The Catechism in a Year (with Fr. Mike Schmitz) - Day 288: The Duties of Parents (2024)
Episode Date: October 14, 2024Being a parent is far more than just having kids. As the Catechism reminds us, the fruitfulness of married love extends to the moral and spiritual education of a couple’s children. Parents are the p...rimary educators of their children, especially in the ways of virtue and prayer. Fr. Mike reminds us that it is also parents' privilege to evangelize their children. Today’s readings are Catechism paragraphs 2221-2231. This episode has been found to be in conformity with the Catechism by the Institute on the Catechism, under the Subcommittee on the Catechism, USCCB. For the complete reading plan, visit ascensionpress.com/ciy Please note: The Catechism of the Catholic Church contains adult themes that may not be suitable for children - parental discretion is advised.
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Hi, my name is Father Mike Schmitz and you're listening to the Catechism in a Year podcast,
where we encounter God's plan of sheer goodness for us, revealed in scripture and passed down
through the tradition of the Catholic faith.
The Catechism in a Year is brought to you by Ascension.
In 365 days, we'll read through the Catechism of the Catholic Church, discovering our identity
in God's family as we Journey Together Toward Our Heavenly Home.
This is Day 288, we're reading paragraphs 2221 to 2231.
That's a lot.
That's at least 10 paragraphs.
As always, I'm using the Ascension edition of the Catechism, which includes the Foundations
of Faith approach, but you can follow along with any recent version of the Catechism of
the Catholic Church.
You can also download your own Catechism in a year reading plan by visiting ascensionpress.com
slash C I Y. And you can click follow or subscribe in your podcast app to receive daily updates
and daily notifications right to your inbox question mark, or just maybe it's easier to
find, you know, you know, the drill.
Or if you don't know the drill, then you can click follow or subscribe and then you will
know the drill. Then you can click follow or subscribe and then you will know The train that rail today's day 288 reading paragraphs 22 21 to 22 31 yesterday
We talked about the duties of children today. We're talking about the duties of parents and that there's you know
I was intimidated. I was convicted as you heard. I was convicted by I actually so convicted a it was it was um, I
Was emotional for me. I don't know if I
I actually so convicted, it was emotional for me. I don't know if I came across that way.
It was just, it's the ways in which,
we fail to live up to God's commands
with the ways in which we fail to live up to the,
that great command of loving our neighbor.
Even just loving your parents, it can be very convicting
and it's so convicting for me.
I kind of, I feel like I kind of plowed through yesterday
just trying to, just like, okay,
just make it through this episode.
But yeah, conviction, it's good because remember,
I said at the end of the episode yesterday,
this is not about information transfer.
This is about transformation.
This is about allowing the Lord,
allowing the teachings of the church
to convict our hearts and challenge and change our lives.
And so today, the duties of parents
And we recognize that parents it I love the first sentence
It's 2221 the reason I love the first sentence of paragraph 2221 is because at one point
I was trying to demonstrate to our students that the catechism is incredibly approachable
And so I said you guys it's it's in like everyday language
You can understand virtually everything that catechism says I just I just randomly flipped open my catechism at the time
and read paragraph 20, the beginning of the paragraph 22, 21.
And it says this, the fecundity of conjugal love
cannot be reduced solely to the procreation of children.
People looking at me like, what, that's ordinary English?
Like, well, no, but I chose the wrong example.
But we're talking about this,
the fecundity of conjugal love, right?
The fruitfulness of marital love between spouses
is not reduced solely to having more kids,
but must extend to their moral education
and their spiritual formation.
So we're gonna talk about that today,
as well as the call of parents to evangelize their children,
the call of parents to educate them in the faith,
the call of parents to help them grow in holiness, the call of parents to help them grow in holiness
and how the whole family's meant to grow in holiness.
Remember, John Paul II made it so clear,
the family is a school of love.
And that's what we're all about today.
And so as we read paragraphs 22, 21 to 22, 31,
that's the goal, being the family being a school of love.
So that's right, because this school also is not
about just data transfer.
This is also a school where we don't just grow
in information, we grow in holiness.
We grow in sanctification.
So we pray, Father in heaven, we trust you.
And in the name of Jesus Christ, your son, our Lord
in the power of the Holy Spirit, we call upon your spirit
to come and be with us, to guide us,
to enlighten us in this moment.
We call your Holy Spirit to challenge us and to convict us.
Your Holy Spirit is the spirit of conviction.
