Reverence

Yesterday Liam and Luna were playing in the yard and found a dead mouse. They ran in and told us about it and wanted to bury it. I discouraged it as I did not want them touching it. Later they came in and told me they buried it using sticks. They were very proud and told us just how cute the mouse was.

What is interesting is that one of the strongest values we want our children to learn is reverence for life. How does one teach a child reverence? We try, perhaps being vegan helps. Perhaps our examples help with James following ministry and my being a midwife and nurse along with our activism. They seem to understand our reasons for these practices. We talk about it when the opportunities arise but in reality it is not central to our conversations. It’s all trial and error.

I woke up this morning thinking about this and realized our children are in fact internalizing reverence. Liam demonstrated this the other day when we came across the stray puppy. And yesterday their immediate reaction to a dead mouse is to respect it by burying it. Perhaps they know more about reverence than I do.