Be Not Afraid

Are you worried about our world? Our news media can bring us a daily dose of fear. I admire Mr. Rogers’ take on televised disasters. He reminds children, “Whenever bad things are happening, look around for the helpers, there are always people who are helping.”

Or is your worry closer to home: your family’s health or financial struggles? You aren’t alone.

Fear can be a good thing, a gift, when it motivates us to run from danger or inspires us to take necessary steps, like studying for a test, or saving towards retirement. Fear that immobilizes us can keep us from growth and love. Our worries and anxiety can damage our health as we create fear over things that are not important enough to waste our emotions on.

So, how do we fight our fears? Which do we face? Which do we ignore?

Let’s start first by building our trust in God now, while we aren’t facing a bear or waking up to a fire.

Our God is all-good, all-loving, and all-merciful, but our world is imperfect, and we will suffer. When we do, we need to remember what it felt like to be a child comforted on a lap in a rocking chair. Then we crawl into God’s arms to be cradled, know this too shall pass, and that we are treasured and loved beyond limits. Our trust in God, and His faithfulness, will get us through.

St. Francis de Sales said: “The same Everlasting Father who cares for you today will take care of you tomorrow and every day of your life. Either He will shield you from suffering, or He will give you unfailing strength to bear it. Be at peace then and put aside all anxious thoughts.” Once we believe this, we can say, “I can do all things through Him who strengthens me.” (Philippians 4:13)

Fears to Face

In The Gift of Fear, Gavin de Becker says we must face fears and act to avoid imminent danger or death. Follow your intuition or gut reaction – don’t ignore true fear! However, some fears immobilize us and keep us from growing. In fact, there are those who say we should be stretching out of our comfort zone in some way every day.

If we don’t work through our fears and face them, we stagnate in many areas:

• Physical – prolonged or frequent fear causes damage to our bodies.
• Social – if we are afraid to take risks we won’t reach out to others, build friendships, find love, or leave unhealthy relationships.
• Financial – Our careers suffer if we don’t ask for help and seek out mentors.
• Emotional – Fear keeps us from growth and prevents the joy of accomplishment and building self-confidence.
• Intellectual – Learning requires admitting incompetence, and it can be frightening to not be good at something… yet.
• Psychological – Fear grows, if we don’t face it, and can generalize into other areas or become true phobias.
• Spiritual – God wants us to connect with Him and His other children. Fear blocks connection and love. It shows a lack of trust in God.

If the danger is real, we need to determine that best way to react. Sometimes running away is a great choice. Usually though, facing our fear means we need to calm ourselves enough to think clearly. We need to assess our strengths and weaknesses, apply our strengths to the problem, and take whatever steps we need to overcome our weaknesses. Is the danger something we can lessen, or do we need help from someone else?

In Feel the Fear and Do it Anyway, Susan Jeffers tell us some truths to help us combat fears:

• Fear will always be present as long as we continue to grow.
• The only way to get rid of fear of doing something is to go out and do it.
• The only way to feel better about myself is to… go out and do it.
• I will experience fear when in unfamiliar territory, but so will everyone else.
• Pushing through fear is less frightening than living with underlying fear that comes from a feeling of helplessness.

Fears to Ignore

Not all fear is healthy. It can become debilitating and keep us from growing to our full potential. Most of our fears are really worries brought on by

• our own negative self-talk
• catastrophizing (I’ll just die if …)
• unwillingness to do what we should for ourselves (self-discipline)
• reluctance to ask for help when we need it (pride)

We can ask ourselves, is what we fear unlikely to occur, or not really worth the anxiety we are expending on it, even if it did occur? Does it really matter what an acquaintance thinks about what we do? Or whether a friend has more or is doing better than us at something? Or if we are occasionally embarrassed? Sometimes we turn our backs on fear by deciding the trouble is not important enough to worry about.

Worry will not bring solutions. It will more likely distract you from finding solutions. If a fear is legitimate, think it through and plan your actions accordingly. If it isn’t, let it go.

DeBecker would say, “In times of danger, follow your intuition”. Mr. Rogers would add, “There will be helpers.” And Susan Jeffers would conclude, “You can handle whatever comes.”

As a gift of meditation, follow this link to hear many artists joining in Be Not Afraid from their homes. https://www.praytellblog.com/index.php/2020/05/28/be-not-afraid/

Blessings on your week! Be not afraid!

Betty

Grandparents – Historians and Storytellers)

“About the time Grandma Mary’s father emigrated from Croatia, Grandad Connor said goodbye to his family in Ireland.”

