Home Base

It might be called the "first child syndrome" -- and we were bitten by it. With our first child, we intensely read every parenting book on the market, we meticulously decorated the cutest nursery (Putting up the Winnie-the-Pooh wallpaper almost caused a divorce!), and we systematically plotted out life adventures for our soon-to-be-born progeny. All of these plans were geared toward one goal: to raise a brilliant, generous, socially successful, and faith-filled child (and we wouldn't complain if he just happened to be athletic).

Then, after our first son was born, a friend innocently dropped one of those casual lines that bring you up short. "You know," she said, "parents are the first and lasting images of God for their children." The truth of this statement was not only self-evident, but it also made us ask ourselves: what were our well-intentioned parenting efforts inadvertently teaching our child about God?

It sometimes seems the parenting model most often advocated by various experts resembles a manufacturing process: to produce perfect children, build a stimulating learning environment, install the right discipline techniques, and prevent contamination from any psychologically harmful experiences. The problem with this model is our frenetic attempts to be perfect parents can communicate to our children that they too must be perfect in order to receive love. As a result, the God we image for our children is a God more interested in what they do than who they are. Our very best intentions can unwittingly give our children a distorted picture of God -- a God who waits for us to measure up before bestowing love upon his children. The fallacy inlaid within "perfect parenting" is that it substitutes a flurry of good works for loving faith.

Faith-vs.-works is an age-old problem in our Christian tradition. The debate revolves around the question of salvation: are we saved by our faith in God, or by our good works? The roots of this discussion can be traced back to the Old Testament, but it comes to the forefront in Paul's letters. In his letter to the Galatians, Paul wrote: "A person is not justified by works of the law but through faith in Jesus Christ" (Galatians 3:16). It seems some Christians took Paul's words as a sign that living a virtuous life was now unnecessary, because the Letter of James offers this rebuke: "What good is it, my brothers, if someone says he has faith but does not have works? Can that faith save him? If a brother or sister has nothing to wear and has no food for the day, and one of you says to them, 'Go in peace, keep warm, and eat well,' but you do not give them the necessities of the body, what good is it? So also faith of itself, if it does not have works, is dead" (James 2:14-17).

However, James was not the last word on the subject. The question of faith-vs.-works exploded once again in the fifth century. Pelagius, a British monk who stressed the role of human freedom, taught that no supernatural grace was needed for one to choose the good -- and that by choosing the good we could achieve salvation. St. Augustine attacked this position, pointing out that we are saved only by the grace of Christ's death and resurrection -- and that this saving act flowed from God's love in us, not from our good works. In the end, the Sixteenth Council of Carthage (418) decided the issue: Pelagius' teachings were condemned.

The tension between faith and works rose once again during the Protestant Reformation when Martin Luther (1483-1546), appalled by abuses associated with the selling of indulgences, sounded a clarion call to rely on faith alone, not works. Relying heavily upon Paul's letters (Luther thought the inclusion of the Letter of James in the New Testament was a mistake), Luther stressed that salvation was entirely the work of God through the cross - and that human action was, in a sense, useless in effecting our salvation. In contrast, Catholic teaching, while acknowledging that salvation is only possible by grace, still asserted that part of God's plan of salvation necessitated that humans cooperate with that grace.

Given the tumultuous history and schismatic effect of the faith-vs.-works question, it is quite remarkable and noteworthy that the Vatican and the World Federation of Lutheran Churches signed in 1999 the Joint Declaration on Justification. This document recognized that while Catholics and Lutherans use different metaphors and language for describing salvation, we are in fundamental agreement about the connection between faith and works. The Joint Declaration states:

"Together we confess: By grace alone, in faith in Christ's saving work and not because of any merit on our part, we are accepted by God and receive the Holy Spirit, who renews our hearts while equipping and calling us to good works.... Such a faith is active in love, and thus the Christian cannot and should not remain without works. But whatever in the justified precedes or follows the free gift of faith is neither the basis of justification nor merits it." In other words, we are saved by God's loving grace -- and if we are living in love, then we shall perform the acts of love.

