Now that I have two little boys I am often thinking about all the times in Scripture that children are depicted as the height of sanctity. On one hand, this doesn’t make a whole lot of sense. I see my two year old climbing on top of our table and getting close to jumping off and immediately think to myself, “Why are we supposed to be more like children?”

But on the other hand, it is really easy to see how Christ calls us to be more like children in today’s Gospel. They have such a beautiful innocence, they are humble because they rely on their parents for almost everything, they are more loving than anyone, and they have a contagious joy that fills the home.

There are certainly difficult moments when raising children, especially two that are under two, but the beautiful moments far outweigh the difficult ones and they even give the difficult ones purpose. When I watch my two year old laugh out loud at the wonder of bubbles or my two month old smile when he figures out his voice for the first time, I am in love.

I have to imagine that this is a small glimpse of the way God sees us all. We are all so small and insignificant compared to the glory of God, however, he chooses to love us unconditionally. We are completely dependent on God and he chooses to love us and protect us and keep us in his care. Sometimes we do things that don’t make sense. God loves us through those moments too. Like a good father guiding his children through life, God is with us.

I think perhaps today’s Gospel is meant to be read as a love letter from a father to his children. He is not so much asking us to go back to a time where we weren’t as aware of things or didn’t have knowledge of the truth, but rather, he is asking us to trust. Like the child who trusts his parents completely, God wants the same trust and humility from us so he can take care of us.

This is perhaps why the Catechism in paragraph 142 states, “By faith, man completely submits his intellect and his will to God. With his whole being man gives his assent to God the revealer. Sacred Scripture calls this human response to God, the author of revelation, the obedience of faith.”

God wants all of us. He wants us to trust him with everything that we are. This becomes difficult if we think we can do it all on our own and become our own god. But if we have the humility of a child and trust in our loving father, then God is able to love us the way that he desires, with pure, full, unconditional love.

From all of us here at Diocesan, God bless!

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