The Rule of Family Faith: Practicing the Presence of God in Our Outward Lives Bonnie J. Miller-McLemore, Ph.D.

amily spirituality does not always look like “spirituality” as many people understand it. When we think of spirituality, we often picture inner peace and tranquility. But families are anything but tranquil. In fact, if you want to turn your life upside down, entertain a serious love relationship, consider marriage, or better yet, have a child. To obtain the serenity we often associate with Fspirituality, one would have to flee all this for the desert or monastery, as some early church fathers did. We also envision spirituality in terms of revelatory mountaintop experiences, the kind religious mystics claim. But again, such an occurrence seems more likely to happen on retreat from, not in the middle of, domestic life. In search of epiphany, people have often left home and family and embarked on a journey. Taking care of a home is actually one of the most ordinary of activities. In fact, preparing food, cleaning toilets, and folding laundry can be downright humdrum, drab, and dreary. It is the kind of work that is never finished and that endlessly recycles, rising up again almost as soon as one has finished the last load of wash or cleaned the most recent mess. Those who cannot pursue either monasticism or mystical visions often turn to the church and congregational worship as the heart of faith. But once again those with kids, especially families with young children, can sometimes find it difficult to get everyone out the door, into the car, and to church on Sunday morning without a minor family feud over who wears what or sits where, arriving frazzled and distraught from the effort. Once there, children’s noise and constant movement are often unwelcome. So families disperse to age-appropriate settings, such as a cry room, and then leave, wondering whether the faith of the family as a whole has been deepened or further fragmented. Neither child nor adult knows what the other encountered for

Bonnie J. Miller-McLemore, Ph.D. is the E. Rhodes and Leona B. Carpenter Professor of Pastoral Theology at Vanderbilt University Divinity School. Her latest books are In the Midst of Chaos—Caring for Children as Spiritual Practice (Jossey-Bass, 2007), Let the Children Come—Reimagining Childhood from a Christian Perspective (Jossey-Bass, 2003), and Children in American Religions (Rutgers, forthcoming 2007). One of seven recipients nationwide of a Henry Luce III Fellow in Theology in 1999-2000, she has also received grants from the Lilly Endowment, the Association of Theological Schools, and the Wabash Center on Teaching and Learning in Religion and Theology for the study of families, children, and religion; research on practical theology; and exploration of teaching and vocation.

This article draws on her book, In the Midst of Chaos: Care of Children as Spiritual Practice.

Summer 2007 Œ Lifelong Faith Œ 1 © LifelongFaith Associates the past hour or two. Nor does the Sunday school flyer or church bulletin usually make it out of the I want to help enrich the active van and into the home. practice of faith already percolating in families If we cannot flee family relationships, travel to the and congregations by exploring the peculiar mountains, or join together to character of the rule of famil y faith. worship in the right spirit on a regular basis, then we might at least consider a quiet half-hour set program to create in Puritans sanctioned the home as a aside daily for individual prayer congregations, or one more family “little church” but then elevated and Bible reading as the bedrock faith activity to work into an the father to the role of pastor, of faith. Yet again there is already overloaded schedule. nearer to God than others—with nothing like having children to Rather I want to help enrich the all the potentially harmful disrupt this. Such practices are active practice of faith already consequences of this equation.4 often further complicated by the percolating in families and None of these patterns is ideal. demands of paid employment. congregations by exploring the Almost all have biases against Given these powerful peculiar character of the rule of women and children and their full preconceptions of what it takes to family faith. participation. be a spiritual person and daunting Christianity has its own obstacles to church participation, Christianity’s ambivalent history on the family what becomes of faith in families? that goes right back to Jesus Are those people who are Ambivalence about himself. A curious passage immersed in what one Family Faith appears in the Gospel of Mark, psychologist calls the “parental right at the beginning of the emergency”—the heavy lifting of gospel, defining his ministry, in parenting that easily consumes at It might help to understand the which he rejects his own family least eighteen years of broader nature of the challenge (Mark 3:31–35).5 Jesus has just adulthood—just “on idle” with first. Few religious traditions have been baptized and tempted, he their faith, taking time off while escaped the tension between has eaten with tax collectors, others seek God on their behalf?1 