Parents have a responsibility to teach their children about morals, ethics, making good friends and living a Godly life.
This is coming from Rector of the St. David’s Church and Chairman of the Barbados Christian Council (BXC), the Reverend Canon Noel Burke, who spoke to The Barbados Advocate on the sidelines of the National Day of Prayer that was held across the various nursery, primary, secondary and tertiary-level institutions in Barbados yesterday.
He stated that they should therefore pay special attention to them and this attention does not mean hovering over them 24 hours every day and watching their every move, but to ensure that they provide guidance for them in such areas as resolving conflict in an appropriate manner.
“So we want to encourage parents to be mindful over their children, to be watchful over the friends that they keep, not that they have a 24-hour guard over them or anything like that, but to teach them about moral decision-making.”
The Canon stated that one of the things that would help parents in this regard is for them to use their faith when teaching their children these valuable lessons.
“And one of the things that we have sort of noticed is that when – and again there is a whole host of research in this area – children are exposed to religion that that also has an impact under which they relate to matters that confront them day by day and so we may be able to lessen those sorts of extremes of behaviour and perhaps come up with a modest way – moderation is always a good approach – so that they learn about boundaries, they learn about not taking things too far, not taking things to the extreme, they learn about taking in things that could perhaps be vexatious with a sense of calm, not to be involved in conflict of one kind or another.”
He added that the church also has a role to play here and they can act as the catalyst in assisting parents in providing the necessary direction for spiritual growth, which would then in turn help these young people in the decision-making process.
“We firmly believe that the Christian community can make a difference and can influence the way in which our young people respond to the issues in society. We want to ask parents to ensure that their children are exposed to religious ideas and religious discussion because in that way, they will learn how to deal with matters that come up – matters that maybe help create anger – and things that become aggravated in their lives and in the midst of it all, there are always ways and means of resolving the issues.” (PJT)