The following is an article / reflection that I submitted in one of my subjects in the graduate school...
“Happy and Cheerful
as our family must be, still we cannot lose sight of one of its principal
functions : It has to be a center of
formation of every member of the family.”
The line above, from the article Swimming Againts the Current : The Family (Part 2) greatly caught my attention. I believe in the same line. When I was a young counsellor of a high
school, I felt that school’s formation is really crucial to the development of
a student. But as one parent, in one of
those “bloody” encounters blamed the school for not doing what it should have
done. I really thought at that time
given the background of this “absentee” parent that perhaps she has forgotten
that she was the first and most crucial formator of her own child.
Young as I was, I saw the
different painful realities that students have struggled at home. A lot of them have shared with me how their
own homes have become the seat of problems that they blamed their own parents
for not being able to guide and support them where they were.
In the first place why did they
go to a guidance counsellor if they felt that they could run to their own
parents for assistance. Our roles as
counsellors should only be to support parents not as the source of primary
help. A lot of parents come to us to
call their children and made us ask them what their concerns were so that they
would know.
Homes have to be the seat of
values formation. Homes have to be that
nest where children are first and foremost honed and trained. Unfortunately, a number of homes have become again,
the seat of problems and trauma whereby children run away from to escape the
painful realities that they encounter there.
What follows next would be an adolescent not formed well goes out to the
world to seek solace and comfort from wrong companies. Friends who are in themselves also are
products of problematic home environment.
From this we could infer “the
blind leading the blind”.
What would become of them
someday? The same misguided students
will soon build up their own families.
All I am saying is that it would create a ripple effect to the very
families that they would soon build.
Though some rise from their problematic situation and learn to do well
when they become parents. But studies
would highly correlate that an adolescent that comes from a problematic home
environment would create the same in the very family that he would soon create
for himself. So sad but this is a
reality.
Family. It is such a challenge to strengthen family
life. The very values that the family
keep would really contaminate its members.
If the family uphold respect, commitment, love of work, love of God and
neighbour, the same would be brought out by them when they go out of their homes. Members of this kind of family are not easily
swayed by the temptations of the world.
They could easily withstand the harsh realities outside of home. They are not easily threatened by any
negative values outside of what they uphold at home. They are very secure individuals. They go home and still feel intact. They are the most joyful individuals trying
to capture moments of growth.
Lastly, a home with God present
in it is a joyful and a happy home. From
experience, a family without God in it
is doomed to fail. God is the
only unitive force in this world that dispenses His power to pour down all the
graces protection and love to each member of the family. God has to be present. He is the true strength of a family. And I deeply believe that…”A Family that Prays
Together…Stays together”. J
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