Part 3 Chapter 6
"The Eucharistic Education of the Child"
I am accustomed to considering the challenges of parenting in our current age and culture. This chapter reminded me that I should spend at least as much time considering the myriad of ways that Our Lord continues to provide for the needs of his children. In those early years of the twentieth century, with the First World War on the horizon, Communism, the debauchery of the 20's, genocides, the years of deprivation during the thirties, and all the horrors of the culture of death looming; God drew humanity, especially young children, closer to His Eucharistic presence. He provided the strength they would need to hold true to the Faith in the midst of such darkness. Not every parent understood how such a young child could possible understand the great mystery of Jesus in the Eucharist. Wonderful priests and sisters cooperated with the will of God to offer the guidance they needed.
By the time I began raising children, there was a myriad of educational aids that helped me explain the Eucharist to my little ones. I have taken it for granted that a Catholic mother would say to her babe in arms, "Look, sweetie! Look at Jesus there!" (in Father's hands, in the monstrance, in the tabernacle) This chapter reminds me that I have taken this gift for granted. The ways in which my children benefited (and continue to benefit) from Eucharistic adoration, beautiful educational books and videos about the Eucharist, Eucharistic Congresses and processions in our diocese and parish will only be fully revealed at the end of time, but I have already glimpsed some of fruits.
The problem with taking something for granted is that I can easily forget that there are still parents who do not believe in the Real Presence of Jesus in the Eucharist and they are not able to offer their children the beauty of Truth on the central mystery of our Faith. Are my blessings in this area provisions?
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Additional resources:
"The King of the Golden City", study edition, is wonderfully rich and layered so that people of differing ages are able to benefit from reading it and reflecting on it.
"Little Catechism on the Eucharist" by New Hope Publications
Father Antoine, with the Brothers of St. John, has a wonderful program for leading children in Eucharistic Adoration.
When my older children were young, we were a part of an Armata Bianca group in our parish.
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