And Lord God, we ask you to please remove the evil one, the evil one who is the
accuser from our midst and allow the Holy One, your Holy Spirit, the Holy Spirit of
conviction to be in our midst and to convict our minds,
in our hearts, our lives, to challenge and to change us.
In Jesus' name we pray, amen.
In the name of the Father, in of the Son,
in of the Holy Spirit, amen.
It is day 288, we are reading paragraphs 2221 to 2231.
The duties of parents.
The fecundity of conjugal love cannot be reduced solely to the procreation of children, but
must extend to their moral education and their spiritual formation.
The role of parents in education is of such importance that it is almost impossible to
provide inadequate substitute.
The right and the duty of parents to educate their children are primordial and inalienable.
Parents must regard their children as children of God
and respect them as human persons.
Showing themselves obedient to the will of the Father
in heaven, they educate their children
to fulfill God's law.
Parents have the first responsibility
for the education of their children.
They bear witness to this responsibility
first by creating a home where tenderness,
forgiveness, respect, forgiveness,
respect, fidelity, and disinterested service are the rule.
The home is well suited for education in the virtues. This requires an apprenticeship in
self-denial, sound judgment, and self-mastery, the preconditions of all true freedom.
Parents should teach their children to subordinate the material and instinctual dimensions to interior and spiritual ones.
Parents have a grave responsibility to give good example to their children.
By knowing how to acknowledge their own failings to their children, parents will be better
able to guide and correct them.
The book of Sirach says,
He who loves his son will not spare the rod.
He who disciplines his son will profit by him.
St. Paul's letter to
the Ephesians states, Fathers, do not provoke your children to anger, but bring them up in the
discipline and instruction of the Lord. The home is the natural environment for initiating
a human being into solidarity and communal responsibilities. Parents should teach children
to avoid the compromising and degrading influences which threaten human societies.
Through the grace of the sacrament of marriage, parents receive the responsibility and privilege of evangelizing their children.
Parents should initiate their children at an early age into the mysteries of the faith of which they are the first heralds for their children.
They should associate them from their tenderest years with the life of the church.
associate them from their tenderest years with the life of the Church. A wholesome family life can foster interior dispositions that are a genuine preparation for a living faith and remain
a support for it throughout one's life. Education in the faith by the parents should begin in the
child's earliest years. This already happens when family members help one another to grow in faith
by the witness of a Christian life in keeping with the gospel. Family catechesis precedes,
accompanies, and enriches other forms of instruction in the faith. Parents have the mission
of teaching their children to pray and to discover the vocation as children of God.
The parish is the Eucharistic community and the heart of the liturgical life of Christian families.
It is a privileged place for the catechesis of children and parents.
Children in turn contribute to the growth and holiness of their parents. Each and everyone
should be generous and tireless in forgiving one another for offenses, quarrels, injustices,
and neglect. Mutual affection suggests this. The charity of Christ demands it.
Parents' respect and affection are expressed by the care and attention they devote to bringing
up their young children and providing for their physical and spiritual needs.
As the children grow up, the same respect and devotion lead parents to educate them
in the right use of their reason and freedom.
As those first responsible for the education of their children, parents have the right
to choose a school for them which corresponds to their own convictions.
This right is fundamental.
As far as possible, parents have the duty of choosing schools that will best help them
in their task as Christian educators.
Public authorities have the duty of guaranteeing this parental right and of ensuring the concrete
conditions for its exercise.
When they become adults, children have the right and duty to choose their profession
and state of life.
They should assume their new responsibilities within a trusting relationship with their
parents, willingly asking and receiving their advice and counsel.
Parents should be careful not to exert pressure on their children, either in the choice of
a profession or in that of a spouse.
This necessary restraint does not prevent them, quite the contrary, from giving their
children judicious advice, particularly when they are planning to start a family.
Some forgo marriage in order to care for their parents or brothers and sisters, to give themselves
more completely to a profession, or to serve other honorable ends.
They can contribute greatly to the good of the human family.
Right, there we are, paragraphs 22, 21 to 22, 31.
Wow, I just, it's beautiful, incredible.
So paragraph 22, 21, that wordy line.
I don't know if you got, it wasn't just 22, 21
that had some wordy lines.
A lot of words, a lot of, multiple, not monosyllabic,
but multiple syllabic, multi-syllabic words were used here.
So the headline, of course, the fegundity of conjugal love cannot be reduced solely
to the procreating of children that must extend to their moral education and their spiritual
formation.
