Parents Are Peacemakers (5 of 7)

Thank you for your wonderful response to these posts on Parents Are Peacemakers! Many of you have sent me emails with your thoughts and it is delightful to hear the plans you have for sharing this booklet with others. I am working on getting hard copies with some extra material together for a minimum cost and hope to have this ready by summer. Otherwise, you can simply print off the pages as I make them available here at the end of each post.

So we started with talking about making peace at home and then we launched into the important needs of those in our homes. The first need was leadership, followed by healing. Today we explore the third need, feeding. Again, so much common-sense advice here! I love how she describes how healthy meals makes “more Maryness in Mary and Tomness in Tom.” But this is my favorite:

But deep in the heart of every person of every age is the need of strength, protection and support which only God can supply. Many grown up people are living their lives with this hunger stifled and forgotten, but children are nearer to reality. Give them the words of eternal life, the words of Christ. Bring them up into the knowledge and love of God, do not leave them down below in the weakness of their human nature. Help them to win the peace of loving trust in a Heavenly Father.

Teaching from peace,

Nancy

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THE THIRD NEED: FEEDING.

Synopsis:

(1) Food in War Time. Spoiling at meals.

Discussion: happy and unhappy meals.

(2) Another kind of hunger: minds need food:—

(a) something exciting,

(b) something funny,

Discuss (c) something to admire.

(d) something to hope for,

(e) something to love,

(f) something to believe in and to worship.

Discuss: (e) care of pets, family affection.

(3) All persons have hungry minds.

Feed starving Europe. Feed hungry families—minds and bodies.

(4) One last hunger (f).

War time makes people food-minded. The wireless announces the latest rulings about eggs—cheese—bacon. The papers are full of advice to cooks. Hundreds of sailors risk their lives daily bringing foodstuffs to England. Slowly the nation learns how to best use every scrap of bread, meat and vegetable, learns how not to waste, learns to be grateful for every good meal.

Everyone needs good meals well cooked, eaten in a happy, quiet, orderly way. It is a joy to the cook when her work is appreciated, every bit finished up. Cooking is an act of love. What a wonderful thing it is that a good, well-cooked meal makes more Maryness in Mary and Tomness in Tom. Their Mother loves Tom and Mary, loves to see them satisfied, enlivened. While she cooks she thinks of them? Yes, but it is easy to spoil them too. What about that boy of thirteen who (in wartime) will never touch any meat except a roast? That girl of nine who refuses all green vegetables? That youth of seventeen who could not be persuaded to touch a milk pudding? What is to be done to get the children to eat all sorts without question? to finish up? to make a clean plate? not to gobble, not to dawdle?

Discussion on happy and unhappy meals.

Happy meals are peacemaking times. The whole family is together sharing, and things shared and enjoyed together are the things which make peace between us all. Quarrelsome meals cause indigestion, unhappy meals cause quarrels and so it goes on.

It is a fine feeling to be well fed on plenty of good food but other things beside food bring life, well-being and refreshment. A man may forget his hunger hearing a thrilling piece of news.[sic] or a very funny joke. A lovely song, sung by a good voice will make a whole hungry family stop eating to listen. If the door opened and Dick walked in, home from the front, who could eat?

Hunger makes everyone feel a very real need for food, but there are two kinds of hunger and there is never peace among nations or in families unless both kinds are fed—both the hungry body and the hungry mind.

In order that every person shall have food for his hungry mind there is a second “Ministry of Food.” It is not a Ministry of Education, but a couple of parents, a Father and a Mother. It is urgent that parents should understand that everyone, children and grown-ups, have a mind-hunger needing mind-food. How often do we feel discontented, out of sorts, dull, and we say we need a change. Really it is the other kind of hunger that we feel. We need something to fill our thoughts in order to satisfy our hungry minds.

Listen to six hungry people:—

(a) “Oh, I wish something would happen—something new, a change, a letter, a present. Nothing ever does happen here.”

(b) “I would come right at once if only there were anything to laugh at, something funny—a story—a joke—no one ever laughs in this house.”

(c) “He’s grand. We do not often see him but it always does you good when he comes. It’s not just his kindness, you know, he’s all right through and through. It’s a comfort to have him near by.”

(d) “That will be something to look forward to. When did you say? Sunday week? That’s not far off, yes, I’ll come, thank you very much.”