spiritual practice and family life, refused to follow religious rules If not, just how does one although most have explored about Sabbath keeping, and understand the development of ingenious ways to deal with it gathered a group of men around faith amid the demands and chaos that do not, in the end, him for intimate fellowship. His of families? What about the adequately resolve it. Catholics, family is rightfully worried about children themselves? Is their way for example, have attempted to him. All they want to do is of faith included in these common mediate the hierarchy of celibate protect him. But they can barely views of spirituality as somber spirituality over spirituality of the get through the throngs of those reflection, mystic awakening, home by identifying the family as who will not leave him alone. corporate enactment, or personal a “domestic church,” a small-scale When they do, what does Jesus prayer? model of the Church itself, an idea say? “Who are my mother and So persuaded are we by these that goes back to the fourth my brothers?…Here are my definitions that we do not century and that has enjoyed mother and my brothers! recognize family spirituality when resurgence in the past two Whoever does the will of God is we see it. The problem, in other decades.2 Jews in eighteen- my brother and sister and words, is as much the common century Eastern Europe and other mother.” perception of spirituality as any periods separated spiritual It is not that Jesus does not failure to practice our faith. My practice along gender lines, with love his mother or cherish hope in this article is actually religious study reserved for men families; other Scripture passages quite simple, therefore: I want to and care of family the obligation suggest otherwise. He blessed explore ways to envision the rule of women. Hinduism regulates the wedding wine, welcomed children, of faith in families so church problem chronologically, dividing valued marriage, and rejected leaders and those in families can the life cycle into four periods divorce. But Jesus had a larger nurture and uphold it. In other with a special stage of vision in mind. He disclaims his words, I will not suggest one more “householding” for rearing own family to proclaim a new spiritual chore to do, one more children.3 Seventeenth-century family of believers defined not by

Summer 2007 Œ Lifelong Faith Œ 2 © LifelongFaith Associates birth but by commitment to The Rule of Religious century, Benedict of Nursia, doing God’s will. created an order that balanced Jesus himself was, of course, Life prayer and daily work, while single and without children, and Ignatius of Loyola founded the he asked those who followed him Early church theologians Jesuits in the sixteenth century as to leave their families. The apostle attempted to resolve this a religious society that combined Paul never married or had ambiguous legacy by setting up a contemplation with action children. He thought the coming two-tier spiritual path. Those who designed to change the world. of God’s kingdom advised against were “religious” left families to Today thousands still belong to changing the situation in which pursue a higher calling. This these orders, and their practices one found oneself. He and his calling involved living by a fresh are receiving renewed attention followers described the early “rule” or pattern of life carefully not only among Catholic laity but Christian community as the new crafted around disciplines of also by all those who seek richer “household of God” (Eph. 2:19), a charity, celibacy, poverty, shared ways to incorporate a religious portrait that subtly shifted the possessions, and steadfast “rule” of faith into daily living. locus of faith from the hearth of commitment that helped preserve The term rule does not refer to the biological family to house bounded religious communities. a set of directives, instructions, or churches and new extra-familial In some cases, the established step-by-step exercises. Its relationships. hierarchy of celibate religious life meaning is better captured by the It is no surprise, then, that as superior to the faith of the laity Latin word Regula, suggesting a the early church did precisely left the latter without spiritual pattern or model that guides a what Jesus predicted: set brother guidance.6 But this was not way of living. From this angle, against brother, father against always the case. Although some “every thoughtful person,” child, and daughter-in-law against leaders, such as fourth-century observes Thomas Moore in his mother-in-law (Matthew 10:21, monastic St. Jerome, viewed Preface to The Rule of Saint 35–36; Luke 12:52–53). It is also family life as a major impediment Benedict, “no matter what his or no wonder that letters written to to religious enlightenment, others, her lifestyle may be, has a rule.” the Ephesians and Colossians— such as Augustine of Hippo and Even though we may associate not by Paul himself, most Bible John Chrysostom, saw the family rule with ideas like regulation and scholars say, but by Paul’s as part of God’s good creation authority that go against disciples in his name—try to re- and, in Chrysostom’s case, freedom, living