So basically that's saying that the call of parents, the call of husbands and wives is
not simply to have as many children as possible, but as in having children, right? The fruitfulness of marital love and having children, their duties are
to the moral education and their spiritual formation of children. And this goes, I know
I've shared this in the past, but I, sometimes I am so grateful that the Lord has called
me to not have children. He's called me to be single, you know, for the Lord. I'm not,
not only because I love being a priest,
I love it so much, not only because of that,
but also because I sometimes see my nieces and nephews
and I am just so preoccupied with them getting hurt.
I mean, just, it's one of those things where I understand
the plight of helicopter parents.
I understand the plight of Zamboni parents,
those who drive ahead of their kids
and make sure that everything's all smooth.
Like I get it because I look at these kids
and I'm just, ah, be careful, be careful.
I remember talking to my sister, Sarah, at one point,
and maybe I shared this before.
I was like, Sarah, I just, man, if I had your kids,
I just, I wouldn't let them go out the house
without a helmet on and elbow pads and name pads,
like full body armor.
I'd just be so concerned all of the time
about their health or about them getting hurt.
And my sister, she's so good, she said, well, yes, of course I care about that, but I care
more about them getting to heaven.
I was like, oh yeah, that's right, here the brother, the priest is forgetting that part.
I didn't forget that part.
It was just, you know, but yeah, that's the concern.
That is the care.
That is the great duty.
The right and duty of parents
is to educate their children.
That's the primordial and inalienable.
In fact, in the middle of paragraph 2221, it says,
the role of parents in education is of such importance
that it is almost impossible
to provide an adequate substitute.
So consider that, that just,
it's almost impossible to provide an adequate substitute.
Now we have in our modern day and age,
we have the modern school system, which I'm grateful for.
I'm grateful for schools.
But we also recognize that the schools,
what they attempt to do is they attempt to hopefully
build on what parents have conveyed to their children.
But teachers can't do that.
And no matter how great a teacher is, they can, yes,
absolutely, I mean, I love teachers
and I'm so grateful for their work, for their vocation,
right, to call that call to be teachers,
to shape young minds,
but they're not just shaping young minds,
they're shaping people, right?
And that's why the church is emphasizing this,
is that no matter how good the teacher,
the teacher cannot take the role of the parent.
Does that make sense?
I mean, again, I am praising teachers here.
So all of us who are grateful for our teachers in our lives,
all of us who are teachers,
so please hear my praise and my thanks for you
and your call from the Lord to convey knowledge.
But you probably know this too.
There's, at the end of the day,
there's only so much that you can do. I mean, actually some of the end of the day, there's only so much you can do.
I mean, actually, some of the greatest teachers I know,
that's one of their greatest pains,
is at the end of the day, there's only so much
that they can do, because we realize
that almost no one can replace the role
of a parent in education.
So moving on, paragraph 2222, which is fun, 2222,
parents must regard their children as children of God
and respect them as human persons,
which is massively important.
A child does not exist for the sake of the parents.
The parent doesn't exist for the sake of the child.
These are beings, persons created for their own sake.
Keep that in mind.
Next paragraph 2223, parents have the first responsibility
for the education of their children. They bear witness to this responsibility first by creating a home with 10 where tenderness forgiveness respect
Fidelity and disinterested service are the rule. No, let's let's pause on this for a second
It says that parents have a the very first responsibility for the education of their children
And then they list a number of areas of education
Listen to those areas tenderness forgiveness for the education of their children. And then they list a number of areas of education.
Listen to those areas.
Tenderness, forgiveness, respect, fidelity,
disinterested service are the rule.
Now, it doesn't say where they learn mathematics
and spelling and social sciences
or the whatever, I'm blanking on other topics
you could learn.
It doesn't say any of those things.
It says creating a home where these things are the rule where tenderness forgiveness respect fidelity and disinterested disinterested service are the rule
Because why because we're not just creating a next generation of engineers
We're not just creating the next generation of
mathematicians or the next generation of nurses or the next generation of teachers or the next generation of
the next generation of nurses or the next generation of teachers or the next generation of fill in the blank.
We're trying to raise people, right?
We're trying to raise saints.
That is the goal of education is it's not just intellectual formation.
Although again, I am not dismissing that in any way, shape or form.
That's very important, but it is human formation.
It is human formation.
And I love this last aspect of the home.
It says, among other things,
that disinterested service is the rule.
And whenever I read that phrase, disinterested service,
a lot of our students are like, wait, what is that?
Just like, you know, mom is plating up some food
and she's like, here, I don't care if you eat it or not,
because she's disinterested.
