Sleep: A Rehearsal for Death

It shouldn't be a foreign concept. Christians everywhere are taught as little children to say an Act of Contrition before they go to bed. The traditional prayer originally read:

Now I lay me down to sleep,
I pray the Lord my soul to keep.
If I should die before I wake,
I pray Thee, Lord, my sould to take.

In our modern times the prayer has been cleaned up to avoid the mention of death.

It's a shame.

In fact, nothing so mimics or prepares or rehearses us for death like going to sleep. Little children know this. I think they feel better when we acknowledge it.

It's why they don't want you to leave. It's why they want another drink of water, another story, another prayer, another back rub.

Puh-leeeez. I can hear you think, you know!

I have a major advantage over most adults I know. I have acute memories of childhood. I know exactly what many things feel like to a child because I've never forgotten. To be hurt monstrously over miniscule things.

The intense joy of finding a doll you left under a tree in the park yesterday that you were sure would be gone the next day. To be not afraid but actually terrified of the dark.

Going to sleep is a little letting go of consciousness. Death is the ultimate letting go of consciousness. We reasonable adults understand this difference, but little people feel everything so intensely, they are so consumed by the present moment, every small ending seems so final. And by golly, most kids want to squeeze EVERYTHING out of TODAY.

Ah, how we should envy them.

Many, not all, but especially the very sensitive ones, the deep thinkers, they get frightened sometimes of letting go.

Oh, you can brush off my words, you can, but if you've got a child who resists bedtime every night, you still might consider my suggestions.

I suggest that children, all children, should be gentled to sleep. Not put to sleep or sent to sleep, but loved to sleep. And they should feel safe at night, in the dark. Because somehow, God seems closer to all of us in the dark hours of the day, if only we're noticing. And we want to give children the experience of a God Who is Love.

"Do not go gentle into that good night.
Rage, rage against the dying of the light."
-Dylan Thomas

"So runs my dream: but what am I?
An infant crying in the night:
An infant crying for the light:
And with no language but a cry."
-Alfred Lord Tennyson

I always get these poems running through my head when I hear mothers talking about letting their babies cry it out, or locking their toddlers in their rooms. And I always think of the Beatitutde- blessed are they that mourn, for they shall be comforted, and comfort the sorrowful (spiritual works of mercy). And I remember that all too soon there will come a day when I will wake in the night and hear...

Nothing.

And I will ache for the days- and nights- gone by.

"Sleep, baby, sleep!
Thy father guards the sheep,
Thy mother shakes the dreamland tree,
And from it fall sweet dreams for thee;
Sleep, baby, sleep!
Sleep, baby, sleep!

Sleep, baby, sleep!
The large stars are the sheep,
The little ones the lambs, I guess,
The gentle moon the shepherdess,
Sleep, baby, sleep!
Sleep, baby, sleep!

Sleep, baby, sleep!
Our Savior loves His sheep,
He is the Lamb of God on high,
Who for our sakes came down to die,
Sleep, baby, sleep!
Sleep, baby, sleep!"

-German lullaby

Ritual for a Mother

Rituals- toothbrushing and facewashing before bed, coffee and the paper at 6am- soothe the body and nurture the spirit. But the ritual of prayer, it does something even deeper.

It feeds the Soul.

Everyone has rituals. Even the people who claim they hate ritual.

Everyone needs rituals.

I used to be the maven of the bedtime ritual around here, but since moving here, myhusband has taken over. A big benefit of his new job is thathe is here, every night. Without exception.

So John Paul and I have a magical hour to ourselves, while Dad gentles Brother and Sister off to dreamland. After his bath, John gets tucked into his second-hand jogging stroller with a warm blanket (the nights here are already growing chilly), and off we trot.

I have a Rosary swinging from one hand as we glide down the hill to the park. A park here isn't much more than a patch of grass with a track around it, a far cry form the acre-after-acre-parks of our hometown, but it's all I need tonight. There are no park lights or street lights around here: when night falls, night falls.

And being in the mountains, the earth is dark while the sky is still bright. Prayer is effortless under the circumstances.

With every step the cares of the day peel away from my soul, a little bit more and a little bit more. The darkness feels like a pool where I come and wash my spirit.