Why does this catch your interest? Because it sounds like the beginning of an interesting story.

Our great-grandparents—fishermen and miners—were persecuted in the “old countries” of Croatia and Ireland. They sacrificed to come to the United States to make a better life for their families. Some of them were mere teenagers when they crossed the Atlantic in ships. In this country they or their children became machinists, teachers, secretaries, and engineers.

My mother and her father had blue eyes, like most of you grandchildren. Red hair appears here and there, as well as freckles and near sightedness.

We grandparents are the historians and storytellers for our grandchildren. We are their connection to the past. Our tales offer them little pieces of their identity and wrap them in belonging. They learn what it means to become “one of us.”

               

Be a storyteller!

Lorene Hanley Duquin writes in her book, The Catholic Grandparents Handbook, “When you share family stories, you help your grandchildren put their lives in historical perspective. Storytelling also hones listening skills and activates a child’s imagination. Whether the stories are happy, sad, funny, or too outlandish to be true, they form an invisible web that binds the family together.”  (p. 130)

• Tell your grandchildren about what you remember about them: when they were born, walked, first talked, visited your house, or when you visited them. Children enjoy being the main character in a story. They also love hearing about things their parents did when they were children. (Careful not to embarrass their parents too much.) I keep a document of funny things each grandchild said that their parents tell me about or post to Facebook. They love to read these when they are older.
• Talk about how your childhood was different than theirs. Can they imagine your life before computers? What were your favorite toys? What did you do with your friends? Did you have roller skates, a scooter, or a bike? What pets were part of your family? What chores did you do? How was life different then?
• Take them to visit where you grew up. Show your house, school, and church.
• Make a family tree, perhaps large enough to hang on a wall. This is a great visual for children to “know their place” in the best of ways.
• Make photo albums for each child or show them old pictures of their parents.
• Help older grandchildren write a Family Who’s Who or consider writing a family history that you give them when they graduate from high school.

“Grandparents are a family’s memory,” Pope Francis says. “They are the ones who gave us the faith.” (Address, Sept. 26, 2015)(p. 132)

Teach your traditions.

Our family makes sugar cookies for Valentine’s Day and Christmas. We eat povitica, a rolled walnut bread, for holidays. When the first snow of the year arrives, we make rice pudding. We choose Lenten resolutions by Ash Wednesday, play Pictionary on Thanksgiving, and put our shoes out for St. Nicholas Day. We have a tradition of dads taking their daughters on first dates when they are 12.

“Traditions bind family members together and instill a sense of belonging. Children learn important lessons from family traditions—about personal values, social behaviors, and communication skills.” (p. 124) They help a child feel secure within the family. Even if there are disagreements, they sense the love that unites them all.

Share holiday preparations with them. Teach them how to bake family favorites. Pass on your skills, whether knitting, sewing, wood carving, mechanics, playing a musical instrument, or building model cars. I still fondly remember an elderly neighbor patiently teaching me lace tatting when I was about ten. Grandpa taught me the names of tools so I could hand him the right one. Grandma was my go-to cooking resource.

Traditions can change over time. Don’t be too worried if things aren’t done quite the way they used to be. Flexibility allows the important facets of traditions to remain. As our children’s children grow, perhaps where the tradition takes place shifts from your home to theirs. Be open to new traditions as circumstances require. Maybe you have the family every other year for Christmas in order for them to celebrate with their spouses’ families. Maybe your Christmas is celebrated at Thanksgiving. The most important part of traditions is the relationships that you are building.

Pope Francis reminds us, “The true joy which we experience in the family is not superficial; it does not come from material objects, from the fact that everything seems to be going well…. True joy comes from a profound harmony between persons, something which we all feel in our hearts and which makes us experience the beauty of togetherness of mutual support along life’s journey. But the basis of this feeling of deep joy is the presence of God, the presence of God in the family and his love which is welcoming, merciful, and respectful towards all. (Homily, Oct 27, 2013) (p .128)

To conclude, a Grandparent Prayer:

“Lord, give me the wisdom to see the goodness in my family history, the patience to preserve our family memories, the understanding of how to pass this heritage on to my children, and the joy of knowing that your love binds all of this together. Amen.” (p. 134)

Blessings on your week! Only two left in Lent.

Betty

PS – As for my storytelling, I have it on good authority:

Grandparents Praying

Pray for your own grandparenting.

We want to model the best attributes for our grandchildren. In the New Testament, Paul suggests older people be temperate, worthy of respect, self-controlled, sound in faith, love, and endurance, reverent in the way they live, and teachers of what is good. (Titus 2:2-5) Not bad advice for any of us.

