The most important thing we can teach our children is how to pray. Prayer will help our children know God's will in their lives, grow in their love for Him, grow in virtues, conquer sin and fight temptation. All prayer is is a lifting of the heart and mind to God. Heart and mind. The sentiments of the heart and mind may be expressed vocally (exteriorly) or mentally (interiorly).
The principal end of prayer is love and union with God and His holy will. If we call upon His name, but do not do His will, we will not enter into heaven. For Jesus says, "Not everyone who says to me, 'Lord, Lord!' will enter the Kingdom of Heaven but only the one who does the will of my Father in heaven." Prayer unites us in love and unites us in will with the Almighty and glorious Lord!
Each day, I become more and more convinced that the time to begin teaching our children how to pray is from day 1. In fact, it's MUCH easier to teach a child how to pray than an adult. The souls of little children are so pure and so open, loving and receptive. A pure soul is easily capable of seeing God in daily life. As adults, more likely than not we've been wounded along our journey, have allowed the filth of sin - even mortal sin - to fill our souls, and have been hurt. These things dimish the purity of our souls, make timid our openness and receptivity, and tarnish our loving. Praise be to Jesus Christ that through Him, we can regain all these things though.
Children are also simple; we tend to overcomplicate and overthink things. They can take things on faith a lot easier whereas we doubt God's goodness and ability to take care of us. For them, there's no question about it.
Truly, I am very convicted of my own lack of faith by the example of my children and it's a very good thing I am!
Aiming to inspire them to pray out of love for God
I have mentioned what the end of prayer is: Love of God and union with His will. We think with His thoughts, see with His eyes, love with His heart, and speak with His words until "it is no longer I who live but Christ who lives in me."
While we must all strive to get to that point of praying to the Lord precisely because we love Him and love spending time in His company, it should not be forgotten that prayer also derives from a sense of duty. Inconstancy in daily prayer is the manifestation of a sin against the virtue of justice, not just charity (love). God made us, He has given us everything, He holds us in existence, all of our gifts and talents and abilities are from Him. We owe it to God to pray to Him and speak with Him and thank Him and praise Him and ask Him for our needs and the needs of others. Imagine if you gave someone you love an incredible gift and in return they said and did.....nothing. Ok, maybe they said 5 rushed words... Or maybe they just ignored you or even pushed you away. Look at that from God's perspective. All He wants is your love in return. He delights in hearing you speak to Him; He rejoices when you give Him your sins.
So in having young children, we don't just leave it up to them to pray whenever they "feel like it" because by their fallen human nature, they're not really inclined to start a life of prayer on their own, which is really quite arduous work! This fallen human nature must be restored and trained - by God's grace - with the help of the parents. It is the parents' duty to train and develop in their children the habits necessary for a life of prayer. To do this, one can't just let the child off the hook easily. Yet one also can't be rigid and severe about it either. Outside the child may seem to conform, yet inside one may be cultivating a hatred toward prayer and holy things.
Laxity and rigidity are the two extremes we may take in instilling a love of prayer in our children and we must find that balance in the middle using our intuition about our children, prayerful discernment with our children and honest reflection on our own selves and weaknesses. While one strives to teach and encourage them to do things freely, out of their own choice, for the love of God, it should also be understood that praying is a Christian duty. But ideally, the goal is to encourage them to pray out of a love for God.
I'm learning that there certainly is a delicate line that must be balanced between making them pray and cultivating in them to desire to pray out of love for God.
10 ways to encourage prayer
With this all in mind, here are some gentle and tender ways to encourage a youngster to pray, either with you or on their own.
1. Gently rub their back for a few seconds or give them a touch on the shoulder.
It's a gentle reminder and works wonders. Sometimes they just need redirected/reminded in the midst of your family prayer without the verbal nagging. So why not a loving touch of affection? Sometimes too, even when they are praying with this or singing,, this gesture can be used as an affirmation of the good they're doing for the Lord. This is always done in a tender, motherly way not a nagging, "I see you're not praying" way.
2. Hold out your arms and gently bring them onto your lap.
It's important that children are taught how to be still when in times of prayer. Again though, it's that balance of being mindful of where he/she is at developmentally and tempermentally, but also being aware of the need to gently begin forming in the child more of the virtue of self-discipline and a disposition of stillness and silence for prayer. Bringing the child onto your lap gives them the physical affection all children need, reminds them of the need to be still, and more often than not, leads himthem to praying and singing with you. On top of that, they're cuddled into a blanket of mommy or daddy! Generally, from experience, we feel that toddlers are free to roam around as we pray, but hitting around 3 years is when we begin gently forming them.
3. Loving reminders that play into their desire of independence and "being like a big boy/girl."
Example: "Remember Joseph, you can go into the prayer room whenever you want to talk to Jesus and spend some time with Him. Feel free to grab your own prayer book or sacred art print or Rosary...you can use whatever is in the prayer room." This makes a young one feel very proud as it seems to be passing the invitation on to him/her to do something "more adult."