an examined life impose order on the family. These believed families were as actually has the potential to letters contain what early Greeks important as monastic liberate followers from being and Jews called household codes, or communities in putting key pushed and pulled around by codes that sanction the authority virtues into practice. Rich internal desires and outside forces. of the pater, the father and reciprocal relationships often A rule for religious life is “an husband, over his children and developed between religious instrument for shaping a wife (wives be subject to communities and families. Those particular kind of life for which a husbands, husbands love wives, in the former sought the good of person has deep and genuine children obey parents, and slaves the latter through prayerful desire.” Such a rule remains open be obedient to masters). Why this intercession and daily practice of to further interpretation and attempt to re-impose order? Jesus the rites of the church. Families reflection.8 and Paul and their disciples had were blessed when a child would The Rule of Benedict points disrupted ordinary family life. enter a religious order. Monastic to practices and patterns that They had turned the world upside communities served as sanctuaries sustain a way of life centered in down. They had made all free and for orphans and the poor and as the love of Christ. As such, for one in the love of Christ—Jew outlets for women who sought fifteen hundred years, the Rule and Gentile, male and female, education and relief from has shaped those under vows in slave and free—all children of domestic work. Benedictine communities; but it God (Gal. 3: 20). Families have always also has the capacity, according to benefited from the spiritual Anglican historian and mother knowledge of those in religious Esther de Waal, to aid those orders such as the Jesuits and the “struggling to follow our Benedictines, both of which baptismal promises in the encouraged integration of faith world.”9 De Waal is convinced into daily life.7 In the fifth- that the Rule’s monastic wisdom

Summer 2007 Œ Lifelong Faith Œ 3 © LifelongFaith Associates practice of speaking with and reflecting upon God amid the The Rule invites us to wake up and mundane tasks of life or listen for God through Scripture, our lives, the “practicing the presence of God” throughout the day regardless of wisdom of others, and the Rule itself. It values external circumstances. stability gained through perseverance and Extending the Rule of endurance, just the sort needed to sustain faith through the constraints of families. Religious Life to Family Faith can speak directly to “those who days. It regards each person as like myself are seeking God in the God’s created, deserving of All of this is helpful as far as it midst of a busy, often confusing respect, never to be used as an goes. But does it go far enough? and exhausting daily life.” Her instrument for our own Can rules written for monastic reflections on the Rule emerge, as gratification. It encourages us to communities account for the she confesses, not from any kind hold material possessions lightly unique demands of families, such of spiritual retreat or direct while also seeking God in our most as solving conflicts deeply participation in monastic ordinary surroundings and daily embedded in the biological legacy community but out of the lived labor. Paradoxically, the ordinary of family intimacy, caring for “experience of a wife and mother is sometimes the most close relatives in sickness and with many commitments.” Joan extraordinary. In all this and its health, or bearing and raising Chittister, a member of the other rich counsel, the Rule children? Does the rule of Benedictine Sisters, also seeks to ultimately hopes to point beyond religious life need further “distill” the wisdom of the Rule itself to the rule or way of Christ. development to correspond to but does so after thirty years of In the last several years, spirituality in families? living by it. The Rule is written many lay people have also turned Various aids to prayer, such “by a layman for laymen,” she to the rule of seventeenth-century as Brother Lawrence’s practicing argues. It offers “sensible, Carmelite Brother Lawrence. the presence, are helpful. But they humane, whole, and accessible” Three centuries ago, he attracted still require an interior focus of guidance for the “overworked, attention because of the spiritual mind, will, and heart that one can overstimulated, and over- centeredness he embodied despite rarely find time for in family life. scheduled;” that is, for the his menial surroundings. As a They call for a kind of stepping average person who does not seek lay brother, his primary outside of one’s routine, or for to escape their world but live responsibility among the bringing something that is outside more thoughtfully, caringly, and Carmelites, was serving others. one’s routine—God, spirituality, fully within it.10 Yet despite monotonous labor— tranquility—into it. One The Rule invites us to wake cooking, washing dishes, cleaning participates in these disciplines up and listen for God through hallways, and repairing