Train Up A Child – What Lesson is Taught in Our Schools?

Train up a child in the way he should go and he will not swerve from it (Proverbs 22:6).

The question is…

Who will train up a child? Who will train up my child? Who will train up your child?

Okay. I have to admit, right now, I’m kind of disgruntled. One might even call me upset or, Heaven forbid, might I even be angry?

Yep, I am!

I am a single Catholic mom trying to raise my five amazing, wonderful, sweet, athletic, intelligent, funny, handsome…did I say amazing? Well, you get the idea. I am trying to raise up my five terrific boys with Catholic values.

I adore these precious children entrusted to me. For as long or as short as God chooses for me to be with them, I will love and adore and do my best to raise them right, to teach them to love their neighbor, and to love God most of all.

But I am fighting an uphill battle.

Every time we turn on the television, sex screams out in the form of Victoria Secret or Viagra commercials. We cannot drive into any major city without being bombarded with billboards exhorting loose morals in the form of alcohol and “gentlemen’s” clubs (gentlemen??? – oh please, don’t fool yourself!).

I don’t want to see that garbage, and I certainly don’t want my children to see it, but I’ve learned to deal with it. Presented in such a way, we can discuss it, pray about it, and deal with it.

We have to. Society has robbed us of our freedom of choice to not deal with it.

And at least when presented like this, it’s out in the open. Where we can see the enemy at work, we can defeat the enemy more easily.

What is more sinister is the evil we don’t see, the evil many of us can’t fight because we aren’t even aware it exists; Satan is a subtle and patient enemy.

And sadly, he is at work where our children spend great amounts of time.

Evil in Our Schools

Having taught in both public and private Catholic schools, I know there are things in our school systems that would shock parents. We have allowed our most precious gifts, our children, to be handed over for the majority of each day to virtual (and in too many cases, literal) strangers!

As a teacher and someone with several wonderful friends who are wonderful teachers, I am not criticizing all teachers by any means.

I am criticizing our blind acceptance of what goes on without our really knowing and our laissez-faire parenting that prevents us from standing up for what is right.

As a teacher, I simply wish more parents would asks:  Who is allowed to train up a child? and What lessons are being taught?

I am not condemning, but wondering.

Are there so many parents out there, feeling like I am?

Exhausted, overwhelmed, surviving – but barely?

So many parents, like me, who leave their children to do schoolwork alone?

Oh, we may see our children working at the kitchen table

we may even glance over now and then

But how many of us actually read the work that comes home, never mind the work that stays in school? And how much interest do even the most well-meaning of parents put in to our high schooler’s assignments?

Luckily Larry Basaj did take an interest in his daughter’s 9th grade biology homework, and what he found upset him.

Students were asked to use DNA results to find out who the father of a woman’s baby was. The choices were

• bartender
• guy at the club
• cab driver
• flight attendant

The question ended with students being asked to explain why the state was going to take her baby away.

The question and answer choices are wrong on SO many levels. 

1. The woman obviously slept around.
2. She slept with people she didn’t even know the name of (guy at the club??? Really!)
3. It implies she was combining sex and alcohol possibly to the point that she didn’t remember what happened.
4. The state would take her baby away – for which reason exactly?
5. How could this question be see as normal for high school students?

and most importantly…

6. Who Are We Allowing to Train Up A Child?

I applaud this dad for taking a stand and for his response, “We teach our children not to sleep around.”

What I don’t understand though is where are the others fighting this?

As a single mom, I’m not even sure where to fight or how to fight or if I have the energy to fight some days.

But it is a battle that is too important NOT to fight!

We cannot give up asking who trains our children and what are they being trained to think.

Assignments like this one perpetuate the myth that single moms are sex-starved, out for a good time, drinking and sleeping with several guys. 

Like the woman in the biology problem.

And that makes me angry.

Assignments like this give our students the impression that children from single parent families have parents with loose morals, low standards, and cheap opinions of themselves and others.

Like the woman AND the men who slept with her.

And that makes me angry.

Assignments like this one give our boys and young men the false idea that, “everybody’s doing it.”

Like the bar tender, the guy at the club, the cab driver, and the flight attendant.

And that makes me angry.

Jesus destroyed the temple when bad things took place. 

Should we destroy the schools?

Not physically, but we must wake up and stand for battle.

But we must battle with God’s shield of love and honor and grace.

And our greatest weapon must be prayer and the power of positive role models.

And we must never give up the privilege of training up our children

Because others are only too eager to step in when we fall behind.

The Lord gave those precious children, HIS children, to you to train up for such a short time.

Don’t take this training lightly.

I will stand. I will train up my children.

How will you train up yours?

How can we train up our children together?

I would love to hear your ideas!

God Bless…