Christian Unschooling: Should Parents Demand Obedience from Their Children?

Not so long ago, I was reading a spiritual book that mentioned monks and their life of poverty, chastity and obedience. And this got me thinking about obedience. Monks are obedient to their superiors and the rule of their order. They are imitating Jesus who was obedient to God the Father even until death.

Obedience is obviously good so perhaps Christian parents should demand obedience from their children. Yes, our kids should obey us. We are their superiors. We know what’s good for them. When our kids obey us, they learn to submit their wills. They learn what THEY want is unimportant. Ultimately, they will surrender their wills in favour of God’s.

Or will they?

I think there’s a huge difference between the situation of a monk and a child. A monk chooses to give up his will. A child doesn’t. His parents take it away from him.

We all have free will. And all of us have to be willing to give it up. Because there are times when we have to do what is right rather than what we might like. But we don’t learn how to do that by being forced. Breaking our wills isn’t the way to conform them to God’s. But love is.

We often talk about unschooling in terms of freedom. We want to be free. And we should be free. We should be free so that we can choose to be self-giving. So that we put others ahead of ourselves. So that we can give ourselves to God. Because we love.

The motivation to do what is right shouldn’t be about punishments and fear and consequences, should it? It should be all about love.

Something Extra

If you do a bit of googling, you will discover parenting ‘experts’ who say that kids should obey their parents. If we don’t insist on obedience, we’re being lazy. Because, of course, training our kids to be obedient requires a lot of hard work. We need to be consistent. For example, we might have to return a child to his bed dozens of times before he gets the idea that we’re not going to give in and let him stay up. And this is hard when we’re tired. We’d much rather relax on the sofa in front of the TV instead of jumping up every couple of minutes to exert our will over our child’s. But our efforts will be rewarded. Just imagine how wonderful it will be when we only have to say something once before our kids do exactly what we want.

Yes, having obedient kids might be convenient for the parent. But is required obedience good for the child? And if we demand obedience, will we end up missing out on something very important?

I wrote about obedience in my story Can We Be Both Parent and Friend? Here’s an excerpt:

There was a time years ago when I just wanted my kids to obey me. I’d had enough of encouraging, bribing, threatening, explaining, begging, or turning everything into a game to get them to do what I thought was right. I was tired. I just wanted to shout, “I’m the parent, and you’re the child. Just do what I say!”

Is there anything wrong with doing this? If we shout loud enough, perhaps our kids will actually do what we want. Maybe it’s good for them to be obedient. They’d be showing respect to us and learning self-discipline at the same time, wouldn’t they? Perhaps we’d be doing our kids a favour by training them.

Training them? Those words remind me of our puppy, Quinn. My daughter Gemma-Rose is training her. She demands obedience of the dog. She says, “Sit!” and Quinn lowers her back end, her velvet soft Shar-Pei skin puddling around her Great Dane bottom.

But do kids need the same kind of training as dogs? Instead of being obedient to our commands, surely it’s better for them to choose to do what is right? And how will they ever learn to do that if we’re always telling them what to do, no questions allowed?

Whenever we say such things as “Just do it!” or “I’m the parent!” or “I don’t want to hear another word!” we close down the lines of communication between our children and us. We erect a barrier. We break all connections.

Why are connections so important? When we are connected with our kids, we are the most important people in their lives. They feel loved and respected. They trust us. When they need guidance, they look to us for our opinion. They come to us when they need help.  And it’s very likely that our connected kids will adopt our values and beliefs, the ones that we sometimes get so anxious about sharing with them.

If you’d like to read the whole story you can find it in my book Radical Unschool Love!

Photos

My daughter, Sophie, took these photos of Andy, Gemma-Rose and our dog, Quinn.

So, what do you think about obedience? Is there a tendency for Christians to demand obedience from their kids? Maybe we’re told it’s our duty to do this? Is there a better way? I’d love to hear your thoughts!