family Archives - Amazing Catechists

I try to prepare myself for the tech requests of my kids: Ipods, Ipads, cell phones, laptops….and of course the newest video games and DVDs. In a world where you need to be tech savvy or at least technologically literate, I struggle with the limits to set on some of these devices and influences.

As I have struggled to raise seven kids and a foster son, I have come to some conclusions about the tech world. First, I can’t avoid it. We can limit television, computers and music, but they are everywhere and so is access to them. Second, all my children react differently to the limits placed on them and some will (horror of horrors) disobey me at times. There, I admitted it. I have raised six to adulthood, two more are close behind and I couldn’t do it perfectly. Yup….. I home schooled for years, took them to church, gave them (what I hoped was) a good example, but sometimes they disobeyed anyway.

Social media can also provide a positive tool for some children! One of my kids has a mild form of autism. Social sites helped her to connect in a non-threatening way with some of her peers. This gave her the confidence to interact more freely in person. Another daughter of mine uses her page to promote messages of chastity and a pro-life world view. We do not need to be out of the social media sites, just not negatively influenced by them.

So, with these things in mind, I have a few ideas to help parents and youth ministers tackle these difficult subjects.

1/ Don’t be too rigid. Experience has taught me that when I draw a line in the sand my children will be challenged to cross it. Rather than not having a television, we all watch things together. Instead of saying you can’t watch a particular movie, we may pre-screen it or watch it together and critique it at the end. This becomes a valuable tool for both the young adults and ourselves. They have an environment in which they are getting the benefit of our knowledge and wisdom and we know what they are drawn to watch. As our children have become adults we hope that they will make good choices and this way we can still have some influence over the things they choose.

2/ Help them to become media literate. Often times, information is presented through media purposefully confusing or even imitating truth. Most teens need help sorting this out. Teaching them how commercials are influencing them, or how movies will say, “This movie is based on actual events,” even when it is not, will help discern truth as they discover media. We can teach them critical thinking skills and give them information on websites that critique and rate movies and games for their offensive content.

3/ Join in. Many teens will use a friend’s computer to have a social networking website if they are not allowed one at home. (i.e. Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat etc.) A better tactic might be to allow them to have one on your computer, but keep the computer in an open, family space and require that you have their password. Another idea is to have your own social media and become ‘friends’ with your kids and with their friends. You would be amazed at how much information your teen or other teens will reveal about themselves on a social networking site.

4/ Teach them safety rules. Teens often don’t realize the long-term ramifications of their actions. Consider hosting an in-service on internet safety. Discuss how predators use the internet, how info they post can follow them into job interviews and future relationships. A quick web search will reveal stories of how social media has negatively impacted someone’s life or safety.

Discuss how simple information can provide information that may violate their privacy and compromise safety. For example, a school sport’s picture with their Jersey number can be used to locate a teen. If you have any doubts about how easy it is to gain info, ask any teenage girl how she can locate a guy she has only seen once and even when she doesn’t know his name!

Encourage kids to leave off location services on their mobile devices when using wi-fi, especially in free hotspots. These services advertise where an individual can be found and when.

5/ Discuss being connected. Kids often disconnect their real life behavior from their internet behavior, song choices or movie choices. I know great Catholic kids who listen to violent music about killing and sex. They don’t think the lyrics affect their thinking process. Other teens will go to horribly offensive movies (either highly violent or sexual in nature), still others have fantasy lives on the internet.

Spending time talking about how these things can change thinking and even personalities, may help them discern what things to allow into their own lives.
*If you watch a sadistic, violent movie for two hours, can you really be the same person when you come out of the theater that you were going in?
*If a boy respects women, can he tolerate lyrics that objectify or reflect violence against women?
Opening this type of dialogue will help young people to create an informed conscience. God bless!
Copyright 2015

The Gift of Life

By Maureen Smith

Today, as we celebrate the gift of Life we pray in a special way for the unborn children who are vulnerable to the threat of abortion. We also lift up mothers who have suffered from abortion or who have been pressured to do so, and that the rights of women may be respected – including the right to give birth to their child and the right to raise their children in a safe environment. We also pray for those who are involved in abortion and any attacks on the dignity of life, that the Lord will open their eyes to the gift of their own lives and those around them.

In today’s world we see so many attacks on life. We have heard most recently about the attacks on Christians in the Middle East and other atrocities. And even in our own country there are victims of trafficking, all kinds of abuse, domestic violence, euthanasia, mistreatment of the poor, the sick, and the disabled.

What can we do? What can I do? Where do we start and how can I even make a difference?

A simple answer came to me when I was visiting my family for the birth of my nephew. As I watched my sister, her husband, and their new son I was struck by the simplicity and the overwhelming beauty of life and love. I saw in the love of my sister and her husband the pouring out of the love of our Heavenly Father and the love of the Son returning it all back without reservation. Out of that love was born a new person, who embodies that love between them, as the Holy Spirit is created out of the love of the Father and the Son.

And if there could be so much love on earth, in one small hospital room, between three people…how much more does the love of God surround us? As my sister looked down at her son, just seconds old, the pain was now forgotten. Only he mattered. And she didn’t hold the pain against her precious little one. That pain only made her more in love with him, and the suffering only made him belong more intimately to her who had waited nine long months to hold him in her arms.