No, that's not what disinterested service is.
Disinterested service is, I want you to have this.
I'm serving you in this way.
Not cause I'm getting something out of it,
but it, because it's for your good.
That's it. It's just freely given.
There's no strings attached.
That's what disinterested service is pointing to.
There's no strings attached.
It's not, okay, here's the deal.
I'm taking care of you now so that when I'm old,
you take care of me or something like that
If we get that idea the home is well suited for education and virtues why oh my gosh. Well
The home is well suited for education and virtues
Because the man the hardest people who are the hardest people to love the hardest people to love are the ones who are related to
And so they recognize that okay
apprenticeship and self-denial in sound sound judgment, self-mastery, all of those things,
the preconditions are to freedom.
And all of those things are in so many ways,
the hardest to live out when you're with your family.
Amen, can I get an amen in this one here?
Because how many times, I have this happen so often
with our students.
Our students, they come to the university
and they're growing and they're, you know,
they've had an encounter with the Lord Jesus.
They were growing in faith, hope and love.
They're becoming more generous.
They're becoming more patient.
They're becoming more forgiving.
All these things.
And that's the first half of the first semester until they go home for Thanksgiving.
And they realize within four days, they realize, oh, I have not grown as much as I thought
I had grown.
Like I thought I was so giving, so so kind so all these things and then they have to be patient kind
Generous all these things with their family members and they realize oh
Yes, I've just started to grow. I have not really I'm not abounding and growth because
Sometimes the hardest people to love are the ones were related to and so yes
The home is well suited for the education in the virtues.
But I love how it says this.
This requires, education in the virtues requires
an apprenticeship in self denial, sound judgment,
and self mastery.
And then it has this dash and says,
the preconditions of all true freedom.
The preconditions for all true freedom
are an apprenticeship in self denial,
sound judgment, and self mastery. Those are the preconditions for all true freedom are an apprenticeship in self-denial, sound judgment,
and self-mastery. Those are the preconditions for freedom. I think I love that. That's amazing.
Self-denial, sound judgment, self-mastery. So good. And so parents should teach their
kids all those things. They should teach them the goodness of subordinating the instinctual
desires for higher desires, right? For those things that are truly for a person's good
No
the last sentence before the scripture quotes in paragraph 22 23 is
I just want to highlight this for parents
It says this says by knowing how to acknowledge their own failings to their children
Parents will be better able to guide and correct them
By knowing how to acknowledge their own failings to their, parents will better be able to guide and correct them.
I remember talking with a mom
when I was just newly ordained.
And this mom was kind of lamenting the fact that she said,
I don't know, I'm so frustrated because I feel so badly
because I keep telling my kids to behave a certain way.
And then I behave the way I just told them not to behave.
Like she says, I keep telling my kids,
hey, don't yell at your sister, don't yell at your brother.
And then I'm yelling at them.
I tell them to be patient with your siblings and I'm not patient with them.
I tell them all these things.
And she was highlighting the fact that I'm not living the way I'm telling them
to live and she felt so defeated.
She felt like such a failure, like such a hypocrite.
And I was like, well, actually here's, here's the hidden blessing in this.
Imagine that you were the mom you wanted to be.
You were the super mom, you were the perfect mom.
Or if you're a dad, you're imagining the perfect dad.
And your kids, they see you not only doing
what you said you would do,
but also never really struggling.
And you have this faith and you believe in Jesus
and you belong to the church and you have this great faith.
And then they see that that perfect image
and as they grow up they realize that wait I'm not perfect though I'm not like mom was I'm not as
perfect as dad was and so I guess you know yeah I guess mom could go to church and yeah I guess dad
could pray but that's because they were perfect and they did this quality the temptation is they
could disqualify themselves
because I'm not perfect like mom was.
I'm not perfect like dad was.
I said there, you're giving your children a gift
of letting them actually see you.
And they're not only seeing you with your ideals
and your, what you're aspiring for,
but also they're seeing you fail.
But when they see you fail,
they also have to see where you go when you fail,
meaning to confession.
The same children that see you sin,
they should also see you go to confession after you've sinned.
Like you should explain it to them,
asking them for forgiveness and then saying,
now what I need to do is I need to go to confession
because I don't want to be that way.
I want to be a better mom.
I want to be a better dad.
And so please pray for me, please forgive me.
And I'm also going to ask the Lord to forgive me.
Hopefully in that, the witness that's given is
this is what it looks like to be a real human being,
not a perfect person, but a real human being
who's striving after holiness and isn't there yet.
