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World at Prayer blog
Reflections of Family and Faith
"The family that prays together stays together." - Venerable Patrick Peyton
Catholic Family Fun | Parenting | summer activities
It’s the first week of June! That means school is out (or will be soon), or, if you are a homeschooling family, the at-home schoolwork is done. Now is the time for the long, slow days of summer. Hopefully, that conjures up images of camping in the backyard, bike rides around the neighborhood, catching fireflies, and lots of running barefoot. But besides all these fun activities, summertime also offers us a chance to experience and grow in faith in unique ways. At the end of each religious-education year, I send out a few ideas to the families in my parish of how to continue to grow in faith during this season. I’m sharing four ideas below, and I hope you’ll find them helpful.
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Catholic Family Fun | Daily Family Prayer | Family Vacation | praying the Rosary
I love taking trips and exploring new places, but I don’t always love the aftermath: the dirty laundry, settling back into “normal” life after fun adventures on the road, and facing the usual chores of cooking and cleaning once again. Yet what’s even worse is the state of my prayer life. When I prepare for a trip, I pore over maps and itineraries, restaurant choices and activities for hours on end. However, I often assume that prayer will “just happen.” Unfortunately, more times than I can count, this assumption has not held true. Despite my best intentions, my prayer life completely falls aside. In a way, this makes sense: when we take trips -- whether for business or pleasure -- our typical daily routine is lost. If our prayer life is tightly attached to our usual schedule, then losing our routine can easily mean losing our prayer.
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Catholic Family Fun | Immaculate Conception | Lectio Divina
Father Willy Raymond, C.S.C., explains how Jesus took on our human nature, coming to us through the immaculately conceived Blessed Virgin Mary to show us the way to a loving friendship with God. In the first three chapters of the Book of Genesis, we hear about the creation of the world and all things in it. The creation story is not a documentary that yields accurate historical or scientific data. It is a spiritual lesson in story form, telling us as much about God as it does about creation. *Please note that there are two stories of creation.
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Advent | Advent calendar | Catholic Family Fun | family life
As we approach the joyous season of Advent, it’s a time for us to prepare our hearts and homes for the coming of Christ. Advent is a season of anticipation, hope, and joy, with many ways we can immerse ourselves in the true reason for the season. This year, Catholic Mom and Family Rosary are excited to introduce several engaging activities to help you and your family make the most of this sacred time, including the SnapAdvent Instagram Photo Challenge, our new interactive Advent Calendar (with three ways to use it), an Advent Playlist on Spotify, and a collection of inspiring eBooks.
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Catholic Family Fun | family prayer | pray the rosary
Getting kids to sit down and recite a whole Rosary is not always met with cheers and delight, as much as I wish that were the case. If I am telling the truth, I am sometimes met with groans and eye rolls alike. But when you lay out a donut Rosary, suddenly your kids are rallying to lead more prayers than their siblings. There’s nothing complex about the Donut Rosary. The cross can be a construction paper cutout, or you can make a cross with donut holes. The Our Father and Glory Be prayers should be regular-sized donuts — whoever leads the longer prayers and Scripture verse for the Mystery gets a “big donut.” The Hail Marys should be donut holes — make a decade one flavor or mix them up. After you say your prayer or prayers, you get to eat the donut(s). You will be amazed at the complaints about how unfair it was that Sister 1 got to lead more prayers than Sister 2 —haha!
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Catholic Family Fun | family life | family prayer
Now that the long, slower days of summer are finally here, they bring with them the invitation to slow down a little. Hopefully, the lengthy twilights and break from school brings a sense of less urgency and more playtime to your home. Of course, the flip side of no school and more flexibility can also mean that the house seems to perpetually be half a step away from descending into complete chaos. When my kids were growing up, summer meant sleeping in and a lot of time for bedtime stories. On the other hand, it was also the season when one or another of my boys would get mad and inform us he was going to run away and we’d be sorry! So summer brings both sides of the coin. (By the way, they only ran away to the stop sign a block away. I would wander over a while later with some snacks in case they had run out of food. They usually had. One time, their dad dropped off a pillow, so they “would sleep better.” They all eventually decided home wasn’t so bad after all.) That is the great thing about summer: there’s even time for some mini-adventures.
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