MPF 272: Disciplining Children without Shame

Messy Family Podcast : Catholic Conversations on Marriage and Family

For a child to learn how to love, they need to first be loved.

So many people find disciplining their children to be one of the biggest challenges of being a parent. We look back to the way our parents raised us and often we realize that we want to do things differently, but we just don’t know how. Without a new perspective, many times we just fall back on what we experienced as a child and we react from our own woundedness or our own view of what a father or mother should be. In this episode, Mike and Alicia talk about how parents can model the perfect parent, God the Father Himself. As we do this, we will find ourselves walking in our true identity as a son or daughter of the Most High. When we understand that, then we can form our children as God forms us.

Listen in to this essential conversation and use our Key Takeaways and Discussion Questions to go deeper with your spouse on this topic.

Key Takeaways

• We need to parent the way God fathers us, free of emotion and manipulation

• Discipline starts with relationship because its all about forming their hearts.

• We need to teach children how to repair and restore relationships when they do the wrong thing.

Couple Discussion Questions

• In our childhoods have we experienced shame from our parents or those in authority? How did that make me feel?

• Do we imitate those behaviors in our parenting?

• How can we reflect God the Father more in our formation of our children?

• Consider one of your children in need of formation. What is the best way to reach their heart?