Communicating the faith to the younger generation

Abstract

Once upon a time, a young woman wanted to be a good wife. She was not deeply in love, but a fine young man had asked her to marry him. He was very good about helping her to be that excellent wife she so ardently desired to be. He even drew up a list to assist her. It dealt with all the details of her life not cashing cheques unless there was money in the bank, checking tomatoes in the market before buying them and other helpful items. And she followed them well. For many years she did all she could to be the wife she felt called to be. But she was never really happy. The husband died. After a few years the woman met another man who loved her very much. She fell deeply in love and married again. She hardly remembered her earnest desire to be a good wife in the first marriage but simply lived and loved her husband, basking in his deeply felt love for her. She was now very happy, and the days of her former marriage seemed an unreal, now even ugly time. One day, as she was cleaning out a room, she discovered the old list. She broke out into perspiration and felt weak; she recalled all the pain and effort of those years. She was tempted not even to look at it again. Finally, curiosity overcame fear, and she looked... She was amazed. What do you think she discovered? She was doing all the things that she had been ordered to do in the first marriage. However, because she was deeply in love, she never thought about it. What she had done because she felt she had to, she did now because she wanted to in the deepest core of her being. In an essay entitled "Faith and Education", Adolf Exeler points out that there are people who are satisfied if the catechism and the Bible are "learned" and if "believers" "practise" their religion by keeping external regulations and performing specific rites [...].