shoes—he “despite” or “regardless” of the Scripture, our lives, the wisdom of reached a point where work was chaos. They still assume one others, and the Rule itself. It no different from prayer. “In the meets God in a quiet inner space. values stability gained through noise and clatter of my kitchen,” Despite popular publications perseverance and endurance, just he says, “I possess God as affirming everyday spirituality the sort needed to sustain faith tranquilly as if I were upon my and longstanding movements in through the constraints of knees before the Blessed Christian history encouraging families. It anchors all Sacrament.”11 This was his “best integration of faith into daily life, relationships in a humility that rule” of “holy life.” “My most Christian perception of faith as sees God as God (and not us) and usual method is this simple something that happens outside refrains from seeking to control attention, an affectionate regard ordinary time and within formal others or push oneself and for God to whom I find myself religious institutions, or within children ahead. The Rule often attached with greater the private confines of one’s establishes a balanced rhythm of sweetness and delight than that of individual soul, still pervades daily prayer, study, and work, all an infant at the mother's Western society. Bias against in a kind of moderation that breast.”12 This is how Brother “outward” forms of spirituality, counters the drive to overload our Lawrence describes his steady as enacted by the body in the

Summer 2007 Œ Lifelong Faith Œ 4 © LifelongFaith Associates midst of family and community, to the world.”15 Do those most human and essential to creativity, still persists.13 Limiting proximate to children have they can sometimes contribute to spirituality to the “inner” life and anything comparable to offer? faith. Work, activity, and restricting theology to the life of What can we learn about faith in service within the home and in the mind ends up marginalizing families that provides its own relationship to children can bring many Christians, and excludes a “privileged” perspective on us as close to God as sublime huge portion of life from both spirituality? contemplation. God loves and faith and theology. The closer one transforms us in the midst of is to the outward life of the Practicing God’s messy details and troubles. The family, it seems, the farther from family can function as a workshop God. Presence in Our or laboratory for honing practices Monasticism rests on a wholly Outward Lives of faith that nurture forgiveness, distinct pattern for Christian generosity, hospitality, and faith—whom and how to love, justice. how to work, where to live, how What might be included in a fresh These kinds of maxims to care for the body, how to spend rule for families? A kind of shaping the rule of family faith one’s money. This pattern wisdom can arise in families and are not meant to eliminate includes celibacy, silence, solitude, parenting, as is evident in qualities often associated with the a dispassionate extension of love memoirs of mothers, empirical rule of religious life, such as to all, transcendence of sexual studies by social scientists, and silence, solitude, rest, humility, desire and the body, voluntary theological reflections of parents. and non-anxious peace. These are poverty, and pilgrimage beyond Some of this wisdom, documented all needed dimensions of a full the bond and boundary of home.14 and elaborated in my books, can faith. Nor do I want to sanction Has anyone ever outlined so be stated in pithy maxims: busyness as somehow sacred: clearly and carefully a rule for Utterly physical acts of birth and there is nothing spiritual about family faith that has comparable care can be powerful spiritual over-extension and burnout. We weight, integrity, and catalysts. Walking “according to should be cautious when we find cohesiveness? the pace of children” can deepen ourselves boasting about our many activities or those of our children. I simply want to widen the A gap exists between the monastic circle of faith for the sake of rule or pattern and daily life for most of us: children and parents. Millions of parents face the question of how marriage, children, and passionate attachment to to live a life of faith when silence specific people; immersion in bodily, sexual and solitude, rest and tranquility, contemplation and centeredness activity; commitment to on e location; ownership are rare. Widening the circle of of material possessions; and the daily grind of faith means balancing profound silence and fruitful words, potent making a living and maintaining a home. solitude and invigorating company. More important, widening the circle of faith means A gap exists between the faith.16 Children form adults as redeeming chaos and redefining monastic rule or pattern and daily much as the reverse, and they spiritual peace to include life for most of us: marriage, have much to teach adults about disruption, interruption, and children, and passionate the life of faith. Words rather disturbance as equally essential to attachment to specific people; than silence, especially in the lives a Christ-like life.17 Grace is active immersion in bodily, sexual of young children, have the not only when we are passive and activity; commitment to one potential to open up worlds, build quiescent or tranquil and mindful location; ownership of material a home, breathe life into our lives, but also when we are deeply possessions; and the daily grind of and invoke the Word “with God” involved in the activities of making a living and maintaining a (John 1:1). Anxiety and chaos are childhood and parenthood home. The monastery, Chittister not in themselves antithetical to themselves. People respond argues, offers a “privileged the Christian life, but when powerfully to Brother Lawrence perspective from which to speak understood as part of being precisely because he seems to

