So yeah, I am humbly grateful (very grateful!) for driven high achievers who help make the world run better and life go more smoothly for all of us, but the bottom line underscoring it all and framing a whole other, very different set of priorities in childrearing and just living, period, is that this homeless loser is a saint.
(More on S. Benedict Joseph Labre)
(More from Ellyn von Huben along the same lines)
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I have no idea who or what Amy Chua is but I’m thinking I am happy for that.
Search for “Tiger mother”….
I read portions of Chau’s article to my 11 and 10 year olds- they were livid (most likely because one of their favorite activities is their Shakespeare class)
There is a middle ground between lazy parenting and obsessive parenting like Amy Chua. Neither is healthy. I feel sorry for Ms. Chua’s daughters.
I’m too close to all this but suffice it to say that Chinese culture needs to talk to God as their emperors used to do for the whole nation but they must do it personally……but hell, if they set their mind to doing a reverse 3 1/2 somersault from the 10 meter diving platform without making a splash….it will be done. My Chinese step granddaughter knows two languages at 5 and is working on a third…and beats us all in a card memory game.
I am always in missionary mode to my Chinese half of the family but as St. Francis directed…in actions first….words second…because that is where they are at. Fr. Adrian van Kamm noted that culture proud ethnic groups are last to convert. The Samaritans were looked down on and they converted to Christ in good numbers right after the well incident. American blacks took to Christ quickly. The Pharisees saw many cures by Christ and few of them believed. France is losing its faith ever since it created haute cuisine. The Chinese are in the latter part of the spectrum. Chua’s
daughter revolted though and Chua changed within the book
but because of the wsj article, not everyone knows that.
My little Cordelia mentioned above is still dealing with the death of our dog a year later in many symbolic ways involving her always ailing dog doll of the same name. With some Franciscans…not thomists….I believe our pets will simply have a natural life in heaven. I told Cordy so. She pointed straight up to heaven…..yes I told her… and her non Christian parents smiled only and allowed her to hear that. We plod slowly as Mateo Ricci did….a ballet of advance and withdraw….a dance willed by Christ.
I love that Fr. Benedict Groeschel took the name Benedict because of this saint…
Our family was good friends with a first generation Chinese family with four daughters when we were growing up. The parents had escaped from China when Mao took over. All four daughters were expected to be the top in everything from kindergarten on, including the best violinists. When they went to college, they had to get into top Ivy League schools, and then go on to get degrees in law, medicine, engineering or some other “acceptable” profession. Only after they had at least a masters in the accepted profession were they allowed to pursue their own interests. Interestingly enough, none of the four are raising their own children this way.
Amy, thanks so much for the link to Ellen von Huben. My teens and I had a good laugh over the “Tiger Mother” article, and I seem less controlling, obsessive, pushy, etc., since then (or so it appears for the time being). I pointed out your picture to my 15 yo, and he had a good laugh over that as well. Hopefully we’ll have an opportunity to discuss this again soon.
You can’t force someone to have faith. One of my friends, now deceased, said to me (as between two young mothers) that we could only educate our children; that faith is a gift from God. But we surely can discourage them in their search for God by our own sinfulness and lack of charity.
My very favorite saints are the homeless losers!
Hi Amy,
You are the only Catholic blogger I have seen who has picked up on this Chua story. I posted the following comment last week on a Protestant blog, but would like to repost it here.
I believe the subtitle of Chua’s book should be, “Mothering in the Absence of God”:
As the parent myself of two “highly accomplished” children, I was very disturbed by the excerpt when I read it last week in the London Sunday Times. I was horrified not by what was there but by what was missing. Although I admire Chua’s self-discipline and accomplishments, and her determination to hand these traits down to her children (whom she clearly loves, and who will doubtless grow up equally accomplished), there is no mention of God or even of service to others. In short, Chua appears to lack any concept of the soul or even of herself and her children as part of a larger human family (something we Christians refer to as “love of neighbor.”) In fact, the only thing Chua appears to worship is worldly accomplishment; the only sin, to lack ambition. In this respect, her book appears to be one long drawn out song of praise to a very insidious form of idolatry.
If Chua is the “best and the brightest” that America now has to offer no wonder the country is on a moral and spiritual decline. Moreover, if we wish to draw the wrath of God down on the United States in the form of chastisements, Chua, by removing the supernatural completely out of the equation, has laid out a plan for childrearing that will do exactly that.
Thank you very much – your thoughts were my thoughts on reading the article and subsequent defenses.
In fairness to Chua she did take in her mother-inlaw after being stricken with cancer. Though she liked her mother inlaw well enough it was a sacrifice for her. Chua would take dinner to her mother inlaws room and the family would eat with the mother inlaw. Chua had a wine and cheese party for her mother inlaw in the bedroom. Chua’s mother inlaw did not like the cheeses that were selected so Chua went out and purchased new cheese.