The series is dedicated to “educating in the faith” on the topic of the sacraments as a means to educate our children. This week: Confirmation.
As we saw in the post about baptism, parents assume that day, freely and voluntarily, a series of commitments that with the celebration of confirmation our children will have to assume as their own. I believe that the sacrament of confirmation is not lived with all the intensity, strength, and depth that it implies. It is as if Pentecost had been just another Sunday in the lives of the apostles, the Virgin Mary, and the Church. The Church will likely struggle to give it the importance it has, but work must continue to convey it better.
60 or 70 years ago it was celebrated even when the child lacked consciousness, at two or three years old. Little by little it was delayed. My older sisters received it when they were 6 years old, and today it is celebrated with adolescence, around 16 years old, but unfortunately, there is no firm criterion. We are trying to see when it can be more effective so that the confirming party assumes and integrates the commitment and can be a turning point to become an active part of the Church, instead of being the last day that he returns to his parish before your wedding.
Let’s get to the heart of it.
The Holy Spirit comes from heaven and joins you! Is it impressive or not?!
Probably, the fact that it is a sacrament in which the confirmation and has the active role of requesting confirmation and that the symbols are as simple as the anointing with the holy oils and the laying on of hands by the bishop, can give the impression that the protagonist is the young man and that God has little to do.
However, if we go to the origin of the sacrament, we see that Jesus, at the Last Supper, told us: “It is not you who have chosen me, it is I who have chosen you, and I have destined you to go and bear fruit, and your fruit lasts.”
Naturally, even if we are elected, we can reject him. This is the great gift of God, he gave us the total freedom to love him or reject him, to worship him or crucify him, but even taking the opposite direction does not mean that we are not chosen by him.
And once we accept his call, that is when God takes an active role as only in the sacraments can occur and descends into the third Person of him to take our soul as his home.
Once again, it is such a huge mystery that what human could have thought of it?
It is a fact that should strengthen not only the faith of the confirming party, but also that of his entire family, but for that to happen we must participate in it. Let’s not settle for taking the kid to catechism, and arriving 10 minutes late to pick him up.
How can we miss the opportunity of the confirmation of one of our children to talk about God, about faith, about life with our children? I think it is the right time to ask them to help us renew our faith. They, who are preparing for the Holy Spirit to conform their hearts to God once and for all, help us, through conversation, to remember the wonder of believing and waiting for the Lord.
