A reflection on ‘normal’ parenting

For the first 30+ years of my life it was firmly embedded in my brain that something bad would happen to a child if they swam directly after eating. It was an immutable law. The daily rhythm of our family holidays was fixed by this established fact. It was only when I first heard those same words come out of my mouth to my own children, I wondered for the first time, “Really???”. 

I wonder what other ‘norms’ my parents could have gotten away with if they’d tried? 

What’s ‘normal’ is massively different all over the world. In Africa, male friends walk down the street holding hands. In Japan slurping your ramen loudly honours the chef, rather than spoiling the mood. Even different families from the same place have massively different ideas about what’s normal. Just ask a married person about their in-laws.

The power of normal

These ‘normals’ are powerful too. Try asking an Australian family to sauna naked together, Finland-style! Enjoy the horrified expressions.

Whether conscious or unconsciously held, what we think of as normal decisively shapes our behaviours. They could be arbitrary, blatantly false or even completely unique on planet earth, and yet we get uncomfortable functioning too far away from them.

This gives us both great power and great responsibility as parents with children. How do we make more of our norms a blessing in our families? Especially when so many of ours feel ingrained; reproducing the habits of our families of origin or the habits we’ve used to cope with the difficulties of life?

New norms

Jesus’ death, resurrection and sending of the Spirit means that our past does not determine our future. No matter what our past normal has been, He enables us to start afresh and set new norms, one by one.

Not only are we freed to choose, but the Spirit points us in the right direction, producing His fruit in us: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. He leads us to seek first God’s kingdom, so that He might add all other things to us in His generosity.

So what new normals might a family want to set?

In some families, pocket money for kids is normal. I’ve heard of some families where children reserve ⅓ of their pocket money to give to those in need. It sets in motion the repeated practice of love as just “what we do” with income. To increase their agency they could even get to choose which need the money goes to. You could even determine that children have to save ⅓ as well! Just to throw delayed gratification/self-control in there as well! Both of these simultaneously teach stewardship/faithfulness, and honouring Jesus with the money that he entrusts to us.

For another example, it could become normal that children respond to their parents at the first time of asking. A small consequence can ensue if they do not, thus training the child that there is benefit to meeting this expectation. No angst or fighting required. Of course, people are often engrossed in the activity they’re doing and external voices may not register. Grace/recognition of circumstances is required! Nevertheless, respectful responsiveness can be the expectation. It can become… normal.

These things might seem weird. They might not even be something you’d ever want to do in your household. But they are doable. They, or other practices of godliness, could become your family’s normal. Whatever we do repeatedly becomes inscribed on our children as “this is just how life works.”

For the Proverb is proverbially true:

"Start children off on the way they should go, and even when they are old they will not turn from it." (Proverbs 22:6)

Let's be intentional about what those ways are.

Taste of Freedom - Olympic ceremony part 3

Sexual limitless-ness was a flavour liberally poured over the banquet of the Olympic opening ceremony. The message: we will be happy and united when everyone is free to fulfill their every desire. 

It seemed no dish at the banquet was spared this special sauce. Characters representing the embrace of all manner of sexual expression were throughout. The promise is that if the stifling limitations imposed by religion can be removed, life will taste all the sweeter.

Limits on liberty, however, are oppressive. Just because you don't like a salted caramel on your ice cream, why would you keep someone who does from slathering it on theirs?

Photo by Kobby Mendez on Unsplash

A hundred years ago, however, an athlete at another Olympic Games in Paris was willing to give up dessert altogether. It must have looked crazy to the outsider, but at the 1924 Olympic Games a Scottish athlete ended up having his cake and eating it too.

Paris 1924 & Paris 2024

Having qualified for his first Olympic games in Paris 1924, Eric Liddel athlete chose not to run in his event. He was a 100m specialist, and was the favourite to win gold. Why on earth would he choose not to run? Not because of the opening ceremony, but because the heats for the 400m were scheduled on a Sunday. And Liddel was convinced that it would be dishonouring his God to participate.

Can you imagine a modern athlete even considering this as an option? Even the most ardent Christian? Firstly, it seems like such an arbitrary limitation. What could possibly be wrong with running in a heat on a Sunday? It wouldn't have hurt anyone if he had! 

For Liddel, however, it was simple. He loved running. But he loved God more.

And so he missed his event. The favourite for the gold medal chose not to run. And he was happy about it. It almost seems like the ultimate example of why limiting yourself for God's sake is foolish! And yet, as Tim Costello writes in the guardian:

The plot had a remarkable twist. Eric stayed true to his perceived duty and pulled out of the heats. But then at the last moment his Olympic team entered him in the 400m, not his event nor one for which he had trained. He claimed gold in a world record time of 47.6 seconds. He had fulfilled the duty he felt to a higher calling, willing to sacrifice his specialist event with all his training, but remarkably managed to win anyway.

