A Young Father's Prayer Life

I have three young kids, ages seven, five, and two. They wake up before six am most days. Usually, one of them is awake by 5:15 am. Every day I wake up at five AM to attempt to pray. It doesn't work...or should I say it doesn't work how I think it is supposed to work.

I wake up and use the bathroom and make coffee. I have at best maybe ten minutes until someone shows. Hurry! When they come running out to me I find myself internally frustrated by the interruption. However, that is the point. That is the prayer. Prayer is something to become as fluid as breathing and I am a slow learner. At best I get to open my prayer book or Scriptures and "get ready."

Not much has changed from ten years ago when I penned this poem about how I think prayer is supposed to be:

I hold prayers,

too close to expose them.

They are rather avid little suckers. I don't suppose they make it,

since I often fake it.

I tell myself four things about my "interrupted prayer life."

1. This is my prayer life. I am living the Gospel passage when Jesus says, "Let the little children come to me." I am to show them Christ.

2. Fyodor Dostoevsky said, "The soul is healed by being with children."

3. My children coming to me serves as a witness to remind me to ask, "Do I come to the Father as often as my children do?" How can I, too, be persistent enough to come to the Father?

4. Just the act of having my Bible and prayer book both present and exposed is a public demonstration that promotes the faith to my children. I am demonstrating that is what you do as a man of God.

Finally, we live in an age where we kill children via abortion. It's hard to become a child of God when we treat children in this manner. During this Christmas season our attention is focused on the baby Jesus and Christmas wouldn't carry much mystery if he just came as a 30 year old man...children show us God's face.

As G.K. Chesterton said, "Being a child is not a disease. Even renaming a child is not a disease. Don't you wish sometimes we could all remain children?"

What an opportunity I have been given! So that's my prayer. It's myself given to my children, my Eucharistic prayer, my thanksgiving.