Momservation: If the threat of Santa not coming and a tattle-telling Elf on the Shelf is the cornerstone of your discipline strategy – good luck with January.
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It’s a pretty sad testament what our society has come to that Santa has more pull than Jesus.
That a creepy little tattle-telling elf on a shelf is more effective than asking: What would Jesus do?
But who am I to judge? My kids think the church down the street is called Our Lady of Perpetual Sorrow.
When I tried to get a little Jesus in my then 4-yr old’s heart by sending her to a Presbyterian preschool she had this to say about snack time prayer:
“I don’t know why we bother thanking God for our snack. EVERYBODY knows that food doesn’t come from God – it comes from the grocery store.”
When my son was little I backed off our theological discussions worried they might be doing more harm than good. That’s because my increasingly paranoid child kept asking these types of questions about our all-seeing God:
Does God see me pee?
Can God see me naked?
Does God smell farts and know it was me?
I don’t think I can poo if God’s watching me.
So, I’ll admit, I’m not the best shepherd of our young flock. It doesn’t help when a blogger friend of mine told a story on his blog, Some Species Eat Their Young, about his young daughter after catechism condemning every little thing he did wrong with: That makes Jesus sad.
Rather than feel inadequate that I didn’t also have my children diligently attending Sunday school, I was seeing dollar signs with a funny new T-shirt:
Maybe if you’re good you can get it under the tree this Christmas!
But only if the creepy elf hasn’t told Santa on you. You know, he can see you pee…