So teach them, when they see you not living up
to what you're teaching them, let them also see,
keep teaching them, right? Let them also see what you do when you not living up to what you're teaching them, let them also see.
Keep teaching them, right?
Let them also see what you do when you fail.
Go to confession.
That's, I love this.
By knowing how to acknowledge their own failings to their children, parents will better be
able to guide and correct them.
So important.
The last couple of things here, paragraph 2225.
To the grace of the sacrament of marriage, parents receive the responsibility and privilege
of evangelizing their children.
And so this is not something I find is so strange. So
many parents who are saying, you know, I'm gonna wait. I, you know, I was raised
Catholic. I want to give my children freedom. I want to give them the freedom
of being able to choose their own faith. And so I'm gonna withhold teaching the
faith to them. And I'd say, okay, that's fine. But there's a great thinker who
once said, if you don't know what you you believe the world will tell you what you believe
So there is no such thing as that blank slate that there are false gods everywhere
We're vying for your children's attention and they're telling your child how to look at the world
You're telling they're telling your child those voices are telling your child how to see others
Those voices are telling your child how to see the universe around them
The world around us is constantly shaping us.
And so if you refuse or abdicate that role
of also shaping the worldview of your child,
that is so deadly dangerous and such, as I said,
it's an abdication of the role of being a parent.
I mean, these guys, do you think about this?
What's the reason why you're Catholic?
The reason you're Catholic is for one reason only, because you believe it's true. So if I believe something these guys, do you think about this? What's the reason why you're Catholic? The reason you're Catholic is one reason only,
because you believe it's true.
So if I believe something was true,
would I allow my child to just do their own thing
and hope they find the truth?
Or would I say, actually, this is the truth
and I'm gonna help you see the reason why this is true?
Because we can't force faith on anybody,
but we can when you're a child,
it's apparent to a child, it can say, you are coming to mass with us,
you are going to religious ed, that kind of situation.
You are going to the school that we want you to go to,
there is such a thing as that,
because the parent knows better.
Again, I see this happen so often,
where parents will say, well, my kid doesn't wanna go
to mass, so I don't wanna force them,
they're gonna resent going to mass.
Okay, do you do the same thing when it comes to their diet?
Like if your child says, I want to just eat on Twink live on Twinkies for the
rest of my life, we'd say, Oh, you know, I don't want to force you.
And then you're going to hate vegetables later on in your life. Like, no,
because you know that Twinkies are not what you live off of.
And you know that a well-balanced meal is similarly.
Why in the world will we just throw our children to the wolves by saying,
I'm not going to impart the faith. I'm not going to make them go to mass. I mean, this is so
remarkable. I mean, paragraph 2226 says this, it says, the parish is the Eucharistic community
and the heart of the liturgical life of Christian families. It is a privileged place for the
catechesis of children and parents. You know, the reality, I remember, I did not like going to mass as a kid.
I mean, I hated it so much.
And yet my parents bringing me back to the Catholic Church again and again,
and saying, you know, this is just what we do.
Like, just like we all sit down to eat, we all go to mass.
This is what we do.
They gave me this gift that I did not realize.
I mean, multiple gifts, but one of, but here's two of the gifts.
One gift was this, that the idea of doing whatever it takes
to get to Sunday Mass, no matter what, is just there.
It's in my bones.
I mean, I think that even if I wasn't a priest,
this would be it.
Just, because why?
Because I was raised on this.
This is just normal.
You do whatever it takes to get to Sunday mass.
The second gift is the ability to walk into any Catholic church anywhere in the world and realize this is part of my patrimony. This is part of my inheritance that I belong here. This is the truth
for you too. I know a lot of people who, again, they were baptized Catholic, but not really raised
Catholic. They weren't brought to the parish on a regular basis.
So the parish became a place where like, no, I know this.
I like, I know that back room back there.
I know where things are here because you get to have this familiarity.
And you realize, I don't just know this place.
I belong here and any Catholic church, every Catholic church you walk into.
Yep.
You might not have the key to the back room anymore, but I belong here.
Like this is, this is mine.
I I'm part of this church.
And so I have rights here.
I also have responsibility to talk about that all the time,
but I have a right to be here.
And that's an incredible gift
that parents are able to give to their children.
It's a small one,
but I think it's a pretty significant one at the same time.
Now, I love 2227.
It says, children in turn contribute
to the growth of holiness for their parents,
which makes sense.