We can pray for physical strength to be good helpers, and spiritual strength to grow closer in our relationship with God. Ask for the Fruits of the Holy Spirit: charity, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, forbearance, gentleness, faith, modesty, self-control, and chastity, as well as the Gifts of the Spirit: wisdom, understanding, counsel, fortitude, knowledge, piety, and fear of the Lord.

I think Joy is one of the best fruits for making our faith be attractive to those little ones (or not so little) looking up to us as role models. And when we are caretakers and feeling not as young as we used to, Patience is at the top of my list of requests.

Pray for your grandchildren.

• There are so many ways to pray for our loved ones. We talked earlier about going beyond asking God to keep them safe. We can and should ask God to guide them to grow closer to Him.
  • Place them in God’s care, perhaps through prayers to Jesus as the Infant of Prague. Looking at a statue of Jesus as a child reminds us that He experienced what they do and treasures them tenderly.
  • Mary, Jesus’ mother, is also their mother. Ask her intercession and know she loves them dearly.
  • When you are beyond being able to pray, try to breathe in God’s love and breathe out your fears.¹
  • Some grandparents keep a Prayer Journal or simply a page for each grandchild where they can write intentions specific to that child and record the ways those prayers have been answered.²
  • If older grandchildren have their own phones, send a text message occasionally saying that you are praying for them. Include specifics if they are facing a challenge. “Prayers that your final exams go well today.”

Pray in front of your grandchildren.

• Many of us find praying to be a very private thing, but our children and grandchildren need to see and hear us pray.
  • Many families pray a Rosary together before bed, or a decade of the Rosary if children are very small. Mary has promised the daily praying of the Rosary will bring grace, protection, armor against evil, flourishing of good works, God’s mercy, and a holy death.
  • Blessings before and after meals remind us that all we have is from God’s providence.
  • Going to church with your grandchildren can be a celebration beyond their normal attendance with their parents. Having you with them makes it even more special. Let them see how important the practice of your faith is to you.
  • Read the Bible and let them understand that God’s Word speaks to you.

Pray with your grandchildren.

An easy place to start with little ones is Pope Francis’ 5-Finger Prayer:

1.) The thumb is the closest finger to you. So start praying for those who are closest to you. They are the persons easiest to remember. To pray for our dear ones is a “Sweet Obligation.”
2.) The index finger is next. Pray for those who teach you, instruct you, and heal you. They need the support and wisdom to show direction to others. Always keep them in your prayers.
3.) The tallest finger reminds us of our leaders, the governors and those who have authority. They need God’s guidance.
4.) The fourth finger is the ring finger. Even though it may surprise you, it is our weakest finger. It should remind us to pray for the weakest, the sick, or those plagued by problems. They need your prayers.
5.) And finally, we have our smallest finger, the smallest of all. Your pinkie should remind you to pray for yourself. When you are done praying for the other four groups, you will be able to see your own needs but in the proper perspective, and also you will be able to pray for your own needs in a better way.¹

Other ways to pray with your grandchildren:

• Before meals and bed, ask what they’d like to pray about. This is a wonderful time to hear about your grandchild’s concerns. Our family goes around the table at dinner and each person states a simple prayer request or something that makes them grateful.
• When you hear sirens, immediately ask aloud that God protect and help the person in need.
• Bless them before they leave. A quick prayer with your hand on their head or shoulder makes everyone feel special. “God, bless this child that you and I love dearly.”
• Sing children’s faith songs with your grandchildren. “Jesus loves me, this I know…” Give CDs or downloads to older grandchildren. Many inspirational groups make recordings of music that teens and young adults can enjoy.
• Help your younger grandchildren to memorize basic prayers and Bible verses but also…
• Teach them to talk to God just like we talk to each other.

Wednesday as I prepared to write this post, the readings for the day included an exhortation from Moses after he led his people out of Egypt amid miracles and wonders:

“However, take care and be earnestly on your guard not to forget the things which your own eyes have seen, nor let them slip from your memory as long as you live, but teach them to your children and your children’s children.” (Deuteronomy 4:9)³

That quote and its timing felt like a personal nod from God. What little miracles or wonders have you experienced and could tell your grandchildren about?

If any suggestion above intrigued you, try that one today! See how the Spirit leads you to pray.

Blessings on your week!

Betty Arrigotti

Sources:

• ¹The Catholic Grandparents Handbook by Lorene Hanley Duquin
• ²Grandparenting with Grace by Larry E. McCall
• ³New American Bible (Revised Edition)