The sweet years

Now into my first year of being chaplain of school kids from Grade 1 to senior high, I feel I have the privilege of enjoying the innocence and exuberance of children. I thank God for this opportunity, because I frankly get charged, not worn out, whenever I get the chance to interact with them. They are like a fresh breeze to a tired person.

I consider those at ages 7 to 12 to be the sweet years for everybody-the children themselves, the parents and the teachers. That's the stage where the kids can already do things more or less on their own, though they still depend on their parents and elders.

That's also the time when the children are most eager to know things, their curiosity at a heightened state, and when they are so transparent they say what's in their mind more or less spontaneously to parents and elders.

How important therefore it is that this transparency be kept and developed as children grow! By constant show of affection and concern, this ideal situation can always be attained.

It's in this period that the children are most moldable. When told properly, they get things easily, still undisturbed by complicated circumstances. That's why it's important that they are supervised very closely so that the lessons, the virtues and values that they need acquire and develop are learned.

In this regard, parents should give special attention to how the children are learning the virtue of modesty and purity. This is a most delicate aspect that, I imagine, parents have almost the exclusive duty to inculcate on their children.

These virtues play a special role in the spiritual life of the children. The faculties of the body-feelings, emotions, passions, memory, imagination, etc.-need to be properly imbued with the proper virtues and values, otherwise they can give a lot trouble.

Parents, therefore, have to be properly trained to carry out this duty. Due to its very nature, sex education to children, properly understood, is almost an exclusive domain of the parents who are the ones with the natural duty to go intimate with the children. They are the ones who should be the first to enter into the minds and hearts of the children.

Children at this stage should already be told about the nature and meaning of modesty and chastity. They can easily understand, for example, that the attire does not only cover the body, but also dresses our person, and that it shows how we want to be known by others, as well as the respect we want to receive and give to the others.

Parents should be wary that while children are naturally simple and spontaneous, the kids should not be indiscriminate in dealing with their intimate selves. The children should learn how to be discerning and should only confide themselves or reveal themselves in a proper way to the proper persons, and not just in any way to anybody.

This is especially true when the children start to interact with new friends and acquaintances in the neighborhood, in the schools and other places. They have to be carefully watched so that they can be given as promptly as possible the proper instructions, reminders or even corrections.

When they approach the difficult years of adolescence, they should already be told about the physiological changes that can take place in their bodies, and the effects these changes can have on way they think and behave.

They should be told clearly about the dignity of the human body and the need to treat it with respect, avoiding anything that would reduce it merely as an object, either of pleasure or curiosity or play. With delicacy, they should be taught about the facts of life. These truths should be taught by the parents, first of all. It would likely be a disaster, or at least worrisome, when the children would just learn these things in the streets.

Fathers with their sons and mothers with their daughters would be the ideal arrangement. And all possible issues related to modesty and chastity should be tackled, always considering, of course, the state of readiness of the children to receive the information.

It has to be a man-to-man talk or woman-to-woman chat done in an atmosphere of complete confidence and trust.

Thus when they reach adolescence when they need independence, they would know how to think and act with respect to modesty and chastity.

And they will contribute to make a healthier society.