The Catholic times. [volume] (Columbus, Ohio) 1951-current, 1962-06-08

Too frequently each of
us looks at a child from
his own viewpoint. A ply
stefan sees the child as a
mass of feverish flesh. He
expects the temperature will
return to normal as it usually
does. The dentist sees the
same child as a reluctant
mouth which he hopes will
open and not snap shut too
quickly, to the possible detri-
ment Of his fingers.
THE TEACHER sees this
same child as the hard little
cement head she is trying to
drill some knowledge into.
The grandparents see the same
specimen as the smart, low
able one who can do no wrong
and whom they are doing
their best to spoil.
The neighbors look upon the
same child as the local YER
sion of Dennis, the Menace,
cutting across their lawn and
running their new shrubbery.
Father sees his child as the
inexhaustible appetite eating
him out of house and home.
Mother sees him as the one
she has to pick up after all
the time.
Each one looks at the same
child and sees something diff
ferent. Once in a while, it
is good to take a look at him
as he really is. Not just a
bird'S-eye view but, in a sense,
a God's-eye view of this crea-
ture of His. So much of our
difficulty in dealing with a
child is that we forget who
he really is.
WI COULD START with
the presumption that a child
is a human being. Observing
the child in a particular sit
uation, a parent may some
times find this hard to accept.
Children, especially young
teen-agers, have a similar
question - Are parents hui
man beings? Other parents
may be human, but they some
times wonder about their
own.
Modern psychology and
psychiatry can offer many in
sights into the nature of the
human being. Perhaps more
has been learned in the last
fifty years about what makes
a human being tick than in
any previous century or COM
bination of centuries. Certain
ly we should be grateful for
the contributions of modern
science and use them wisely.
However, equally, we should
be aware of the wealth Of
knowledge concerning human
nature which Gods revelation
and the Church's teaching af-
ford us. A look beneath the
surface of commonly accept
ed truths can give an explana-
ton of the cause of a child's
behavior and at the same
time a clue to correction.
Take, for example, the doc
trine of original sin. Gods
creation of a human being is
good, but the sin of our first
parents caused a faint or a
distortion in human nature.
This can explain the stubborn
ness and orneriness of a
child and his sometimes
chronic propensity for mis-
chief making and wrong-do-
ing. The teasing that goes on
among children, their push
ings and shovings, their jeal-
ousies and seeming cruelties
to each other have a root in
the fact of original sin.
PARENTS CONTINUALLY
ask each other - When are
they ever going to learn?
When are they going to stop
all this pickering? When are
they going to stop being
selfish and so jealous of each
other? When are they going
to stop doing things for which
they know they will be pun
ished? Why do we have to
keep after them so much?
There are two facts of life
a parent should face in re-
gard to a child because of the
effect of original sin. One is
that the child will have a GER
tain difficulty in compre-
hending the difference be-
n