Early Years
Cultivating Virtue
If you like the content on this page, then you’ll love the video segment “Develop Virtue” from the Embrace Parenthood DVD Program! You can watch this video segment for one week and download relevant workbook pages for only $2.99. Are you ready for some “heart work”? That is what cultivating virtues is all about. Virtue…
Read MoreParenting in the Early Years: Serving Life
SERVING LIFE The next task of parents is to serve life – both the children who have been born and those that are to follow.* When you are parenting children between the ages of birth and three, the more immediate need will appear to be to those who are already here. You will serve life…
Read MoreParenting Style Matters
Parenting is complicated because every child is unique and each situation is different. This means that parents can seemingly lose their minds trying to decide the best way to help their child grow in love. Diane Baumrind, a research psychologist for the Institute of Human Develop at Berkeley, looked at the relationships between parental behavior…
Read MoreParenting in the Early Years: Form a Community of Persons
The first task of your family is to become a community of persons. With the birth of your child you have gone from a couple to a family. Even though this is a small community (and hopefully one that will grow) it is a unique and important one. There are three main objectives that parents…
Read MoreYour Guidance Has a Destination
Sometimes in amidst the humdrum tasks of parenting (feeding, clothing, sheltering, and disciplining our children), it can be difficult to keep in touch with the loftiness and dignity of the vocation of parenting. But all the guidance we give to our children has a destination, and it’s a destination of glory.
Read MoreBegin with the End in Mind
In the book, Seven Habits of Effective Families, written in 1998, Stephen Covey directs families to develop a mission statement that will guide them. He firmly believes that if you want to achieve a goal you have to begin with a statement of your purpose – a clear description of who you want to become.…
Read MoreCivility: Time for a Comeback
Click Here to Download the PDF A recent experience literally made me stop in my tracks in disbelief. While on my nightly walk, I noticed a group of grade school children arguing in a neighbor’s yard. Their voices boomed with anger as they stood face to face poised for physical combat. Unmistakably, a line had…
Read MoreWe ARE Capable of Self-Possession and Self-Control!
Click Here to Download the PDF PLEASE PRAY THAT Parents will lead their children to self-control and self-possession. Our culture will start to value a fully human life rather than animal self-indulgence. Families can become a place of loving correction, true repentance and true forgiveness. Catholics will return to the Sacrament of Confession and fully…
Read MoreConnect as a Family
In 2003, the Institute for American Families published a report called Hardwired to Connect. This study was filed by the Commission on Children at Risk – a team of 33 medical doctors, research scientists and mental health and youth services professionals. The group concluded that the rising rate of mental problems and emotional distress among…
Read MoreCelebrate the Liturgical Seasons
Parenting Basics –> What Works? –> Participate in the Life & Mission of the Church –> Celebrate the Liturgical Seasons The Bible tells us that there is an appointed time for everything (Eccl 3:1). The Catholic Church marks the special feasts and seasons of each calendar year in the liturgical calendar. Knowing the basics of…
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