Isn’t this a reflection of the love of Jesus for all of us? After he poured himself out upon the Cross for us, he didn’t look at us with annoyance, shame, or guilt because we had “caused” him such pain. Rather, it only brought us closer to His Most Sacred Heart, and it only strengthened His love for each of us.

How precious must we be to God! How precious must you be to Him! Experiencing His love gives us the context to celebrate the gift of life and to reverence each life no matter the circumstance. Even the greatest sinner and those who commit acts of violence, even they are looked upon as precious, and they especially are deserving of our love and prayers. So must we dare to love! Without reservation and without counting the cost we love even those who have hurt us. We can love them because they too are children of God.

I realized the truth of each person’s preciousness in the Eyes of God and how close He keeps each of us to His Heart as I looked down upon my nephew, only a few minutes old. The Lord will never let go of us even when we feel abandoned and alone. For any of you who have felt that you have failed God, remember the mother who does not cease loving her child when he cries as an infant, or when he screams and has temper tantrums as a toddler, or when he gets in trouble or struggles with addiction as a teenager, or when he loses his job as an adult, or even if he fails to be there when she is dying. Her love is always and forever.

How much more then is the love of God, who loved us into being?

How My Special Needs Child has Sanctified Me!

By Mary Lou Rosien

Anya and Me

I often write about how we can help special needs children learn the faith and help them in their sanctification. Today, I would like to share my personal story of how my special needs child has helped sanctify me.

My sweet Anya-Marie (Elizabeth) Joy is almost sixteen now. Our journey together has been difficult at times, almost unbearable at others, but like her name, she brings me great joy. Within hours after her birth, my husband and I noticed that Anya looked a little odd to us. She seemed to stare off into space. She is our sixth child, so we had some frame of reference on which to base our observations.

At first, we didn’t really worry about what we were seeing, but as time went on, she didn’t accomplish milestones at the same rate that our other children had. She didn’t look at us, she looked above us. She rarely smiled. We couldn’t ignore it anymore… something wasn’t right.

She was only mildly delayed in terms of motor skills, so by four years old she functioned physically quite well, except for extreme sensory integration issues. She was both hyper and hypo sensitive and required physical therapy from age two. She would stomp her feet when she walked, but would also scream if a light went on or a hair touched her body. Blessedly, we had dealt with similar issues with her older sister, so we recognized the problem and got intervention early.

By the time she was four, we were told that she had a low IQ and was moderately developmentally delayed. By age eight a diagnosis of Asperger’s (a mild form of autism) had been added to the list. As is typically with that combination of issues, the world was a threatening place to poor little Anya. She spent most of her time in screaming fits and meltdowns. Life was difficult for our entire family due to managing her problems and still trying to raise a healthy family and maintain a strong marriage.

At one point, an ‘expert’ suggested we find a ‘home’ for her. It was then that we decided to proactively change everything in our lives to help our little girl thrive. We read everything, studied anything, spent countess hours working with Anya. We were supported by some wonderful family and friends who wanted to help us, help her. We developed a plan and strategies, regularly changing them to adapt to her changing needs. We looked at all family outings as potential meltdown scenarios and developed coping and exit strategies when our worst fears materialized.

One of Anya’s safety zones was, well, me! A friend once referred to me as her Rosetta stone, because I could translate her to the world and the world to her. She went everywhere with me. My mom jokingly (and lovingly) called her, “mommy’s little barnacle.” She clung to me all day, everyday. As she got older she would even go to work with me, sitting quietly for hours as I had meetings.

A few years ago, things started to improve. She still went everywhere with me and still wouldn’t venture anywhere except school on her own, but her gifts and talents started to shine through. She has a love for the clarinet. She also has a wonderful gift for caring for small children, especially with children who have disabilities. As I would teach Adult Faith Formation, Anya would care for the children of some of my catechumens. One little boy was non-verbal, autistic. He would jump up and down as soon as he saw her. Anya also has an ability to take beautiful pictures. Her dream is to photograph special needs children.

A few years ago she was Confirmed. She chose Elizabeth as her Confirmation name, very logically, as she was already named after Jesus’ mother and grandmother, why not his cousin too?! She often contributes at youth group, goes on the March for Life and to the Steubenville Youth Conferences (as long as I am one of the chaperones) and will even venture to a friend’s house occasionally now and then.

She has taught our family patience. She has taught us to put another’s needs above our own comfort. We have learned to be flexible, to accommodate her rigidity. All of my children are loving and sensitive to the needs of others, especially to the disabled. She has helped us grown in the love of Christ, as we learned to love the least of our brothers.

She has grown exponentially in the environment of our family and has had a jump in IQ score and social skills. She is still measured as low, but low-average on most scales that measure intelligence and social functioning!

As my little ‘saint-maker’ sits beside me as I drive to work, I realize how much we have shared because she has always been by my side. I recognize that someday, she will be on her own, and that my passenger seat will no longer hold my chatty, constant companion. My heart flies at the knowledge that she has grown, but as I sit here writing this, I am wiping more than a few tears from my eyes. She has succeeded, but maybe I am the one who has grown. Thank you, Anya. We love you!