similar issue (already mentioned).

Anything else to suggest he or you (the parent) is in grave mortal sin is totally moronic.

 

[micahmike]

If this were such a serious sin for a 6 year old, then forgiveness would be available to him. But since the Sacrament of Penance isn’t offered to him until he makes his first communion, this is not an option. Why? Again, because he isn’t sinning. I’m not saying to take it lightly, but there are a few misguided folks here who are insinuating that this poor boy is sinning and should be punished harshly. This is just ridiculous.

Thank you for this post, I was about to say the same, but you said it better than I would have.

 

[Shin]

Do you have a list of people who are in Heaven and Hell? Or even Purgatory for that matter? So if a baptised infant dies in his sleep, where does he go? I was just wondering how you knew that few people are in Heaven. Are you saying that this boy or his parents will go to Hell for this?

Just because I was asking if the pope was speaking infallibly and asked for the context does not mean I was pitting myself against him. I will ask again, was he speaking infallibly?

Not to be sidetracked but –

I was quoting scripture when I said few people go to Heaven.

Enter ye in at the narrow gate: for wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leadeth to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat. How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leadeth to life:** and few there are that find it! **

Matthew 7:13-14

I also have 100 quotes of the saints speaking about the fewness of the saved. Would you like them all at once or one at a time? Not here of course. But anytime you like…

And but seriously… we are born in original sin… we are not born angels. There are some common misconceptions about this and children these days. I understand. You leap to the reaction so common among worldly people sainting children from birth. But that’s just what St. Gregory is warning about. That’s not the way it works, no. We have to get that out of our heads, for their sake.

I will note reading his words you can easily see they’re not a solemn infallible declaration – and why would they be? They aren’t made on these subjects as a general rule. That doesn’t make them any less true.

Our Lady of Fatima showed Hell itself to three small children. Aged 7, 9, and 10.

She warned one of them, Francisco, that to go to Heaven he would have to say many rosaries. We have to raise our children to say these…

Lucy asked, “And shall I go to heaven?”
“Yes, you will.”
“And Jacinta?”
“She will go too.”
“And Francisco?”
“Francisco, too, my dear, but he will first have many Rosaries to say.”

All these children practiced corporal, that is physically punishing mortification for the rest of their lives.

Children reach the age of reason at different ‘ages’, some earlier, some later. Sometimes the immaturity is there for the wrong reasons, not simply due to ‘aging’.

The above example is with a five year old. Did you know that part of the full old baptism ritual contains an exorcism – used even for infants? We are born in original sin, ‘children of wrath’, in the dominion of the devil.

We get out of it through baptism but that doesn’t make us angels. Where we are tending towards, Heaven or Hell, begins at day one – and if before we can even sin, we are committing it objectively, though not interiorly – there’s still great harm in that kind of preparation for life. Sin always has consequences.

When I read Fr. Furniss that famous children’s missioner’s ‘The Sight of Hell’ a book for children, I realize how much it is easy to lose sight of how necessary it is to teach the fear of sin from the beginning.

There are two kinds of children. Those who are afraid to sin, and those who aren’t afraid to sin. You can raise one or the other. And it’s very important.

I don’t know what individual circumstances call for specifically for this child, I’m not the child’s parent. Whether it calls for spankings or not. But ‘spare the rod and spoil the child’ is something that is worth reminding people of, especially in serious situations. Discipline needs to be there consistently not just unusually too.

What it definitely calls for is a lot of grace.

 

[Jennifer_J]

. But ‘spare the rod and spoil the child’ is something that is worth reminding people of, especially in serious situations. Discipline needs to be there consistently not just unusually too.

.

You don’t understand the quote you used. “Spare the rod, spoil the child” doesn’t mean that spanking is okay.
Shepherds didn’t normally hit their sheeps with the rod, they guided them. No doubt some guidance needs to be taken so that this child doesn’t develop a bad habit, but this child is not sinning and SPANKING a child for this will cause more problems than it would solve. This child is not sinning and the CHURCH states that a child is not cuplable for sins until the age of reason, around age 7 (newadvent.org/cathen/01209a.htm). To indicate that children below the age of reason can choose hell is going against what the Church teaches. Pope Gregory the Great is in fact a saint and pretty great, but that doesn’t mean that everything he wrote or said is infallible. He was allowed to have an opinion (including his belief that the end of the world was close at hand in the late 500’s).

Sin should be taken seriously. Bad habits should not be encouraged, but neither should we overreact and cause physical and mental harm to a child–a child the Church says is not culpable for sin. We should guide and treat the child as Jesus would…the Good Shepherd, not the beating shepherd…

 

[Shin]

You don’t understand the quote you used. “Spare the rod, spoil the child” doesn’t mean that spanking is okay.
Shepherds didn’t normally hit their sheeps with the rod, they guided them. No doubt some guidance needs to be taken so that this child doesn’t develop a bad habit, but this child is not sinning and SPANKING a child for this will cause more problems than it would solve. This child is not sinning and the CHURCH states that a child is not cuplable for sins until the age of reason, around age 7 (newadvent.org/cathen/01209a.htm). To indicate that children below the age of reason can choose hell is going against what the Church teaches. Pope Gregory the Great is in fact a saint and pretty great, but that doesn’t mean that everything he wrote or said is infallible. He was allowed to have an opinion (including his belief that the end of the world was close at hand in the late 500’s).

Sin should be taken seriously. Bad habits should not be encouraged, but neither should we overreact and cause physical and mental harm to a child–a child the Church says is not culpable for sin. We should guide and treat the child as Jesus would…the Good Shepherd, not the beating shepherd…

Well, a little off the main thrust again because we are discussing fundamentals that we should not have to discuss but which should be -known-.

