Orthodox Christian Parenting

If you've ever snapped at your child over nothing and then watched their face fall, you know how much damage one harsh word can do. This week's episode revisits some of the best moments from our full conversation with Father Stephen Muse, who joined us to talk about repentance. He tells a personal story about repairing a hard moment with his grandson, walks through how fear can quietly take over a household, and explains how our own children often help us heal the exiled parts of ourselves. 

Listen to the full episode.

Episode Recap:
  • Today we're talking with Father Stephen Muse about repentance, fear, and healing within our families. (0:00)
  • What does it look like to repent to your own child after a moment of harshness? (0:44)
  • How does fear take hold of our inner life, and how do we keep it in its place? (3:09)
  • George in Michigan asks: How do we repent of patterns we didn't choose but still carry into our parenting? (5:21)

Resources:

What is Orthodox Christian Parenting?

Orthodox Christian Parenting, hosted by Faithtree Resources Executive Director (and mom of four!) Michelle Moujaes, is a weekly podcast for parents and grandparents navigating the holy struggle of raising kids in the Orthodox Faith. Each episode offers honesty, encouragement, and practical wisdom from the Church—creating space to exhale, freedom from the pressure to be perfect, and openness to grow as you raise children who are deepening their knowledge and love of Christ.

Michelle Moujaes:

Hello everyone and welcome to a special episode of Orthodox Christian Parenting. We have now had two incredible seasons and before we're back for season three, we're putting together some of our top clips from the past year. Our first highlight is some profound wisdom from Father Stephen Muse. He talked to us about the power of repentance within our families. He shared a very personal story about repairing a moment with his grandson.

Michelle Moujaes:

He talked about how to keep fear from overwhelming our lives and how our children can actually help us heal the exiled parts of our own hearts. It's so good. Take a listen.

Father Stephen Muse:

So we live in one end of the house, and when he comes there on another end, and we try to keep a little space that's free. My office is one of those. And he knows if I'm in there, I'm working. But he likes to come down and ask me something. You know?

Father Stephen Muse:

And nine out of 10 times, you know, I'm fine. But then here's what happened. So he comes down the hall, and the part of me that's like a gestapo and a rule of something has to be kept or else a person will become an infidel or whatever. You know? Alright.

Father Stephen Muse:

Alright. So he comes down, and I'm thinking he can't find anything to do. He's got to have entertainment. And so that put a negative passion in me. So when he came in, I was a little abrupt.

Father Stephen Muse:

And I said, I'm busy now. He said, You want to be alone? I said, Yes. So it was very sweet, very nice how he said that. And then he left, and I finished working.

Father Stephen Muse:

And then when I went out, he was playing with with the yaya. He had his back to me. And normally, he's really happy to see me and everything. So I knew, okay, he's hurt. And I hurt him.

Father Stephen Muse:

So I sat there for a few minutes, and he didn't turn around or anything. And I said, Daniel, come here a second. I said, I said, when you came down to get me in my office, I was harsh with you. That hurt you, didn't it? He start he bawled and just held on to me.

Father Stephen Muse:

I said, I'm so sorry. You didn't deserve that, and I apologize. Will you please forgive me? You know? Of course, he says yes.

Father Stephen Muse:

You know? What's he gonna say? But then he did a little hide and seek game. And after that, after he recovered, he went into another room and looked at me from there. And he was acting out the residue of the disturbance this created in him.

Father Stephen Muse:

Someone with that's gone through all that he has. One harsh word from me in a moment where I'm in a passion and not wanting to be bothered by him and casting him in my mind as a child who can't be still or something. I hurt him. So that's my repentance, my confession before God.

Michelle Moujaes:

When we think about kind of the passions that we face in this world, like one that comes to mind that we hear from our audience all the time is fear. How does fear impact that inner life that I know you've taught me so much about? What what does that look like? And and what can we do about it to kind of keep it in its place?

Father Stephen Muse:

Well, if the fear is coming from, like, the people that wanna shoot the TV because of how crazy it's making them to look at all the stuff that's going on, and they need to quit chasing ambulances and concentrate on their repentance because the best thing we have to give the world is aligning with the Holy Spirit. Our martyrdom may come at some point, but, the church and even Saint John Christosom taught, don't look for it, but be manly when it comes. So the best thing we have to offer is to trust the providence of God, who has created us in love and done all things necessary for our eternal life. So we don't have to fear what's going on. We should soberly understand that politically and, in our situation, we're in some real dire times.