Summer 2007 Œ Lifelong Faith Œ 5 © LifelongFaith Associates suggest that our outward actions with divine approval as with the zoos. And we played turkey bowl. themselves might become prayer. costliest gold and jewels.”18 When Even though I don’t like football, done in faith, raising children I’d show up in sweats and mittens Sample Practices of pleases God. every November, rain or shine, to So, several years ago when I divide into lopsided teams. Faith in Families saw God in the most unlikely of All this playing filled many places—in changing my sons’ good purposes. We never dwelled Practicing the presence of God in cloth diapers—I was in good on them or even spelled them out. families involves recognizing company. Somehow the mundane But we knew deeply and practices that invoke, evoke, and routine of rinsing, washing, thoroughly, without having to form faith in our outward family drying, folding, and piling up a define them, the lessons of fun, lives. We already participate in fresh stack of clean diapers vigor, joy, happiness, defeat, such practices in the varied became a source of graced solace recovery, conflict, arbitration, contexts where children and through which Christ entered my reconciliation, camaraderie, adults live together: cleaning, life. I still like folding clothes. sensual energy, touch, tackle, and playing, working, eating, talking, There are others who know what I roll. learning, fighting, making up, am talking about. When Kathleen Especially for families with arriving, departing, and otherwise Norris published an essay about boys, as in my case, playing in making a home. laundry in the New York Times today’s society is frequently Magazine—specifically, about the driven by technology (with video Doing Laundry as Spiritual “joys of hanging clothes on the games a primary illustration) and line to dry”—she received at least organized activities (with travel Practice a hundred letters in response.19 sports the epitome). How does one My own Protestant background Although Norris doesn’t reclaim play as a potentially rich shapes my desire to reclaim a rule explicitly connect her attempt to faith-formative practice? Has of family faith. The Protestant reclaim the mystery of the play moved so far out of the orbit tradition has long seen the “quotidian”—the daily, the of spirituality—not only in our ordinary as significant. Protestant ordinary, the commonplace—with technological, economically Reformer Martin Luther her own Protestant heritage, I stratified world but also over the challenged the sequestering of speculate that there is a close link. long history of Christianity’s Christian vocation to a select few, It takes discipline to notice the subtle disdain for embodied fun— capable of practicing celibacy and distinctive grace of Christ in the that making this connection is living in cloistered community, ordinary. Many Protestants have ludicrous? and reclaimed mundane life as a fallen out of the habit. We have To answer, we must first potential site for sacred activity. developed a kind of amnesia consider a larger question about To put his own sixteenth-century about the call in our own how to regard popular culture and principles of religious reformation tradition to sanctify the its relationship with family faith. 20 into action, he renounced his vow ordinary. This call is worthy of Do these two stand in adversarial of celibacy and wed Katherine retrieval. relationship with technology or von Bora, a former nun. sports or marketing, tainting and Together—and she was a Playing as Spiritual Practice threatening faith? If not, just how wonderful, straightforward, hard- does one withstand the powerful Few Thanksgivings go by when I influence of wider society? Society working partner who knew how to do not think fleetingly that I am hold her own—they raised a large does not always support our late for the “turkey bowl” and efforts to raise faithful children. and boisterous family that then realize, a bit deflated, that included six of their own children This may come as a surprise most our family does not play turkey particularly to mainstream and four orphans. His comments bowl any more. Like the stimulus- on faith and family are among the Protestants like myself who have response of Pavlov’s dog, when otherwise escaped religious and most remarkable of any classic my family got together with close Western theologian. Christians social marginalization and friends, we played. We—adults presume cultural affirmation. should look on the “insignificant, and children together—played distasteful, and despised duties” The solution is not to get rid Hearts and Oh Hell, we played of TV, spurn competitive sports, of household work and child Wiffle ball in the side yard, we care—rocking the baby, washing and otherwise reject the ways took trips to major league culture defines play, however. its diapers, changing its bed, baseball games, theme parks, and staying up at night—as “adorned Instead we are challenged to

