[The following is an excerpt from my new book, Spiritual Design].
If it is possible to prepare the way for ourselves to explore and be open to receiving God’s message, what does that mean for how we raise our children? Once we try to apply these techniques to another person, a key element of the process — our yearning to reach the Divine — is potentially lost.
Spiritual design is based on a sincere and willing feedback loop: a person changes their environment, sees if that brings them closer to the Divine, and learns from that experience, adapting and making changes over time. It’s an iterative process in which the person repeatedly reaches out to the Divine to listen, to commune, and to learn His will. There’s no feedback loop if the person doesn’t want to do this. And if that inner yearning isn’t already there, we risk coercing our children into an empty ritual — something that makes it harder for them to find God.
Some aspects of spiritual design may be reasonable and helpful for our children, however. One of the most basic techniques is simply education: knowing about God and his teachings, as a guide to help people seek Him out when they so choose. Many faiths believe in the ever-present opportunity of connecting with the Divine; it’s the daily distractions of life that make it hard for us to find the way on our own. A little education about what’s possible can open the door for our children, without pushing them through it before they are ready.
In this way, basic knowledge of scripture and of spiritual practice can be a spiritual tool. It’s something children can learn and deploy in their lives when and how they need. Regardless of where they are in their spiritual path, and their relationship with God, knowing that the scripture and other teachings are there can help them explore further. Similarly, knowing about the Church, and the community of believers who support and welcome people who seek closer communion with God, can be a tool for children to use in the future. They may choose never to use that tool, or it may help them when they need it. If we teach our children about prayer, and how it can work and enrich our lives, we also arm them with a spiritual tool. We leave room for them to employ that tool in their own authentic search and connection with God.
Trouble can arise when we try to instill spiritual habits. As we discussed earlier, habits are funny things: they are nonconscious and free our minds to do other things. The more we repeat something, the more our minds say, Okay this is something I need to do often; let me make it effortless and mindless. Let’s think about eating. We’ve all had the experience of only barely “tasting” or “experiencing” the food we’re eating because our minds are focused on something completely different while we shovel it into our mouths. The more we eat the same thing in the same way, the less special and noticeable it is.
If we don’t give particular attention to God during them, our spiritual rituals can become like mindless eating: just something we do because we have to, while we’re thinking about something else. That isn’t necessary of course; habits (and the spiritual rituals they support) help us clear and focus our minds on God. But that works if we’re searching and yearning for God. Yearning for God isn’t something we can force upon our children. They themselves determine if prayer and other spiritual rituals are meaningful. We can only supply them with the tools and the opportunity to use them.
Beyond habits and spiritual tools, as parents we also play a major and beneficial role in setting the norms of behavior. Especially before their children’s teenage years, parents have a strong say in what other children their kids play with and hang out with. If the acts of finding faith are like other behaviors — health behaviors, eating behaviors and studying behaviors — then social group matters. Kids who are around others who study tend to study more. Kids who are around others who exercise tend to exercise more. And if spiritual behavior is similar — a big if, but one to consider — kids who are around others who pray (outward behavior) and talk about their search for God (inward behavior) may be more likely to pray and search for God themselves.
Personally, my wife and I considered this social effect of spirituality very strongly when we thought about where to put our kids in school. The Quaker Meeting my wife and I were attending when our children were born had a school associated with it: Sandy Spring Friends School. Academically, it’s a very good school, from what we could see. More importantly though, some of the children from the school also attended our church. And they were good kids: confident, well behaved, thoughtful, and regularly attending Sunday school and participating in church. We wanted our kids to be like them and explored ways to send our kids to school there; unfortunately, we moved out of the area before it was financially possible for us. After we moved to Chicago, a major factor in joining a church was its children’s community, so our kids could have a supportive environment.
Sending kids to a religious school is one way to shape the behavioral norms a child encounters. I know some people reading this are reacting in alarm, if not outright anger — especially people who were raised in religious schools and felt coerced or abused there. Their experiences should be a warning sign to all well-meaning parents: a religious school doesn’t magically mean a good environment for kids. Kids learn from other kids, and from their teacher. If those two groups are setting a bad example, kids will learn that, regardless of the lofty principles on which the school is founded. Further, if the teachers enforce habits of the spirit without supporting children to find their own authentic connection with God, they can do real spiritual harm. Children may rightfully see their experience of religious expression as empty, and turn away from God. On their own, I would argue that religious schools can help, and are a non-coercive action for parents to take — but parents can’t turn a blind eye to the coercion and examples being set by the members of the school community itself.
And, finally, parents help shape the identity of a child, and that identity can have a spiritual character that makes it more natural for the child (as children or as adults) to find faith themselves — or not. For example: parents who instill a strong sense of atheism into their kids, and define them as “atheist,” just as another parent would label and inspire in their kid an identity as a “German-American” or “Hispanic-American.” Identity, as we talked about earlier, is a powerful force that guides one’s behavior in new or ambiguous situations. If I’m visiting a new city and walk down a street where I encounter a beautiful old church, whether or not I go in depends, in part, on whether I see myself as a religious person (and a person who likes old buildings). If I see myself as an atheist, I just wouldn’t pay as much attention to the beautiful old church, and to me it wouldn’t feel it natural to walk in, sit and meditate for a while. Identity matters. Of course, as parents of teenagers well know, identity is not something parents can force upon their children. Like prayer, knowledge of the Bible, and the social norms of faith, it is something that parents can offer to their children, and pray that they choose to incorporate and build upon in their lives.