Father Stephen Muse:

Because ideological warfare is happening all over the place, not just for our country, but about anthropology. We have an anthropological crisis, theological anthropological crisis that's happening in our time. And so if you are on the surface of all this, there is fear and a disastrous attempt to try to fix something, but it just will exhaust you. And like Thomas Merton said to Jim Forrest in the Vietnam War, if you're not a contemplative, you'll be destroyed by your activism. We can't do anything if we're not rooted in that which is at the heart of Christ's connection between heaven and earth.

Father Stephen Muse:

So this must be our aim. We must put the kingdom of God first, but not as a virtue of good boys and girls, but for real.

Michelle Moujaes:

Okay. This one comes from George from Michigan. He asks, I was raised with a lot of fear and a lot of control, and I don't wanna repeat that. But under stress, I hear my parents' voices coming out of my mouth. How do I repent of patterns that I didn't choose but still carry with me into my parenting?

Father Stephen Muse:

That's great. That's good. He's yeah. He's one that needs a witness for what happened to him. So that means he's got, at one level, turn around and accept the pain that he got from that, and realize that as the children are at the age that he lived at a time and was undergoing that, it's gonna awaken in him the part of him that went through that.

Father Stephen Muse:

So this is an opportunity. At every age our children are, we have an opportunity to experience a connection with an exiled part of our own being that our parents we felt our parents couldn't tolerate or they were disapproving of or whatever. So we it was driven into the wilderness, like the scapegoat. Then we tried to live without part of our own vitality. And as the children grow up, we are in touch with that.

Father Stephen Muse:

So that's an opportunity to really pay attention and see what the defenses were that we acquired to survive that and watch out for how, as he's already noticed, the tendency may either be to, you know, turn it toward himself or to do the same thing. This is a great opportunity. The first chance we get is when we marry, because we're gonna go through everything with our spouse that we did. It's gonna awaken all kind of stuff because it's at the deepest level of our interior world. And then the second chance is with our children.

Father Stephen Muse:

At every age, they awaken stuff in us. So a lot of our early life, first couple of years, may be really unconscious. No awareness at all of it. When the child is 1.5 and screaming their lungs out because of their diaper needs to be changed or whatever it is. Or and it's it's it's pure rage.

Father Stephen Muse:

And that rage is without any sentimentality. It is a lightning bolt that goes right into our capacity to experience rage. And so it's gonna trigger where whatever we've got there. Now let's say I've got the Gestapo, you know, one of my inner theaters. You know, that if I got too rambunctious, it would send my mother into terrible pain with her illness.

Father Stephen Muse:

And I had a father who had paranoid schizophrenia the first four years. So I learned I better be be good. Okay? Well, that also has side effects. And so when that lightning bolt comes into you, when that child's screaming, something in you that crushes your own inner vitality may be triggered to crush that, and you don't respond properly.

Father Stephen Muse:

So you've got to come to terms with how you yourself are already, in many ways, over controlled, not allowed to breathe. You can't some people can't experience anger. Some are not allowed to have a need. They would be terribly shamed if they ask for anything. Now you get a child and they go into the store.

Father Stephen Muse:

Now, mommy, I want this. I want this. Well, the little part of you that was told that learned you can't have anything. Do you think you're gonna either let your child have anything or you're gonna give them everything? Two ends of the same stick, both wrong.

Father Stephen Muse:

And it'll be because you haven't come to terms with the own your own wanting and the shame you have that shut you down there. So all of these are part of the unfolding of a parental relationship is coming to terms with the child in me that was not allowed to live in some way. And so Jesus says, look. Stop being so high and mighty and bring those children to me. Because if you don't come to the kingdom of heaven except as a child, you can't get in.

Father Stephen Muse:

I don't care about your resume. I want to know you. Wow. I want communion with you. I don't care that you made a's and b's.

Father Stephen Muse:

It's wonderful if you did, but if you don't have communion, what good is it? So we've we've opened up a whole new dimension here with this man's question because the confrontation with the child outside of us is a confrontation with the child inside us. Wow. And both othernesses, our child and the inner child, deserve our attention. And if we're gonna give it attention, we can't be dismissive, punishing.

Father Stephen Muse:

We have to be open to hear what it is you want to tell me.