Women: Career or Home and Family…

Rachel Allison

What has our society done to us?

Has Hollywood and advertising caused us to focus on looks rather than depth, and instant gratification rather than virtue and self-control?  Have we become caught up with priorities that may bring status and recognition while true and lasting fulfillment are eluded because we have not focused on selfless service?  If only we could place our causes and priorities under a type of magnifying glass that could clearly project the future outcome of our time and efforts.  We could then examine whether our time commitments are helping us reach the top of the mountain we are really wanting to reach.

Recently I read an article entitled “The Bride Who was Groomed for a Career” by Lea Singh.  What an interesting viewpoint on feminism.  In years past I have rubbed shoulders with many women who believe that first and foremost they should prepare for a fulfilling career.  These women eventually want marriage and family too, but they have been so focused on priorities dictated by secularism and feminism that other concerns are given only a side-glance.

Several years ago my husband and I became good friends with a fortyish-age woman who had made quite a career for herself in the fashion world.  Her name and photo were regulars in some of the more exclusive New York magazines. She once told us that she lived the life of “The Devil Wears Prada.” In fact she had worked closely with the woman who inspired the above-mentioned movie.  She said that her schedule required that a sleeping bag be kept in one of her office drawers, and evening gowns were kept in her office closet.  There were many weeks where her office WAS her home, and she loved the excitement and lure of all the glitz and recognition!  That is she loved it until she realized that with this kind of pace she would never find serious prospects for marriage. As she neared her 40^th birthday, she made a courageous decision.  She actually quit her job and began writing a book.  Her time became her own, and amazingly she was married within a year. The last I heard she had two small children, and she was finally living the life she really wanted all along.

I’m not at all implying that women should not attend college and get a degree. Any and all education received gives confidence and perspective.  It can inspire and empower….making any woman a better companion and mother.

I found Lea Singh’s viewpoint extremely interesting. The following is taken from Ms. Singh’s article:

I wish that as I was growing up, the role of wife and mother had been more fully present as a respectable and important option that also needs time and training, not just an afterthought that automatically tacks on to a career. Much of the skill set I acquired in university is not very useful in the home. Although I know how to write legal briefs, I wish I knew how to sew, play family songs on the piano and cook without a cookbook, and even that I was more familiar with caring for little ones and for a busy household. All the chores I was protected from in order to enable me to study as I was growing up – maybe I should have done them after all, including some babysitting. I want to give these experiences to my daughter, so that she will be better equipped not just for a career, but also for motherhood.

I even wish – and this is sure to get some hair frizzed – that it had been explained to me that a high-flying career does not go well with family life. Men and women really are different. When the man gets married, it is just a sweet step in the direction of all his life dreams. He can climb up the career ladder and still be a good father to his nine kids. He will get a deep sense of meaning and fulfillment from providing for his family.

But where feminism has confused women, it has made us dream that we are the same as men. Men are not mothers, and children don’t need them in the same way as they will inevitably need us. So if we want to have children, we can’t pretend to be men in our career plans and aspirations. Do we really want to have someone else caring for our homes and our children? It does not have to be that way. We need to embrace a model of life success that is less career-oriented and more family-centered. Giving of oneself to others, while it comes without diplomas, year-end bonuses and frequent-flyer miles, is just as worthy and important as building up one’s own career.

 

 

 

 

 

Childhood and a Mother’s Direction

Rachel Allison

A few days ago a Portuguese cardinal sparked controversy by repeating the Catholic Church’s longstanding teaching to encourage women to be at home with their children. He stressed that the function of a mother is essential to the education of her children. Cardinal Manuel Monteiro de Castro said that “We should give much more value to family and to the value of women at home… the presence of the woman in the family has a very, very important value for the whole nation. The best educator is the mother, and if the mother doesn’t have time to breathe how is she going to have time to educate?”