Summer 2007 Œ Lifelong Faith Œ 6 © LifelongFaith Associates transform play from within, in the Such criteria may or may not out of the sun and the rest of the same way that theologian H. rule out certain video games. world. In hushed voice, we Richard Niebuhr talked about They simply give us a solid rule browsed. We sat on the floor, “Christ transforming culture.”21 on which to stand as we measure leafed through books, picked this We must discern its negative the play that dominates our lives. one, put back that one, and then impact so we can resist and They give us guidelines by which read a few together before final transform it “even as we make we can revitalize forms of play decisions on what to check out appropriate use” of it, as Richard that sustain relationship, connect and load into the wagon for the Gaillardetz says about us to the environment, and foster trip home. technology.22 This means talking genuine joy. Adulthood by The books felt like gifts, much more self-consciously with each definition involves growing up, more precious than if we had gone other and in our families about out, and weary of play. Adults to the store to buy them. I even how play subtly forms us and outgrow some of the best kinds of liked explaining to our kids how a shapes our view of the world. It play, in much the same way that public library works—a also means recognizing criteria by our capacity for wonder fades. community agreeing to pool which to distinguish faith-filled Living with children keeps play resources and share the wealth so play from less faithful play. alive, and we adults are fortunate all, the haves and have-nots, can Faith-filled play involves when kids invite us to run in this benefit. This only works as long as pleasure of a holistic sort. Mind, direction. borrowers abide by the covenant body, spirit—all are engaged together. Play has rich inter- personal and intergenerational potential, connecting us to others, …family can function as a workshop and is wonderful when done together in a communal or or laboratory for honing practices of faith that cooperative context. But play also nurture forgiveness, generosity, hospitality, and involves activity done by oneself. One must be able to play well justice. alone in order to play well with others. Play sparks and fuels imagination and creativity. It Reading as Spiritual of care for the books, returning suspends and transforms reality Practice them as they received them. So but does not supersede it. It people “hand on” what they creates legitimate spheres of Reading aloud together is one of “received,” much like Paul irresponsibility and liminal space the most satisfying and mutually passing on the tradition of where failure and risk can occur transformative experiences adults the breaking of the bread without dire consequence, and and children can share. Like play, (I Corinthians 11:23) or people transformation can happen. It reading can subvert and handing on stories they have involves an attitude of delight and transform the world. Kids also known and loved from one enjoyment—an embodiment of know and remind us how to read generation to the next. joy—as much as any specific slowly, meditatively, savoring the We discovered a lot of books activity. In fact, any playful act words, asking us to read the same on these treks, some wonderful can become work if the pleasure book over and over again. authors never heard of before, and dissipates. Everyone should have Pilgrimage to our favorite others that evoked deep-seated equal access to play, regardless of local library was an integral part memories from our own talent, wealth, or the right outfit. of our larger practice of family childhood. I cannot easily Genuine play does not harm those reading when my children were describe our criteria for selection. playing or others around them. younger. We traversed the Our choices had something to do Through its unique power to walking distance between home with sensual, aesthetic appeal: create, re-create, and resurrect, and library with an incredible size, color, quality of picture, faith-filled play embodies tricycle that had a little wagon word spacing, feel of the book in essential facets of God’s behind the seat where we put the our hands. But it also had to do relationship to the world and of fifteen or twenty picture books we with other elusive, faith-related our relationships with God and were returning. The library had goals. We looked for and stumbled each other. the feel of sanctuary: a cool, quiet, across books that not only gave welcome respite on our way in and pleasure. We sought books that

