"And that is bad because?" is our reply.
"But won't your kids be sheltered?" people ask about our decision to home school.
"And that is bad because?" is our reply.
"But won't your kids be sheltered?" people ask about our decision to keep alcohol out of our home.
You get the idea.
I don't understand the stigma that comes with the word "sheltered." A shelter is a good thing. It keeps out those things which are too powerful for us to withstand, such as wind, rain, hail, dirty magazines, drugs, ridicule, abuse, and shame, to name a few. Children are tender, like green shoots. Their roots are delicate and easy to pull out of the ground. Though I can appreciate many different parenting styles, I see nothing wrong with sheltering my four green shoots until they are tough, thick trees, with root systems that a mack truck could not move.
Well, OK, so maybe there is one bad thing about sheltering children. Their theology might just become a bit, shall we say, skewed.
Take Bright, for example, who saw an open beer can on the picnic table the other day that some friends had brought. No one ended up wanting to drink the thing (the friend who brought it along actually thought it was a vegetable juice, and in her defense, it did have "V8" printed on the label in English). So there it sat, right in front of Bright.
When I noticed him nervously eating his lunch behind the open beer can, I offered, "Would you like me to move this can from the table, Bright?"
To which he replied, quite relieved, "Yes, it is making me uncomfortable. I am a believer."
Oh dear.
.JPG)