Each and everyone, parents, kids, siblings,
should be generous and tireless in forgiving one another
for offenses, quarrels, injustices, and neglect.
And it says, mutual affection suggests this,
and charity of Christ demands it.
And that is incredible.
It's just so beautiful.
The last couple of paragraphs are about choices.
So 2229, that parents have a right
to choose a school for their children,
which corresponds to their own convictions.
It says even this, it says, this right is fundamental.
That's remarkable.
2229, the right to choose a school
that aligns with their own convictions is fundamental.
And hopefully you can find a school that is in line with your, with your convictions.
Because again, this world is changing so quickly that, uh, you know, I went to a
public school for most of my life.
I went to Catholic elementary school, the public high school.
I guess most of my life is an exaggeration.
I went to Catholic Catholic elementary school, Catholic college, but my high
school years, you know, junior high and high school were
spent in the public school and I, it was great.
It was, it was wonderful.
I loved it.
That's changed a lot.
So we recognize that again, great teachers, great teachers in the
parochial schools, in the Catholic schools and in the public schools, great teachers.
But what's the ethos of those schools?
There are plenty of Catholic schools that aren't,
they're Catholic in name, but not necessarily Catholic
in what your students will get, your children will get.
There are plenty of public schools that,
with great teachers, again, but parents have to be careful
about where they're sending their kids to school.
I work on a campus at a public school, a state school,
the University of Minnesota in Duluth,
and it's so remarkable because, you know,
there's other Catholic colleges
our students could have chosen to go to,
but I think a lot of them said, you know,
I could go to a Catholic school
that's Catholic in name only,
and I wouldn't know that this,
it says Catholic on the side of the wall,
but inside the walls, it's not Catholic.
And it will almost be like the teachers in some ways, I'm not saying every teacher, please don't misunderstand me, but in some
ways the teachers can be like wolves in sheep's clothing. Like, Oh no, I thought I wait, I
was going to this theology class and I thought I was getting this, what the church teaches.
No, this is just what you teach. And it's not the faithful faithfulness to the church.
Now at the school I work at as a chaplain. Our students, they know when they arrive on campus,
they know that, nope, I'm walking into an arena
that is not necessarily friendly to the Catholic Church.
In fact, I'm walking into an arena
that sometimes there'll be even some hostility to the church.
I mean, by and large, there's not a ton of hostility,
but there are, again, are gonna be teachers
and our students aren't surprised when they find it
because they knew, they knew that going in
And so, you know, wherever you're going to go to school wherever you're going to choose school for your kids
The big thing is you have a right to choose a school for them which corresponds to your own convictions
And this is so important now. This is the last piece. This is quite a long episode
I understand this it says this it says when they become adults in paragraph 22 30 when they become adults
Children have the right and duty
to choose their profession and state in life.
They have a new relationship with their parents
and they can ask their parents
and receive advice from their parents.
But parents should be careful
not to exert pressure on their children,
either in the choice of a profession
or in that of a spouse.
That is very important.
We have this happen too often.
Where we have young men
in particular, but also we have young women on our campus
who are discerning religious life,
young men discerning seminary, and the people
who are standing in their way the most are their parents.
That had to happen so many times when here's a young woman
who wants to go into religious life,
but the person putting up a fight is her mom or dad.
The young man who's like, I think I'm supposed to call it, go to seminary next year, but the person putting up a fight is her mom or dad. A young man who's like, I think I'm supposed to call it go to seminary next year. But the person putting up the fight for them is their
mom or dad. And I just think, okay, you have a say in the sense you get to, you get to give counsel,
you get to give your thoughts. In fact, it says the necessary restraint of them not telling here's
what you're going to do does not prevent them, meaning doesn't prevent parents
from giving their children judicious advice,
particularly when they're planning to start a family,
planning to take a next step in their vocation.
You get to have an opinion, but parents,
you may not make the choice for them
or make the choice against them.
That's one of the things that we just recognize
is not under the purview of a parent
when their children become adults.
Well, there has been so much that we tried to cover today.
I'm so sorry. But what a gift.
I mean, we you know, when you have this many paragraphs,
when do you stop talking tomorrow?
We're going to keep talking about family in the kingdom,
as well as the authorities and civil society.
And we talked about roles of children to their parents,
roles of parents, their children.
We're also going to talk about the duties and roles of civil authorities and the duties and roles of citizens.
That's coming up tomorrow and the next day.
Until then, I have a little secret.
I'm praying for you.
Please pray for me.
My name is Father Mike.
I cannot wait to see you tomorrow.
God bless.