Here's to You, Faithful Fathers
BY: Barbara Curtis
I remember the day my dad left. He hugged
me and cried, but even deep in his last embrace, I felt a chill gathering round me, whispering to my little girl’s heart:
What
would it be like not to have a father?
The years to come provided harsh answers. Mine was not a carefree childhood.
Shuffled with two brothers between foster homes and relatives and – when things worked out – my overwhelmed mother,
I saw innocence give way early to a cynic’s worldview: “Don’t depend on anyone and no one will disappoint
you.”
Ask the fatherless, they’ll probably agree that the loss and defenses don’t end when you
grow up. Beneath the glossy, too-tight scar tissue lies too much tenderness.
Now 40-some years later, way too many
share the same scars as a million kids suffer the pain of their parents’ divorce annually. Every night one quarter of
our country’s children go to bed without a dad.
And while conventional wisdom may deem it better to go to
bed without a dad than to listen to squabbling parents, those who’ve been there tend to see it differently.
Not
long ago, I heard one 30-something mom confront another, recently separated, with this child’s eye-view: “I’d
rather have had my parents stay together – even fighting – than to have my dad ripped out of our home.”
Even with the hindsight to see how unsuited her parents truly were for each other, she still wished they’d stuck it
out.
That flies in the face of everything divorcing parents want to believe – especially these days when fatherhood
is given such short shrift. One survey found that 50 percent of divorced mothers see no value in a father’s continued
contact with his children.
And yet, studies of fatherlessness tell a different story. The National Center for Health
Statistics has found that children living with divorced mothers are four times more likely to need professional treatment
for emotional or behavioral problems, twice as likely to repeat a grade at school, and more likely to suffer chronic asthma,
frequent headaches, bedwetting, stammering or speech defects, anxiety, depression or hyperactivity.
Children growing
up without dads, according to the Bureau of Justice Statistics, are more likely to be delinquent and twice as likely to end
up in prison.
How ironic then, that in our zeal for lifestyle validation, we have, in the words of author Cathy
Young, “Proclaim[ed] the fatherless household to be just another wonderful addition to the mosaic of diversity.”
I
well remember the idea of the expandability of fathers being touted in the ‘70s by radical feminists such as Shulamith
Freestone. What was regarded then as fringe political theory – like countless other counterculturisms – morphed
in less than a generation into mainstream thought. Which goes a long way to explaining why two-thirds of today’s divorces
involving children are initiated by mothers.
I was reading a message yesterday that told a grim story
of the fatherhoodism in today’s society, granted we have said for years children who grow up with out a father will
seek a father and is usually is someone that is full of contradiction and faults-hood, not the Heavenly one. It is like people
who hurt others often they are in seek of character traits that tell them anthers insecurity. In my opinion these are one
of the greatest vile a creatures that walk the planet and they are even in our churches. However there are people that cross
over to the greatness of God’s power in their lives and find Serenity, Peace and Love. I meet people all the time that
have over-comes great obstacles growing up and are very giving, enriching and spirit-filled people. Sometimes we have to accept
that the things we cannot change will have a defining moment, after all Jesus Promises that all we need do is keep our eyes
upon HIS Face. There will Serenity…Falcon Serenity Unveiled / Better Tomorrows
“Those
who follow God belong to HIS Family…..”
-Matthew 12: 46-50
Father
God, Take me in Your arms and teach be Father to be what You would have me be in family, community, and life Lord. I need
You to replace any old non-constructive-ness in my thinking, in my habits, in my behavior, I know its You who have healed
our land before Lord and You we need to heal our land and our Lives.. Make me an example of your Love Father……..
Any Materials accepted by Better Tomorrows in-Section the Author is listed
and we might or might not be in total agreement with their opinion or description of facts they are presented however for
the sole purpose of God’s people growing in Christ…… Dr. Raymond Blank
Better Tomorrows
Http://BetterTomorrows.Tripod.com
E-mail:
BetterTomorrows@Live.com