My dear the age of reason used by the Church is not a fixed number that works for all children, it’s simply a rubric for practical use. A child doesn’t instantly become reasonable upon reaching a birthday, that’s common sense.

As for spare the rod:

‘Withhold not correction from a child: for if thou strike him with the rod, **he shall not die. **Thou shalt **beat him with the rod, and deliver his soul from hell.’ **

Proverbs 23:13-14

He that spareth the rod hateth his son: but he that loveth him correcteth him betimes.

Proverbs 13:24

Why hateth? Because you love your own emotions more than you love what is needed to do for his soul.

Because you’re willing for him to go to Hell rather than for you to go through the pain of your duty as a parent. Of course you don’t think of it that way, but that is the result, raising a child who can’t bear discipline.

We must beware of trying to reword Bible passages to suit us in cases like this. The crook doesn’t have to strike too, but it can be used for it and must be at times. If you don’t raise your child with physical correction, he will when he gets older not take to it at all, and react more outrageously and rebelliously – both to it and otherwise.

We practice physical correction of ourselves as Catholics. We have to be able to put pain in its proper context in life, not as evil, but as a good corrective measure.

I am not saying whether in this case it’s the thing to do immediately, but it should not be off the table especially with serious stuff – and to my mind if you do not use it at all, there are more problems than if you use it on occasion or so rarely it’s a big fuss. It should be part of the field of tools of discipline, not foreign to a parent.

I’m not an expert. I’m just talking fundamentals to keep in mind.

And grace is totally necessary.

 

[micahmike]

If I see any person beating a child with a rod, I will do my duty to stop the abuse to the best of my ability with whatever level of force necesary - and I suspect any other good Catholic would as well.

 

[BobObob]

I’m a mental health major.

Sometimes cases like this has to do with tactile (affectionate/nurturing touch) deprivation.

There was an article published in a major medical journal entitle “Excessive masturbation of childhood: a symptom of tactile deprivation?” That showed that when prepubescent children who masturbated a lot were given more tactile touch by their parents, their masturbatory behavior stopped. I would recommend that you try it with your child (giving him more nurturing touch).

Also, you mentioned that this happens more when he has a full bladder. Sometimes young boys touching their genitals just means that they need to pee.

Given that he’s only 6, I couldn’t imagine that this would be a sexual thing at all.

Otherwise, try not to worry about it too much, and try not to shame him about it. Adding shame to this situation would make it worse.

 

[OAO]

It’s a normal part of young childhood; virtually all kids do from some time between 4-7. Tell him to do it in private, but don’t force him to stop. If you guilt him about it, it will cause him to have sexual troubles later in life. Don’t ask random people on the forums; ask any expert in children. Ask your GP, ask school psychologists.

Even some fetuses do this in the womb.

 

[Claire_from_DE]

I’m a mental health major.

Sometimes cases like this has to do with tactile (affectionate/nurturing touch) deprivation.

There was an article published in a major medical journal entitle “Excessive masturbation of childhood: a symptom of tactile deprivation?” That showed that when prepubescent children who masturbated a lot were given more tactile touch by their parents, their masturbatory behavior stopped. I would recommend that you try it with your child (giving him more nurturing touch).

Also, you mentioned that this happens more when he has a full bladder. Sometimes young boys touching their genitals just means that they need to pee.

Given that he’s only 6, I couldn’t imagine that this would be a sexual thing at all.

Otherwise, try not to worry about it too much, and try not to shame him about it. Adding shame to this situation would make it worse.

I think this may be one of the more helpful suggestions given on this thread.

I have heard and read that young women who have not had a physically affectionate relationship with their fathers when they were children are more likely to give in to sexual pressure from young men simply because they hunger for loving physical touch.

Perhaps something similar is going on here. This would not imply a lack in the parents. It could be that some children have a greater need for nurturing touch than others do. It seems to me that this is certainly worth trying. It may do a lot of good and would not be likely to be at all harmful, which some of the other suggestions may be.

It might also be helpful for the parents to pray for and make little sacrifices for this child. Give him a miraculous medal to wear, not making any reference to his habit when you do so, but telling him that Mary is Jesus’ mother and she loves him too and that he can go to her to help him with anything. They can pray to their son’s guardian angel to help him too.

When I was six years old I was conscious that some things my parents disapproved of were not ‘wrong’ but that other people didn’t like to see you doing them. So I knew that picking your nose in private wasn’t ‘wrong’. I knew that ‘wrong’ things were things God didn’t want me to do. For instance, hitting my brother or stealing from him or cheating in school was ‘wrong’ even if my parents didn’t know about it. This is part of forming a child’s conscience.

But also make it clear that God loves him and his parents love him and will forgive him for doing wrong if he is sorry and tries to change. Otherwise, why would he want to do what’s right? Telling a little child to avoid doing wrong because, if he doesn’t, God will make him burn forever in hell will not help him to develop love of and trust in God as a loving Father who he wants to please.

Isn’t it better to instill in a child a confidence in God and a desire to please Him? I’ve never been a parent but I clearly remember being a child and that’s what I would have responded to.

Rather than punishing a child for touching himself whenever you catch him (wouldn’t that just make him more secretive about doing it rather than extinguishing the behavior? unless it’s the attention that he really wants) would it be better to reward him with attention or approval whenever he doesn’t do it or stops doing it? I don’t know how this could be done unless he could report this to his dad on a regular basis, something like a daily examen of conscience in a very positive and supportive atmosphere. Then afterwards he and his dad could pray? But, of course, a loving and supportive relationship would have to exist for this to work. This is certainly a difficult problem.