My kids don’t get up on Sundays and ask if we’re going to church, they know that we’re going each week, it is what we do. It is something they can, and do, count on. My kids are active in Children’s Church and in our Youth Group; I believe we are very fortunate to have such a supportive church.

After all the trauma, after all the chaos that has surrounded my children before they joined our family, I have been very careful and selective in providing stability and activities that they can constantly count on. They need, and they crave uber stability in every way, shape and form. If anything, I go overboard in structure.

No one goes out the door to church without a bath or a collared shirt. No torn clothes, no raggedy shoes and no bad attitudes. Eat breakfast first, and we will not be late as I believe that indicates rudeness. Yes, I’m a Preacher’s Kid, a product of the 1950s, but it has served me and my family well.

If you don’t believe in something, you will fall for anything.

Life is hard, there will be many difficult scenarios, choices and problems for my children to face as they grow up, and it is left to me to give them a strong spiritual base. When they are grown they may choose differently but, at this point, in my house and when I am in charge, this is what we do.

I never have any refusals on Sunday mornings, sometimes we’ve had unrelated emotional breakdowns, and we’ve had to then reconfigure our schedule, but it is a very rare Sunday for my family to not be in church, maybe once a year at best.

I need my own batteries to be recharged; I need to get fired up to face each week. I need the prayer time, the praise songs, and I need to hear the Word of God in sermon form by my very capable, anointed pastor.

Truly, I fail to understand how anyone survives in this world without the assurance provided by a very strong faith.

What you can’t see as I write this, are the interruptions, the breakdown by an 11 year old that required 30 minutes of snuggling and reassurance on my part as he, after almost 7 years of living with me, hates to allow himself to trust that this is real and that is forever. Wow, we are going to church, like Mom said.