(e) “Mummy, can’t I have a kitten? Jane has one, and Mary has a rabbit, and you have Baby and I haven’t anything.”

(f) “Oh dear, what does it all mean? Where will it all end? There must be someone who understands and cares, who can be trusted. There must be truth somewhere and lovingkindness and power. Where can I find the thing I need so deeply?”

Anyone in any family could say those things, not all six at any one time perhaps but from time to time. Everyone hungers for excitement and change, for fun, for something to admire, to hope for, to love, everyone longs for the words of Life and the knowledge of God. We are hungry for these things and must have our meals or starve. Fathers and Mothers are both cooks for this kind of meal, they work together.

(a) For instance they put their heads together to plan a family treat, a surprise.

(b) Then there are family jokes (not at the expense of each other) but perhaps something funny happens as Father is coming home from work. He tells the story at tea time and Jane makes it funnier by telling it all backwards next day and we all have a good laugh about it for weeks. It’s a family joke, they last a lifetime and keep a family together in a wonderful way for years.

If excitement and fun give food for thought, still more do the things we admire, that we hope for and we love; these bring meal after meal of joy and wisdom to fill our minds and to enliven us.

(c) Things to admire. How can these be provided? Pretty things? Stories of great people and heroic acts? Bible stories? Pictures and flowers? The wireless songs and music? Books?

Discussion.

(d) Things to hope for. Parents say “When you grow up,” “Next birthday,” “When you are Tom’s age,” in answer to “Daddy, why can’t I do that? When can I?” and the child’s thoughts live in hope, in the future. How easy it is to make promises. In order to stop endless questions a promise is given, forgetting what hopes are roused and how keen is a child’s memory. Promises must be kept; every promise broken is a cracked trust and a shattered hope. Who knows how deep the injury may go? There must be disappointments and a child must learn to face them, but if he cannot trust to his parents’ word, he loses both hope and security.

(e) Things to love. The things for which people care deeply, which fill their thoughts, for which they make plans, to which they give patient service—those are the things which they love. All through life we are learning how to love and children, too, must learn. They give deep affection to those around them but, like their elders, children need someone to love with responsibility. Sometimes there is a younger brother or younger sister to care for. Sometimes the most wonderful gift that can come their way is a pet of their very own to look after. A kitten or a puppy cannot be treated as a toy. Its owner must feed it regularly, keep it clean, consider its well-being, protect it, be responsible for its actions and health, train it into good household manners. When the novelty of ownership wears off, comes the first lesson to be learned in all loving, how to be constant and faithful, to go on taking trouble in spite of lazy feelings and new interests. Children can and do learn this lesson with help from their parents and attain peace of heart in caring for their pets.

Discussion on care of pets, family affection, etc.

Every member of a family is a person with the infinite possibilities, the dignity, and the rights and duties of a person. The very youngest person and the very oldest live, not by meals alone, but by their admirations, their hopes, their loves, by the thoughts of truth and beauty and justice which fill their minds. It is sad to hear of starvation in Europe. It is sad too to read in the lives of men and women that many of them were starved in childhood by loving parents in well-to-do homes. Will there be peace in a starved Europe? Will there be peace in a starved home? No, quarrels and irritation and misunderstanding will destroy peace if hungry mouths and hungry minds are left unfed. In our lifetime much has been done to make people more comfortable, still more is being planned. People do not seem to be much the wiser for it (more loving, more thoughtful or more true). In remembering to care for their bodies, do we forget to feed their minds? If so, let each family be the one place where there is no starvation of body or mind.
One last hunger. People are seeking Social Security with which to face the uncertainties of the future. But deep in the heart of every person of every age is the need of strength, protection and support which only God can supply. Many grown up people are living their lives with this hunger stifled and forgotten, but children are nearer to reality. Give them the words of eternal life, the words of Christ. Bring them up into the knowledge and love of God, do not leave them down below in the weakness of their human nature. Help them to win the peace of loving trust in a Heavenly Father.

Parents Are Peacemakers (1 of 7)

Parents Are Peacemakers (2 of 7)

Parents Are Peacemakers (3 of 7)

Parents Are Peacemakers (4 of 7)

Parents are Peacemakers (5 of 7)

Typed by the Charlotte Mason Poetry transcription team.