4. Timing is everything...
In cultivating habits of prayer, timing is everything. When it comes to drawing out a child's own personal prayer life, the timing of it is so helpful. Choosing a time of day that will incline them to spend a few mintues of their own time in prayer helps foster their own individual prayer life. For example, we have a daily "rest time" where the youngest three nap and Joseph usually does a restful/quiet activity in his own special spot. I let him out of rest time and invite him to come into the prayer room with me; sometimes we'll pray together, sometimes just on our own. But he's always receptive to it. Then I'll leave and let him know he's more than welcome to stay in here to pray as long as he needs to (I use the "big boy" approach). It definitely helps with the timing of when I do this. But this is great in developing the habit of prayer because eventually our desires and habits will align with our repeated actions in time. Look at your daily routine and see when the child would be most inclined to do this. Also, it might be different for each child. And remember, some times may seem an inconvenience, but it's worth taking a double take at considering it because remember, inspiring in our children a love for prayer is the greatest gift we can give them and most important for their souls if we desire them to be in heaven one day.
5. Sing.
Simple enough! Memorize a hymn together by singing it every day. Children love to sing and St. Augustine said when we sing, we pray twice!
6. Give them a picture of sacred art to look at.
There's so many beautiful holy pictures you can find on the internet and simply just print out. Build up a little post-card sized collection. It helps keep their minds focused on the Lord.
7. Make a family tradition
Kids have fond memories of their family traditions. So why not make a lovely family tradition of prayer of some type that's something out of the ordinary and special? At our home, we do a weekly family prayer night on Fridays and the boys always look forward to it. Right now, we only do it with the oldest two for practical reasons and to give them a little more "spiritual food." So after Teresa and Ronan go down for bed, they get dressed (in "vestments") and ready. We do this after their bedtime, so they love being able to stay up later (again, timing is everything and doing this once a week isn't hurting their health). After it, we always enjoy a dessert together in the kitchen. It's been a beautiful grace for our family. Little family traditions will associate positive affections and sentiments of warmth and love with the practice of prayer in young children, which is a good thing.
8. Challenge them to be a saint.
I'll just use an example because it's easier to illustrate this point: "Now John-Paul, I know St. John Paul is so pleased with the roses you bought Mary at the store because he loves Mary soooo much! St. John Paul did things just like that!" (Then he does that hidden smile thing that kids do to make it seem like they're not smiling and so happy about that)
9. After they pray, remind them from time to time how pleased and happy Jesus and Mary are when they pray to them.
In the lives we live, we're always trying to please someone - even if it's ourselves (God save us from this!). But in reality, there's no one better to please and to serve than the Lord!
"You know, because Jesus loves you so much, it makes His heart so happy when you talk to Him. You should try to pray and think of Jesus as much as you can!"
10. Be a model of prayer to them.
I wrote a post about this a couple weeks ago. Sometimes, rather than correcting and training them in how to pray, it's more fitting to just not worry about that and keep your eyes closed in prayer or fixed on a crucifix while kneeling. Let them see your attentiveness to the words you pray out loud; let them see you on your knees in reverence and humility; let them see you bow your head at the name of Jesus; let them see your hands folded in devotion; let them see you lost in a gaze upon the Cross. Let. them. see.
Things to consider as we go about this
With all these different ways of encouraging our little children in the way of prayer, it'd be important to remember a couple things:
1. These are not "one-size-fits-all." They are different ways for different moments and situations. There may be some ways that seem to effect one child more than another. In the end, we need to use our parental intuition with the ways we prompt our children to pray. You know your child better than anybody else...except God! So make sure you consult Him if you hit a road block in cultivating this desire to pray in little ones.
2. Overall, the ways we draw our children out of themselves to prayer must be tender and gentle and in accord with their unique little selves. Don't get me wrong, there is a time where you just need to give a good spank or raise your voice (I'm thinking super-silly, nothing-you-do-snaps-them-out-of-this-and-when-you-raise-your-voice-they-find-it-even-funnier). BUT, encouraging our children to pray and praying with them must be overwhelmingly dominated by affection, patience, tenderness, warmth and love. Harsh reactions, coldness, severity and rigidity will do nothing but harden their hearts on the inside, even if on the outside they seem to comply. What's more important than the exterior comformity is the interior desire and love we must cultivate, by God's grace and inspirations, in our children.
It really helps to think of our Lady in this respect. Think of how She taught the child Jesus His Jewish prayers and the Scriptures of the Old Testament. It's not hard to imagine how tender Her motherly love was toward Jesus and how lovingly She guided Him. I could imagine the giving of affectionate kisses on His forehead, of her gentle touch upon His hands as She showed Him the gestures. I could imagine how She wrapped Her arms around Him in a warm embrace as He sat on Her lap reading the Psalms together. So beautiful! What an overwhelming presence of love and warmth He must have felt!
This is the way, I am convinced, of leading our children in the spiritual life. And we must look to our Blessed Mother as a model for us all.
Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners now and at the hour of our death. Amen.