Summer 2007 Œ Lifelong Faith Œ 7 © LifelongFaith Associates would embody values and ideals came down to a complicated gate, from the center of one’s in which we believed, “a moral compromise between a variety of most primal, passionate, intimate vision,” as Herbert Anderson says commitments. love of our children—we are about Dr. Seuss, “without Doing justice in families often called to realign our passions and moralism.”23 We read to move involves negotiation and help our children do likewise. “into the shoes of another, and compromise—something that Finally and not least thus ultimately to learn seems to go against the grain of important, how families model compassion” in Anne Thurston’s genuine prophetic justice. “How justice internal to the home words.24 We also looked for books to be peacemakers both at home powerfully shapes children’s that raised tough religious and and in the larger world is quite a understanding of justice in the philosophical questions about challenge.” So James and wider world. When the “first and loss, death, human meanness and Kathleen McGinnis, Catholic formative example of adult evil, ambiguity and daily parents and peace activists well interaction” is “one of domination struggles so familiar to all of us known for more than two decades and manipulation or of unequal who, like Judith Viorst’s of work on “parenting for peace altruism and one-sided self- Alexander, know what it is like to and justice,” admit on the first sacrifice,” rather than “one of have a “terrible, horrible, no page of the tenth-anniversary- justice and reciprocity,” children good, very bad day.” In all these edition of their widely read book are considerably hindered in ways, reading is a rich practice in Parenting for Peace and Justice. learning justice. “It is within the an active life of faith. They have refused to see family,” political scientist Susan parenting and doing justice as Moller Okin argues, “that we first Doing Justice as Spiritual divorced from one another. But come to have that sense of Practice they have struggled. “For almost ourselves and our relations with twenty years,” they say, “we have others that is at the root of moral This is perhaps the most wrestled with the challenge of development.”28 The family must challenging rule of faith in integrating our family life and be just, she asserts, if we are to families and the most overlooked social ministry… We have have a just society. practice in books on family faith. wanted…to be able to act for Lots of popular literature feeds off justice without sacrificing our Conclusion specific religious traditions while children and to build family overlooking the mandate that community without isolating often stands at their heart: family ourselves from the world.”25 The Out the great hubbub of daily life, love must not stop at the effort to raise children faithfully it helps to look at a few sample doorstep. Genuine Christian pushed both of them to a whole practices like cleaning, playing, family values are not simply new level of what it means to do reading, and doing justice as full about commitment or fidelity. justice. of rich spiritual potential. I name They compel love of one’s Fortunately, love of one’s own these practices as illustrative, not neighbor. children need not exclude love of exemplary. The last thing those Families are actually crucibles other children, and under the best caught in the demands of families for learning ethics and for of circumstances the love evoked need is one more exercise to practicing justice internal to the by one’s own children helps us implement, one more ideal to live family and in relationship to the “see each person as someone else’s up to, one more task to execute. wider public good. When our child, someone else’s pain and No one can excel in all the family moved ten years ago, we joy,” as it did for one mother. It practices of faith. Instead one had to decide where to live. We left her less able to bear some of cultivates favorites, those toward soon discovered that choosing a the “misery we inflict on each which one naturally gravitates, house was not just a decision other.”26 by which to live and raise about location, size, and school Parents are also a bridge or a children. I simply hope to extend district. Instead, it plunged us hinge standing between children an invitation to people to consider into much bigger questions. and the wider world, helping areas in their own family lives Deciding where to live, which children move from love of self to where they already find itself is a privilege not extended love of others in the wider themselves pursuing the love of justly to all, marks one’s community.27 Precisely at the God. fundamental convictions and point where one’s heart might forces one to put one’s values into turn away, might curve in on action. Our decision ultimately itself—on the doorstep, at the

