My family watched Passion of the Christ the other night. I have to admit I did not make it through the movie, I cannot bear to watch it and my children’s eyes were wide as can be through the whole thing. I don’t know if showing them that movie was the right thing to do. Although it portrays the human path of Christ, I think the true lesson gets lost. It’s difficult to get adults to understand the spiritual and symbolic representation of Christ’s crucifixion and even more so for children. Or maybe it’s not the child/adult division that makes it difficult, but the level of spiritual maturity. I believe children come into this world with a strong spiritual understand which we slowly squeeze out of them and then as adult work to re-acquire.
Where am I going with this ramble, I’m not sure. I guess what I want to discuss is what we are feeding our children spiritually. I grew up with a religious background which emphasized the loving aspect of God. I was not raised fearing God, nor Hell. I always knew my Father/Mother to be a loving God, a healer and a supporter. I am bothered somewhat by the teaching my children are receiving, they lack spiritual depth and my children are, I believe, missing the mark of Christ’s teachings. I have this overwhelming desire to attempt to explain what I believe to my children, but my fear is its too abstract for their young minds. My son was telling me about something he had heard in class at Church. I can’t remember exactly what it was about, but he was very confused because he had been given a story from the bible which to him didn’t make sense because he was looking at it purely from a human presepctive. I had to explain symbolism to how Christ spoke in parables at times. I tried to help him understand to look for the lesson and not focus so much on the seemingly concrete story line.
I really don’t know why, but this whole subject lays heavy on my heart. I want my children to grow SPIRTUALLY and not get stuck in that age old box of doing good deeds to earn a tick mark in the “good” column. Our God gave us so much when he put Jesus into human form, but Jesus was so much more than a MAN. I pray that my children’s spiritual eyes and hearts be open to Christ and that I am given the wisdom and means to give them even a spark of the wholeness of Christ.
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