So given this complex connection between faith and works, what are we, as parents, expected to do? There is, certainly, an immense responsibility to being a parent, and part of that must include the forming of a child's spirit toward good and Godly things. We cannot leave our children's development completely to chance, and we do them a disservice if we do not educate ourselves -- through books and the experience of others -- in good parenting practices. To "do what come naturally" as a parent can mean that we fall back on the parenting habits we observed as children, that we do not grow as mothers and fathers of a new generation. On the other hand, to parent by our power alone means that God's Spirit is left out of the equation of our children's development. Yes, parenting involves a good many works, just as it involves faith. Which path, then, are we to follow?

Fortunately, this dichotomy between faith and works is as false for parents as it is for all followers of Jesus. The real question is not, "Which is the true way to salvation: faith or works?" It is, instead, "How does God parent us, and what does that tell us about raising our own children?" In the biblical stories we are reminded over and over that God holds out no false distinction between faith and works. The only guiding principle for parenting -- indeed for living itself -- seems to be love.

In Genesis 1-3, God's love is so great that it spills over into action. He creates a world that includes human beings as his own children. Once God had labored on behalf of his children, however, he does not spend each waking moment (if God ever has anything but waking moments!) looking over the shoulders of Adam and Eve, assuring himself that they are making the correct choices, working to create a perfect world. Instead, God allows this new creation to unfold, intervening when needed, but exercising faith in the fact that (despite their sinfulness and mistakes) his children and all of creation are essentially good.

What a lesson for us, as parents. When God creates Adam and Eve, it is done out of love. When he warns them of dangers in the Garden, that too is born of love. Even when Adam and Eve are expelled from Eden, one has the distinct sense that it is God who is suffering most. The rest of salvation history found in the biblical texts, in fact, consists of God parenting us, trying always to love us back unto God's self, even to the point of sending his son to live and die with us in seemly the most imperfect way.

Similarly, the parable of the Prodigal Son offers us another peek inside the parenting style of God. This story touches us not only because of the profound message of forgiveness, but also because Jesus connects God's struggle to parent us with our struggle to parent our own children. It could very well be that the Prodigal Son might have avoided (or at least minimized) his wasteful life if there had been more discipline at home, if his father had communicated to him more clearly the expectations and obligations connected with his inheritance, or the consequences of loose living. We are not privy to the details of his leaving.

What matters most in the story is his return. When, after a series of poor choices, the Prodigal Son shows up at the homestead, seeking the bare minimum of assistance and support from his family, he is met instead by a father whose faith has sustained him until the son's return. So intense is that faith the father appears to have been ready for this moment of reunion for years. But the father does not flaunt the conviction of his faith, does not say to his son, "I told you so -- when will you ever learn?" Like God's faith in the creating the world in Genesis, the father's faith must spill over into the work of celebration, to welcome his son back into the fullness of love.

In both of these stories, God's guiding principle and unyielding bias is love for his children. Love always finds its way into both faith and works. It cannot be limited by our need to understand and control it. Love is the defining characteristic of a parent, even when we miss the mark badly.

How, then, does God parent us? God has not created for us the perfect environment or the perfect set of experiences. God does not rescue us from hurt on the playground, in the office, in our marriages, or in our old age. All he promises is to know and love us -- and welcome us home when we stray too far away. God has not read all the parenting books (as far as we know!), although he wrote one, and continues to write it in the text of our lives. The split between faith ("What can God do?") and works ("What can I do?") is not the heart of the matter. In a life of love, faith will naturally call us to action, and acts of kindness naturally draw us into faith.

For parents, faith is the expectant sound of a newborn's uneven breathing. Faith is getting up in the night with a sick child. Faith is waiting for the headlights to illuminate the driveway after curfew. Faith is holding our children when they need comfort and knowing when to let them go. Parents know, deep inside themselves, that faith and works are the same "yes" to God's invitation to love.

(Patrick Russell is director of adult and family ministry at St. Dominic Parish, Brookfield, and adjunct professor of theology at Mount Mary College, Milwaukee. Stephanie Russell is the executive director of mission and identity at Marquette University, Milwaukee. They have been married 20 years and are promised members of the Ignatian Associates, a lay group affiliated with the Jesuits. They have four sons, who range in age from 19 to 10 years old.)