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Endnotes 13. See also de Waal, Living with (St. Louis: Chalice, 2005); 1 David Gutman, Reclaimed Powers: Contradiction: An Introduction to Elizabeth Ann Dreyer, Earth Toward a New Psychology of Men Benedictine Spirituality Crammed with Heaven: A and Women in Later Life (New (Harrisburg, PA: Morehouse, 1989). Spirituality of Everyday (Mahwah, 10 York: Basic Books, 1987), p. 190 Joan Chittister, OSB, Wisdom NJ: Paulist Press, 1994); and and Janet Martine Soskice, “Love Distilled from the Daily: Living the Delores R. Leckey, The Ordinary and Attention” in Philosophy, Rule of St. Benedict Today (San Way: A Family Spirituality (New Religion and the Spiritual Life, Francisco: HarperSanFrancisco, York: Crossroad, 1982). 18 Michael McGhee, ed. (Cambridge: 1990), pp. 3-4. Martin Luther, “The Estate of 11 Cambridge University Press, 1992), Brother Lawrence of the Marriage,” in Luther’s Works, p. 62. Resurrection, The Practice of the Walther I. Brandt, ed., and Helmut 2 See Florence Caffrey Bourg, Where Presence of God, a critical edition by T. Lehmann, gen. ed. (Philadelphia: Two or Three are Gathered: Christian Conrad De Meester, Salvatore Muhlenberg Press, 1962), pp. 39–41. 19 Families as Domestic Church (Notre Scriurba, trans. (Washington, DC: Kathleen Norris, The Quotidian Dame: University of Notre Dame, ICS, Institutes of Carmelite Studies, Mysteries: Laundry, Liturgy, and 2004). See also Vigen Guroian, “The 1994). The quote is cited by "Women’s Work" (Mahwah, NJ: Ecclesial Family: John Chrysostom Marjorie J. Thompson (Family: The Paulist Press, 1998), p. 15. 20 on Parenthood and Children,” in Forming Center, Nashville, TN: See Douglas F. Ottati’s chapter, Marcia J. Bunge, ed., The Children Upper Room Books, 1996), pp. 81– “The Sanctification of the in Christian Thought (Grand 82 comes from an earlier 1985 Ordinary” in Reforming Rapids, MI: Wm. B. Eerdmans, edition, p. 93. Protestantism: Christian 12 2001). Lawrence, The Practice of the Commitment in Today’s World 3 Ernest Boyer, A Way in the World: Presence of God, The Second Letter. (Louisville, KY: Westminster John 13 Family Life as Spiritual Discipline See Owen C. Thomas, “Interiority Knox, 1995). 21 (San Francisco: Harper and Christian Spirituality,” Journal H. Richard Niebuhr’s Christ and SanFrancisco, 1984), pp. 32-33. of Religion, Jan. 2000, 80(1): 41–60. Culture (New York: HarperCollins, 14 4 See John Demos, A Little Wendy M. Wright, “Living the 1951). 22 Commonwealth: Family Life in Already But Not Yet: The Spiritual Richard R. Gaillardetz, Plymouth Colony (Oxford: Oxford Life of the American Catholic Transforming Our Days: University Press, 1970). Family,” Warren Lecture Series in Spirituality, Community and Liturgy 5 The story also appears in the other Catholic Studies, no. 25, University in a Technological Culture (New Synoptic Gospels (Matthew 13:55; of Tulsa, Mar. 21, 1993, pp. 2-3. York: Crossroad, 2000), p. 138. 23 Luke 8:19–21). See also Wendy M. Wright, Sacred Herbert Anderson, “Sense and 6 See Carol Harrison, “The Silent Dwelling: A Spirituality of Family Nonsense in the Wisdom of Dr. Majority: the Family in Patristic Life (Leavenworth, KS: Forest of Seuss,” New Theology Review (Aug. Thought,” in Stephen C. Barton, Peace Publishing, 1994) and 2001): 45. 24 ed., The Family in Theological Seasons of a Family’s Life: Anne Thurston, Because of Her Perspective (Edinburgh: T&T Clark, Cultivating Contemplative Spirit at Testimony: The Word in Female 1996), pp. 87–105. Home (San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, Experience (New York: Crossroad, 7 See Ignatius of Loyola, The 2003. 1995), p. 47. 15 25 Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius, Chittister, OSB, Wisdom Distilled Kathleen and James McGinnis, Louis J. Puhl, S. J., trans. from the Daily, p. 9. Parenting for Peace and Justice 16 (Chicago: Loyola University Press, See Miller-McLemore, Also a (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books, 1981, 1951); Timothy Fry, ed., The Rule Mother, pp. 152-153 and Herbert 1995), pp. 1–2. 26 of Saint Benedict in English Anderson and Susan B. W. Camille S. Williams, “Sparrows and (Collegeville, MN: Liturgical Press, Johnson, Regarding Children: A Lilies,” First Things, Aug.–Sept. 1982); Marilyn Schauble and New Respect for Childhood and 1993, p. 12. 27 Barbara Wojciak, eds., A Reader’s Families (Louisville: Westminster See Rodney Clapp, Families at the Version of the Rule of Saint Benedict John Knox, 1994), p. 27. The Crossroads: Beyond Traditional and in Inclusive Language (Erie, PA: phrase comes from Genesis 33: 14. Modern Options (Downers Grove, 17 Benet Press, 1989). For other treatments of faith Ill.: Intervarsity, 1993) and Cheryl 8 Thomas Moore, Preface, The Rule of within the ordinary practices of J. Sanders, Ministry at the Margins: Saint Benedict, ed. Timothy Fry family life, see Bradley J. Wigger, The Prophetic Mission of Women, (New York: Vintage Books, 1998), The Power of God at Home: Youth, and the Poor (Downers pp. xvi-xvii. Nurturing Our Children in Love and Grove, IL: Intervarsity, 1997). 28 9 Esther de Waal, Seeking God: The Grace (San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, Susan Moller Okin, Justice, Gender, Way of St. Benedict (Collegeville, 2003); Tom Montgomery-Fate, and the Family (New York: Basic MN: Liturgical Press, 1984), pp. 12- Steady and Trembling: Art, Faith, Books, 1989), pp. 14, 22. and Family in an Uncertain World

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