With God, it can be true that less, is more. Trusting God and exercising restraint, can taste even sweeter than putting on every flavour of syrup you can think of.

Is this what the opening ceremony was about?

This week Christians have wondered and argued about whether their God was mocked. What really happened at the opening ceremony of the Paris Olympics?

What happened?

Having read the interviews, 'apologies', answers and the pre-ceremony advertising, it seems clear that the organisers 100% intended a reference to the Last Supper painting as a religious symbol. (*Edit: the Olympics producers have now confirmed this.)

Artistic Director Thomas Jolly has said that he's really sorry if Christians are offended. In that communication, he emphasised that inclusion was the scene's inspiration and message, not the Last Supper. But he did not deny that he was referencing it.

But... was it mockery? 

Jolly says that mockery was not his intention. And I'm inclined to believe him on this too. Here's my best guess at what was going on.

If not mockery... then what?

France has a long history of secularism. It stretches back to the violent French Revolution against the ancien regime which climaxed in 1789. The ideals of liberty, equality and fraternity replaced older values as the country was dechristianised. In short, the narrative has inclusion as something that France moved on to after Jesus.

If this is the right cultural reference point, Jolly's intentions are a bit easier to see. The message was inclusion, and Da Vinci's Last Supper the old scene that needed correcting. It depicts Jesus sitting with 12 white (presumably straight) men. The company Jesus kept: cis-males wielding religious power. 

Into this scene Jolly interposed characters from all colours of the LGBTQIA+ rainbow. Finally, the table is open now that we've moved on from Jesus.

The problem is, the narrative is simply untrue.

The company Jesus kept

See, if this is what Jolly wanted to communicate, it simply says that he has no idea who Jesus is or what he was like. Criticisms of Jesus' social habits universally agreed that he was too open in his fraternisation, not too closed. You get the feeling that Jesus would have frequented pubs and clubs that Christians and politicians would fear to tread.

'... they say [of me], "Here is a glutton and a drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and sinners." But wisdom is proved right by her deeds.'

In fact, I'm willing to bet that the kind of people Jesus associated with would have made Thomas Jolly hesitant to pull up a seat. See Jesus dined with both prostitutes AND tax collectors. Not only sexual sinners, but financial and political traitors too. Inclusive, even when that was dangerously politically incorrect. Not only when it puts you on the 'right side of history'.

And while Jesus was willing to have a glass of Dom Pérignon with the powerful religious figures of his day, they mostly left his company wanting his head on a platter. He was no friend of the oppressive power structures of his day.

Thomas Jolly seems glad that we've moved on from Jesus so that we can be more inclusive. Yet he's doing so while standing on the shoulders of Jesus who told the parable of the prodigal son, the good Samaritan, etc. Where does Jolly think that the Western world got its views of the value and dignity of all human beings? Because it's certainly not from gods of Greek mythology in purple body paint...

Keeping your grace

The Gottman Institute is a ... well I don't really know what they are. But I do know that they send me emails with insights on and provocative questions about how my marriage is going. And that's pretty cool. It's kind of like what I should be like with my friends but only rarely take the time out to do.

Tonight as I was reading one of their little emails, I was asked, "What's your conflict style? When arguing with your partner, do you have a signature move?" After running through various jokes in my head involving 90s fighting cartoons, I asked Mel what my signature move was.

We worked out that I'm at my worst when I perceive that Mel isn't at her best. So when I feel like she's not engaging in the ways that I'd find most helpful, my frustration can peak into criticism and anger.

As the conversation went on I heard myself saying, "In those moments, I find it hard to keep my cool." But as I heard the words instinctively knew that that wasn't quite what I was trying to say. It's not that I fly off the handle. It's something that's actually worse in a way. Something more fundamentally important. And then it clicked. I don't so much fail to keep my cool. I fail to keep my grace.

'Keeping my grace' is about whatever is coming towards me, I'm compassionately caring for the other person. It's about remembering that my goal in every interaction is to love them. My objective is not to defend myself. It's not to be proved right. It's to love (in my actions) the other person. When I lose this perspective, this approach, all my default learned behaviours kick in. That's when I bring out my signature moves. The most effective fighting strategies I've got, well-honed from years of battles in my family of origin.

So. Just wondering. How are you going at keeping your grace?

I've worked out a few things I need to do to be able to keep my grace. But we can talk about that in another crumb.

This is what Easter means

The following piece began life as an article written by Melissa and myself for a newsletter for an aged care facility. The occasion was Easter 2021.

Lockdown, masks, sanitiser and nasal swabs. This last year has reminded us how inescapably physical we are. That patch of dry skin, cracked from the constant hand washing. Masks that fog up your glasses. The hugs we want but can’t have.

We're powerless to escape our physical bodies and their limitations. And so the protocols rule our lives.

I wonder how the first Easter would have played out had it happened in 2021. Not long having walked out of Joseph of Arimathea’s tomb, Jesus appears to his followers and says to them, “Touch me!”. 