His statements are similar to those of Pope John Paul II, who wrote in his Apostolic Exhortation Familiaris Consortio in 1981 that “the true advancement of women requires that clear recognition be given to the value of their maternal and family role, by comparison with all other public roles and all other professions.”

“The mentality which honors women more for their work outside the home than for their work within the family must be overcome. This requires that men should truly esteem and love women with total respect for their personal dignity, and that society should create and develop conditions favoring work in the home,” the pontiff wrote.

The words of these wise and honorable men made me think about a class I took some time ago on child development.  When pure and precious babies are born the billions of neurons in their brains are free from any negatives or positives.  But that quickly changes.  As these babies are nurtured, cuddled, talked to, and laughed with they are taught that they are important, and they are loved.  These neurons quickly make connections with other neurons until there is a well-traveled path that makes up their understanding of who they are.

‘When I fall down and hurt myself, my mother will be there to comfort me.’  ‘My mother feeds me, and bathes me, and dresses me.  I am important to her, and she loves me…and I can be important and loved by others.’

Just as Cardinal Castro said, “The best educator is the mother.” Mothers help a child form feelings about themselves.  She helps her children understand that they are important, they are appreciated, needed and they are lovable.  She teaches them to understand the appropriate way to act in society.  She teaches them the value of work and she gives direction that helps them form habits that will bless their lives.  She teaches them honesty and she shares the values she holds dear.

Hardwiring their minds in a positive direction is a full-time job. It takes patience and fortitude.  It requires love, selflessness and creativity.  I would say unequivocally that it is the most important roll a woman can have…to influence another human being to become a happy, productive, contributing member of society.

Thank you Cardinal Castro for speaking out to a world that too often does not place its priorities on home and family.  The news bears testimony of that truth.

 

We do what’s best for kids – who are we kidding?

Ann Bailey

Sitting there in the dentist’s office, the Reader’s Digest cover caught my attention.   Smartly-dressed Michelle Obama grinned at me from the cover and the headline read:  “Michelle Obama’s Family Values.”  But it was the quote from her that really got me going:  “Everything we do must be for our children.”  But before I could snatch up the magazine, the receptionist called me into the back and into the dentist chair.

“Everything we do must be for our children.”  I could not agree more!   That’s such a lovely statement, but unfortunately, the policies that I see promoted by the occupants of the White House leave me wondering how much Mrs. Obama actually understands that statement.   As I sat there with the man in the white mask trying to save my ailing tooth, I had plenty of time to make a mental list of policies and behaviors that are promoted in this country, that do anything but show that “everything we do is for our children.”

These are not in any particular order, but here’s my list:

• Readily accept and even promote cohabitation, including giving benefits to individuals who “shack up,” when we know that these relationships are unstable at best and downright dangerous for children at worst.
• Create policies that encourage individuals to bear children out-of-wedlock dooming many of these children to lives of disadvantage and poverty.
• Allowed same-sex marriage to gain a foothold, ignoring the fact that acceptance of same-sex marriage means unequivocally that marriage and child bearing are unrelated.  Once again putting adults “needs” ahead of children’s.
• Use reproductive technologies that bless the lives of married men and women that wish to have children, but also allow children to be created to satisfy the whims of adults – many of these children being stripped of their right to have and to know both their mother and father.
• Disposable marriages and easy divorce that pretends to serve the needs of adults, but has brought enormous physical, emotional, and economic harm to children.
• One word:  abortion!
• Allowed feminism to convince us that woman’s place is in the workforce and that daycare suits children just fine.  Now we’ve built an economy built around this falsehood.
• Speaking of economy, we’ve consumed all that our parents bequeathed to us, lived a lifestyle beyond our means for decades, and now we’re consuming our children’s future as well.

This is certainly not an exhaustive list, but it is a sad one.  Mrs. Obama and all of us need to take a closer look at that sentence and REALLY think through what it means.  What’s best for our children should always be our primary focus– not just window dressing for a magazine cover.