How do you raise children who care? Education professor William Damon says that one of the first and most important steps in raising moral children is to nurture their ability to feel empathy. According to Damon, “Empathy toward those in distress” is one of the “elements of a universal morality.”
The good news for parents is that empathy arises naturally in children at an early age and is easily nurtured through fun family activities such as watching movies together. You don’t have to go looking for special events or situations to make this happen. A child receives the best moral education during normal daily situations when adults are actively engaged in that child’s life. Here are a few ordinary opportunities where you might cultivate empathy in your children:
1. Read stories and watch movies together.
Occasionally stop and ask your child, “How do you think this character feels?” There is no right answer. The point is to encourage empathetic feelings and reflection. Such questioning will give children opportunities to hone their ability to sense the feelings of others. It will also help them to base their future actions on compassion rather than self-centeredness.
2. Allow your child to fully declare their feelings when they’re having a difficult time with a sibling or friend.
Ask your child if they can also express what the other person might be feeling and why. The point of this exercise is not to put down or dismiss your child’s feelings but to widen his or her sense of all that is truly going on in the situation.
3. Create a safe climate for your child to take responsibility for his or her actions—both good and bad.
Professor Damon says, “There is no more effective facilitator of moral development than fostering children’s willingness to take responsibility for good and bad deeds.” You can encourage this willingness by responding calmly and evenly when your child admits to misdeeds. Your child can still experience the consequences of those misdeeds, including your measured expression of disappointment or anger. Emotional tirades will just suppress your child’s willingness to admit mistakes.
4. Be a good listener.
Take the time for open conversation with your children and answer their questions honestly, this provides endless opportunities to talk about caring and respecting for others. Simply lead by example and you’ll accomplish a lot.
I have been thinking a great deal about my experience at Reconciliation this past Saturday. I felt an intense and unexplainable urge to go and confess my sins when I woke up that morning. I try to go every six weeks or so, but this was no routine visit to the priest for me. I needed to unburden myself of the numerous venial sins I had committed since I last participated in this Sacrament.
Purest Gold: God's Refining Fire in our Lives »
After salvation, many young Christians wonder if there's anything more to their newfound faith than just the security blanket of "being a Christian." Time and time again, God shows himself as a "refiner," and our lives are as gold. God started leading me in this study to understand what He was doing in my life, as well as in the lives of others.
Picking up my pen to write this column, I couldn’t imagine how time flies. Since the last publication of this column I have gone through a lot, especially the loss of my dear mother to whom I dedicate this article. Not only her, but seems I lost a whole generation of my close family.
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“Do you see a man who excels in his work? He will stand before Kings; He will not stand before unknown men.” Proverbs 22:29
Spiritual Development for our Youth »
Most of us youth in today's fast moving world are easily thrown off by difficulties and worries.
The theme of conversion is a thread that runs all through Lent, but conversion takes on different aspects throughout the phases of Lent. The first two and a half weeks focused on the interior turning of hearts; the liturgy urges the faithful to reflect and examine consciences thoroughly.
Saint Josephine Bakhita »
Feast Day: February 8
Patron Saint Of: Sudan
Saint Josephine Margaret Bakhita was born around 1869 in the village of Olgossa in the Darfur region of Sudan. She was a member of the Daju people and her uncle was a tribal chief. Due to her family lineage, she grew up happy and relatively prosperous, saying that as a child, she did not know suffering.
Catholics Must Fast More Intensely This Lent»
The Norbertine Canons of St. Michael's Abbey have created this digital Lenten retreat so that you can journey through this holy season alongside them. If you want to have one of your best Lenten seasons yet, join us in our Lenten Program "The Great Fast" - https://theabbotscircle.com/the-great-fast-join
When Your Faith Is Put to the Test - Bishop Barron's Sunday Sermon»
Friends, we come now to the Second Sunday of Lent, and we’re on both dangerous and very holy ground with the first reading from the twenty-second chapter of Genesis. The ancient Israelites referred to it as the “Akedah,” which means the “binding”: Abraham binds and is ready to sacrifice Isaac at God’s command.
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