HOME SCHOOLING
Monday of the Sixteenth Week in Ordinary Time
My dear encountered couples:
Parents send their children to far-off schools, especially colleges, to learn what they feel they cannot teach them. And they might be right in doing so. But let no parent cut him or herself short. If a child does not learn the love of God, the love of neighbor, and morality at home, no private school or college, however esteemed, is going to make him or her a better person.
Jesus spoke about the people of Nineveh who abided by the words of a prophet not one of their own but from a far-off land, while the Jewish people paid little attention to their own home-grown prophets. He talks about the Queen of Sheba who came all the way to Jerusalem to listen to the wisdom of King Solomon, while there were Jews who wouldn’t cross the street to listen to Jesus, the Son of God. What does this all have to do with our children’s education? Or our own for that matter?
God teaches us what we really need to know right where we are. He teaches us through his creation, he teaches us through our parents, grandparents, through all the elders around us. Never count out the wisdom of senior citizens acquired by many years of experience; they might be sources of more worthwhile knowledge than all the renowned universities of the world. We can all learn from one another.
Knowledge and education are wherever we are.
How’s that? Because God is where we are. And he speaks through everything and everyone around us. Let us try to listen to the God amongst us much more attentively than the Jews listened to Jesus when he was in their midst.
