Wait. They'll tell you when they're ready.

As parents, we give and receive this advice quite frequently.

When should I introduce solid food? When your baby starts reaching for your green beans or chicken, he's ready to try some. He'll tell you when he's ready.

When should I start potty training? When your toddler starts showing interest in the potty, it's time to sit her on it. She'll tell you when she's ready.

When should I teach my child to read? When you child grabs a book and starts pretending to read, he's ready to learn. He'll tell you when he's ready.

When should I teach my child the birds and the bees? When your child starts to ask questions about where babies come from, she's ready to hear an "age appropriate" answer. She'll tell you when she's ready.

"They'll tell you when they're ready. "

What does this mean?

When we give this advice to another parent, we are generally trying to encourage them not to worry. We are encouraging the parent to wait until the child gives some sort of signal... grabbing the fork, sitting on the kiddy potty, pretending to read a book, or asking if he was in Mommy's tummy just like baby sister. But does this advice work for everything? Let's face it, if many of us waited for our children to tell us they were ready for vegetables or ready to learn to clean their rooms, we'd still be waiting for the signal when they left for college! On the other hand, sometimes we get signals we aren't sure what to do with, are intimidated by, or seem to be "age inappropriate." By age inappropriate, I mean that our child is asking questions about things that our culture has decided are above their comprehension for thier age so we have no guideline for discussing these topics with our children. This seems to happen most often with topics of spiritual signifigance. When do you start talking to your children about topics like sin, redemption, death, and sanctification?

I believe in this situation, where a child is asking a question about a topic you feel he is too young to understand, you answer the question... or at least try to. Lest you respond, "That's easy for her to say." Here are some questions that our kids have asked Frodo and I recently (after each question, I have indicated which child asked it and how old he/ she is):

"Why did God create light first?" (Terzo, 5)

"What would happen if lightening hit our car and we all died?" (Terzo, 5)

"Why would someone steal a kid?" (Primo, 9)

"Why did God make butterflies if they only live for 2 weeks?" (Secondo, 7)

"Why did the Stone Table break after Aslan came alive again?" (Primo, 9)

"Why does God let tornados kill people?" (Primo, 9)

"How come there aren't any more dinosaurs?" (Secondo, 7)

"How come different books about dinosaurs say different things about why they died and what they looked like?" (Secondo, 7)

"How come Eve ate the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil when God told her not to?" (Terzo, age 5)

"Will you die?" (Primo, 9; Secondo, 7; Terzo, 5)

"Will I die?" (Primo, 9; Secondo, 7; Terzo, 5)

We did our best to answer their questions and pray for wisdom in answering those that will inevitably come up in the future.

Our children will let us know when they are ready to face some of life's hard questions. But I have learned some things through my children's questions... I don't know all of the answers, I probably never will, and I don't ask enough questions myself but it is important that I ask. Asking questions and searching for answers (sometimes receiving them and sometimes not) matures us. If I stop questioning, I stop growing.

Have I stopped asking?

Have you stopped asking?

Does this mean we are not ready for the answers?

Or does it just mean that we are hiding from the responsibility required of us when our questions are answered?

Jumping in on a discussion a planned to avoid...

I had been attempting to avoid this topic, and succeeded until I went onto the Well Trained Mind message board today and found that my only oasis from this topic had finally been tainted by it, and I realized, for my own sake, I had to say something... then I will let it go.

For those of you who may not be familiar, there has been a controversy for years over two parenting books: To Train Up a Child and On Becoming Babywise. The first discusses discipline issues and the second breastfeeding issues. The issue came to a head recently when a couple applied a discipline proceedure not mentioned in the TCUAC book and killed thier son. Later, the couple mentioned TCUAC as thier primary resource on discipline (techniques which they took too far), so the book got labelled as the manual of child abusers.

So that I am being upfront and honest with everyone, I happen to own both books in question (actually I lent one to someone and never got it back, but that's irrelevant.) I read both many times, lent them to people, applied some of the principles of both books, and ignored some princilples in both books.

I very rarely agree with everything in every book I read, and there are many that I don't agree with much at all. If I own it and don't want it any more, I may donate it to the library, freecyle it, give it to a friend, toss it or burn it in the burn barrel depending on the book (keeping in mind content and condition). I do not view any book (with the exception of the Scriptures because I am a Chirstian) as sacred. If you are a private citizen and want to burn your copy of a book, go ahead. I tend to be environmentally concious, so that comes to play in my decision on what to do with a book I no longer want. I am amazed at the calls for the mass banning and burning of these books and anyone who has any association with them (including Homeschol Blogger because the magazine the site's owners publish has advertized the books.)

I don't expect everyone to agree with every author's recommendations in books (like the ones I mentioned above or any other book). Some people take things too far in their applications and some people don't go far enough. Some people have mis-applied Scripture, abused the Constitution, and used kitchen knives to murder people rather than to butter their bread, but I do not think these things need to be banned or burned for censorship's sake. Should we have the right to get rid of books (or anything else) in our possession that we do not find edifying and supportive of our mission to "glorify God and enjoy Hin forever?" Yes. As Americans we have the right to do that and more, but I don't beleive that this is the true issue here. The true issues here are the lack of recognition of sin and the abuse of autonomy that causes people to think of themselves as better than others.

Sadly, we live in an imperfect world. We will never get rid of abuse, neglect, murder, and hatefulness. Should we strive to overcome these things? Yes. But we must also trust God, have good-faith in our neighbors, and invest ourselves in each others lives so that when someone wants to go too far in their application of something (like beating their child to death with plumbing supplies) we can step up before (with love and familiarity) and say "No!" rather than wait until afterwards to feed our self-rightousness (I include myself in this) and say "I would never do that!" and try to find blame. The real crime here is one of selfishness and laziness on the part of those of us just outside these situations.

We need to regain the desire and ability to talk to our neighbors and friends openly and intimately about topics that are controversial, get our opinions out there, and trust that others can use their brains as well as we use our own and make their decisions thoughtfully. It is just as much my fault as anyone's that it happened because I didn't love my neighbor enough to stop them before-hand because it was politically incorrect to do so. When my parents were little, it was common that if a neghbor saw them doing something wrong, the neighbor would go out and stop them then go talk to thier parents. That rarely happens any more... with children or adults. We have taken independence and autonomy too far. We silently recognize this fact and attempt to reconcile it by having the government do the dirty work for us. See a child with a dirty face or a bruise? We call Child Protective Services annonymously. We would feel too "weird" doing it ourselves. Have we stopped to think that we should feel weird? We feel awkward because deep down we know that we are just as sinful and in need of rebuke. We know that "there but by the Grace of God go I." We ask ourselves, "Who am I to confront them about their sin? I'm not perfect either." Of course you aren't. No one is. But we are afraid that if we point it out in someone else they might point it out in us, and we will shatter the visage that we have worked so hard to create.

We have to confront sin, in ourselves and others, not because we are perfect but because God is. We have to acknowledge that our world is perverted. Man was not meant to live in a world pervaded by sin and death. We were created for Eden and to be in intimate fellowship with God. Will pointing out our own and others' sin return us to Eden? No. But we can't get to where we were intended to be if we don't first acknowledge that we are lost.

Now, I will let it go.

(By the way, I am leaving this open for comments, as I do all my posts, under the assumption that you will comment civily and respectfully. I will delete or edit comments that do not meet this criteria. Thank you.)