I hope he’s sanitised.

“Touch me and see,” Jesus insists. “A ghost does not have flesh and bones like you see I have.” There’s something about his resurrection that Jesus wants to make sure his followers understand. It’s not just his spirit that they see. It’s his body. The same one that they saw killed days earlier.

“Look at my hands and my feet. It’s me!” (Luke 24:39)

Jesus was not only recognisably himself, but his body was the same one he had before. It was him. Thomas had only to reach out and put his fingers in the holes in Jesus’ hands to confirm it. Not just a spirit, a body. And not just any body, his body.

This isn’t just a curiosity, however. This is the pattern of Spirit-enabled resurrection. 

Jesus’ resurrection life wasn’t an escape from physical existence. Resurrection by the Holy Spirit is the fulfilment of physical existence. You will not leave your body behind, escaping the trappings of everyday life. The resurrected in Christ will pass him the fish and ask him for the salt.

What then for those who can no longer taste? Whose legs no longer work? Whose eyes do not recognise their own children?

They are not looking forward to the simple easing of their pain. Passing from the body and its limitations. Escaping to a world without these things. This is not how it will be for those in Christ. They will glory in the balance of the spices. They will run. And they will recognise their loved ones when they see them.

This is what Easter means.

Happy Easter. 

Why can't we discuss values anymore?

[minor language warning: contains a quoted swear]

I'm starting to think that Australians find it hard to discuss values. The plebiscite debacle was a difficult and yet powerful example of what happens when we do. It gets ugly.

And I got to thinking, why? Some would point the finger at elements of toxic tribalism - which certainly plays its part - but what other factors are at play?

I wonder if a combination of scientific naturalism and post-modern cynicism is what's tipped things.

First, we fell in love with science. Fair play too, she's a total babe. And the technological devices she gave birth to are as alluring as she and even more accessible. Science-derived tech has successfully increased human power over over reality at an astounding rate. As the ever eloquent Richard Dawkins put it "it works, bitches". And so, when she speaks, we listen. She has become the arbiter of any truth claim. If you want to know if something is true or not - and a quick google won't suffice - you consult 'science'. It's a given.

Simultaneously, postmodernism's influence has pulled the authority out of any and all truth structures that sit outside of science. Stories, truths and interpretations of data - they're all power grabs that oppress those who come up against them. See the patriarchy and Victorian sexual mores as cases in point.

Which means that when we come to discuss issues that aren't questions of science but of morality, we struggle. Well, we struggle if we find that someone has a different value set to what we do. Or even the same value set but a different context that means we understand and implement them differently.

At this point, we have no recourse. Science does not help us (which doesn't stop us from claiming that its results support our side of the debate) and neither will the insights of philosophy or religion, tainted as they are by the power that their proponents are simply seeking to maintain.

Which leaves us in a difficult place in terms of public debate. We need to discuss our values and where we've got them from. But we don't seem to do that much. We don't go there. I've never heard someone discuss where the idea of the right to define yourself comes from, and why we should have it.

For some reason, we don't seem want to discuss the differences in values that underlie the differences of opinion. Those are off-limits.

Which leaves Pauline Hanson's famous catch phrase "I don't like it" being as coherent an argument as any.

A crumb for when someone is being unreasonable

I'm not the only one who would argue that the West is experiencing a loneliness epidemic. And plenty of people argue that tribalism is causing problems in our global community. Loneliness and tribalism, two of the biggest issues for our civil discourse.

But if we see these two things as linked, it might help make someone that we once thought unreasonable much more understandable.

Many try to find a tribe of people who think like us because we feel it's our best (last and only) hope for connection. And that makes the tribe a precious thing indeed. Which, in turn, makes staying in equally precious. Which makes risking disagreement over the very thing that keeps one included unthinkable. Literally impossible to consciously be aware of, perhaps.

The upshot of this is that much of the overly defensive, non-curious and emotionally charged responses to differing viewpoints are driven not just by tribalism, but by the loneliness that makes belonging to a tribe such a desperate need.

Disconnection (general loneliness) breeding more disconnection (with anyone outside the tribe), for the sake of maintaining what little connection we have (with those inside the tribe). Only, the quality of that connection is lessened for being dependent on total agreement. Unconditional it ain't.

Now there's nothing revolutionary in all this. But I think what it DOES do is to help make understandable the sheer vehemence with which many refuse to 'go against the family'. When from the outsider's perspective it beggars belief and logic to hold to that party line.

Because that family may be all they've got.

So be gracious to them.

Of course, this isn't the only reason people are unreasonable, but if we can demonstrate loving acceptance with individuals - even those who seem unreasonable to our minds - then perhaps connections can form across divides. And that may lead to some small number of people believing in their hearts that they can be loved despite disagreement.

And once being truly known and truly loved happens at the same time... well... anything can happen.