One of my favorite passages from my readings in von
Balthasar is one in which a child begins to experience the absolute in its
life.
"Its ‘I’ awakens in the experience of a ‘Thou’: in its
mother’s smile through which it learns that it is contained, affirmed and loved
in a relationship which is incomprehensibly encompassing, already actual,
sheltering and nourishing. The body
which its snuggles into, a soft, warm and nourishing kiss, is a kiss of love in
which it can take shelter because it has been sheltered there a priori.... a light which has been
perpetually asleep awakens at some point into an alert and self-knowing
light. But it awakens at the love of the
Thou, as it has always slept in the womb and on the bosom of the Thou....
therefore it is right that the child should glimpse the Absolute,... first in
its mother, its parents, and that only in a second and third stage does it have
to learn to distinguish the love of God from the love which it has experienced
in this way."
Again while reading von Balthasar’s study of St.Therese, Two Sisters in the Spirit, he reflects
on her prayer life.
Therese cannot pray in a vacuum. She prays with her parents,
or her sisters, or the maid, but each time her prayer as a kind of festival, a
festival in the communion of saints. Praying brings into communion with her mother,
her father and her sisters. For part of her experience in prayer is conditioned
by the presence of beloved persons: presence of human love is a sort of token
for the presence of God. How otherwise can a child be trained in prayer, in
realizing the invisible presence, except by the sacrament of visible, tangible
love?
In both passages the parent-child relationship and its
importance in the formation of the child’s concept and experience God is
realized.
Balthasar goes on to explore Therese’s prayer and its
connection to parents. He quotes from The
Hidden face: A Study of St. Therese of Lisieux.
‘To be good in Therese's world means only one thing: to do
the will of the father, to give joy to her mother. Guilt means only one thing:
having hurt her parents. Repentance and pardon blot out misbehavior entirely,
instantly and without question.” That is the first and basic ethical experience
from when she never departs. Quoting Therese herself, “Even
when I was three years old, there was no need to scold me in order to make me
better. One kind word was enough, and has been all my life, to show me my
faults and cause me to repent.”
Balthasar reflects: And yet one wonders whether Therese was
really an exception, or whether similar effects would not be produced in most
children (who would love God in a personal way and without fear) if only
parents showed children deeper Christian love and humility.
