A child’s prayer June 18, 2008
Posted by emsgeiss in parenting & family, toddlers.Tags: children's understanding of death, death, God, meme, prayer, spirituality, Tim Russert, toddlers
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Yesterday, when I turned on the Evening News with Brian Williams, they were covering scenes of the viewers who lined up for hours to view Tim Russert’s body as it lay in state.
Michael is a constant chatter box, and at 28 months, some of what he says is still completely unintelligible, remnants of echolaic babble combined with the utterances of a toddler whose tongue isn’t quite able to match what his brain thinks it’s creating.
Watching the coverage and half listening to Michael, I heard from his little mouth: “bablebablebable God, babblebablebablebable blah blah blah babble babble blah blah blah. Amen.”
Michael has only been to one wake in his conscious memory. The first he attended when he was still a babe-in-arms; the second was a few weeks ago when my husband’s uncle’s mother-in-law died. At that wake, before we left, he insisted that he had to go up to the casket, where he knelt and did what he saw all the grown-ups do: make the sign of the cross.
At the time, it was cute — the actions of a toddler who wanted to be involved, simply mimicking the adults around him.
Apparently however, sometime between the wake a few weeks ago and yesterday, when he witnessed the televised event, Michael made the connection between seeing a casket and spirituality, as he babbled his heart-felt prayer.
I don’t know what he said between uttering “God” and “Amen.” Only he and God know for sure. But that’s one prayer that I’m sure will get through.
Copyright © 2008, Erika-Marie S. Geiss
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That’s a great story, Erika! Thanks for sharing. That is a feel good story. Love it!
Thanks Shannon! It was one of those moments where I wish I’d been recording. The best ones always seem to escape the camera.
This is precious, Erika! I’m so glad you shared it with us!
Oh, and I finally posted that meme you tagged me for. Sorry it took so long!
*smiles*
Michele
That is really great. Hopefully it will stick with him as he grows up.
That’s pretty cute– and coming from me, the one who dislikes children, that’s saying something
Oh that is so sweet Erika! And yes it seems like all the great moments we never capture on video or camera.
Sometimes I think my children teach me so much more about spirituality and what God means than I will ever be able to teach them–the words escape me to explain. Precious. Thanks for sharing.
I find this incredibly touching. I hope Michael grows up to be something special (and I think he will be).
Michael sounds like a great kid.