The love of the Triune God is burning there, here, within, waiting. And when the words of the prayers open me, and I connect with that furnace, the past and the future are burned away leaving only the present moment. Flooded with Grace.

John Paul never lets me get too lost in my prayers, as he eventually points up the hill and cries, "Home! Night-night!"

And so we go.

Generally speaking, I don't 'find' time for prayer. But a priest told me once, you must avoid occasions of sin; you must create occasions of grace. Just as I order the environment for my children towards joyful learning, I strive to order my own environment towards prayer. We have little rituals- prayer before meals and each time we get into the car. In fact, I used to use my driving time as my Rosary time at times when home was so busy and so hectic, I'd fall into bed exhausted and realize I'd barely nodded at my God all day. Unfortunately, there just isn't anywhere far enough away from you in a small town to get much prayer done on a car ride!

This half an hour tryst with my stroller is my own answer to a mother's busy life, for now at least.

"The hunger for love is much more difficult to remove than the hunger for bread."
-Mother Teresa

"Pray, hope, and don't worry. Worry is useless. God is merciful and will hear your prayer."
-Padre Pio

Prayer is the Answer

What was the question?

A Montessori Rosary and an Easy, Peasy Pita Lunch

I try very hard to help my children pray. Not just endure our Holy Hours in our Adoration Chapel. Pray. Communicate with God. And, well, it’s tough. After all, it is difficult, no, CONTRARY to a child’s nature, to sit quietly in a silent chapel. For an hour.

For several months we have been using the fantastic suggestions from http://mostholyrosary.org/childjesus/childrens_holy_hour.htm
Thanks to Brenda, who sent me that link! But for May, the Rosary! I was inspired as I dilly-dallied in bed, tangled up in several children.


Here are the materials- prayer rug (we take these every week and they are simply table runners cut in half and hemmed), Rosary picture book, basket, rock, 10 flowers (I am a pathetic gardener and the only flowers in our yard are dandelions and clover):

I will tell you how we used these in a moment. Three bags packed and ready to go:

Tromping to the chapel:

Each child set up, turning to the first Luminous mystery picture, and this is how we prayed the Montessori Rosary:
During the Our Father, the children picked up the rock and held it or looked at it, or pretty much whatever they wanted to d with it short of throwing it. After the prayer, they set the rock in the basket and picked up a flower. “Hail Mary” while holding, sniffing, or thinking about the flower.

(Since ever I can remember, I have told my children that every Hail Mary in every Rosary they pray blossoms eternally in Heaven; when they get their they will see a field all their own of these glorious flowers.) Repeated for 10 Hail Mary’s. On the Glory Be, they removed the rock and dumped the flowers back in their place.

A decade of the Rosary:

Rosie liked this best. She actually concentrated for 3 mysteries.

Isaiah went back to his Rosary ring after the first mystery, but he said he enjoyed it. Maybe next time I will let him use pebbles instead of flowers and we’ll talk about spiritual ammunition.
John Paul participated. Actively. Very actively, the whole way through.

Prostrating to concentrate:

I closed our formal prayer time after the first 3 mysteries. About 20 minutes. The rest of the Hour was filled with writing petitions for the petition box, checking the holy water fonts, and looking through holy cards.


"Never give to the mind more than you give to the hand."
-Maria Montessori


Afterwards, we were famished. And lunch was long past by the time we made it home.

Thursday is usually pita day. Anything works in a pita. PB&J, hummus, veggies with leftover meat, mashed up beans with sprouts. So here are the plates we sat down to after a super-quick (8 minutes?), super-easy lunch prep with the help of Eden organic, BPA-lining-free black beans. (Yes, it's cheaper and better to cook your own. But we're talking 2pm and no one's eaten lunch and you didn't think about that this morning.) Simply pitas stuffed with black beans and a bit of mayo. The silver cup holds homemade salad dressing/ dipping sauce.

And a toddler plate with leftover pancakes:

Super-healthy. Awfully delicious. Easy, peasy.


The spirit cannot endure the body when overfed, but, if underfed, the body cannot endure the spirit.
-St Frances de Sales