You CAN Raise Faithful Kids. Here’s How.
Dr. Greg & Lisa Popcak. CatholicHOM (Households on Mission) Founders
When it comes to Catholic family life, there’s bad news and there’s great news. First, the bad news. A recent study by the Center For Applied Research in the Apostolate (CARA) at Georgetown University found that 85% of kids raised in Catholic homes will leave the Church by the time they are adults. That’s a tremendously sobering statistic. But here’s the great news.
The same study identified families who successfully raised all of their children to a faithful adulthood. Researchers interviewed both parents and their faithful, adult kids to identify the habits they believed were responsible for their success. The study revealed that children tend to own their faith as adults when they have experienced the faith as the source of the warmth in their homes growing up. The degree to which everything else “sticks” (e.g., regular Mass attendance, Catholic education, youth ministry, etc) appears to depend on how much kids see the faith making a practical difference in the quality of the family relationships at home.
Better still, researchers identified 12 habits these families used to help them achieve their remarkable success. These simple habits can be easily taught and can help all types of families (e.g., traditional, divorced, blended, single-parent, etc.) create more fulfilling and faithful family lives.
These 12 habits involve simple things like scheduling regular family time throughout the week, being generously affectionate and affirming, using a gentler, teaching-oriented approach to discipline (as opposed to a more punishment-based approach), creating and protecting family rituals that enable parents and kids to work, play, talk, and pray together at least a little bit every day, encouraging every family member (parents and kids) to seek out opportunities to serve each other at home, and discussig ways they could care for others–as a family–in the parish and community.
Families in the study saw these habits as an important part of both a healthy family life and a deep and meaningful family spirituality. They talked about how their faith made them want to do the things that helped them draw closer to God and each other, and they believed these habits helped them do both.
Even if these habits are simple to learn, busy families can have a hard time remembering to do them. And sometimes it can be challenging to overcome obstacles that come up as they try to practice them. That’s why the CatholicHOM (Households on Mission) app and the CatholicHOM Monthly Parish-Based Parenting Groups were created. In the monthly parenting groups, Catholic moms and dads get together to share their experiences living out these habits and encouraging each other to keep at it. Then, through the CatholicHOM app, parents can get unlimited feedback from a team of expert Catholic family life coaches and pastoral counselors to help them overcome the little challenges they face as they try to build a more loving, caring, and connected Catholic household on mission. Plus, both parents and kids can take advantage of a ton of creative resources (e.g., monthly downloadable activities, an animated cartoon series teaching the whole family how to work together to build a more loving and faithful family life, exclusive podcasts, monthly livestream events, etc) that help make it fun to be together and live the faith at home.
Together, the CatholicHOM Monthly Parish-Based Parenting Groups and the CatholicHOM App, provide the resources, support, and community you need to succeed at creating a household where your Catholic faith is experienced as the source of the warmth in your home.
Whether or not you take advantage of the resources and expert support CatholicHOM offers, the most important thing you can do today to start creating a more loving, faithful CatholicHOM is to give yourself permission to prioritize family time. Each week, get out your calendars and discuss how you might get at least a little bit of time to have a few meals together, pray together, play a game or laugh together, or do a little work around the house together. Creating space to be a family is the first step to making everything else work, because we can’t grow together if we don’t make time to really know each other.
Just as Jesus reminded Martha and Mary to “choose the better part” (Luke 10:38-42), by prioritizing intimacy over activity, Catholic families can bring Christ’s love to each other and even witness to that love in the world, by making space for each other and picking love over busyness.
To learn more about living the habits that can help you create a more loving CatholicHOM, register for the monthly parish based parenting groups and subscribe to the CatholicHOM app.