I have three posts sitting in my draft file all on the same topic. They have different titles and different introductions, but they all contain the same thoughts. Then the posts go on to rant and rave, and aren’t “seasoned with grace.” So they’ve sat in my draft box until the next time I have a thought.
On my post “Being A Parent”, my good friend Melinda posted a comment and said what I had been trying to say, only better:
I had people from all sides giving me advice (most of it against attachment parenting)…I was feeling very unnecessary guilt..as if I was sinning because I had to hold my child all day long to comfort him
“unnecessary guilt” – she hit the nail on the head. That’s what it is folks. “as if I was sinning. . .” That’s the legalism that has so discouraged me. People in the Church (universal, not necessarily my local body) who would normally be opponents of legalism, become rabidly religious – even evangelistically so – about their favored approach to parenting.
“My style” becomes “God’s way” and those who disagree aren’t different, they’re wrong. I notice in everything I read, that nothing says “here’s something that might work in your family.” Instead, they not only claimed to be the only way to parent, they actively malign other techniques and philosophies. The result is that new parents feel that unnecessary guilt Melinda describes. We feel as if we’re sinning no matter what we do!
In the end, so many Christian parents resent their kids for not following what the books say should be true; or resent their spouse/parents/in-laws for not agreeing with their preferred “God Approved” style of parenting; or they just curl up inside, convinced that they, themselves must be outside of God’s grace, because they can’t make their child fit the box they are expected to fit. They lack joy. They feel the weight of parenting, without the rest of Grace. They have been loaded down with more than God intended for them to carry rather than having that burden lightened by fellowship in the body of Christ.
They feel unnecessary guilt. I had been trying to say it for months, but Melinda said it better.
