Open Mic At The IM Cafe: Horrible, Terrible Children in Church
May 10, 2009 by iMonk
A friend and I were swapping stories about the amazing, crazy, hilarious, rude, embarrassing, you-can’t-make-this-stuff-up bad behavior of some children in church. Also, we tossed in a few stories about the adults who bring them and often make things much worse.
We thought you might have some stories to share. I prefer bad behavior stories that make the entire audience wince, but will take whatever you have.
No cute stories please. I want the dark side. This is oral history. Call the Smithsonian.
You Catholics should win this thread easily. With no nurseries, you already have the table set for excitement.
I had switched churches for a while, but I went back to my old church for a visit. A redheaded lad took my superior height and girth as an indication that I wanted my manhood challenged by his alleged martial arts skills. So I slapped him around some.
Well, I was quite a prankster, which is a horrible thing to be when your father is the senior pastor. I once escaped out of the sanctuary on a Sunday morning and pulled the fire alarm. I got paddled with a wooden spoon pretty harshly for that.
I was the problem child at my church. I’d fidget during the service (pastors, never force a six-year-old to sit through your sermons if they can’t follow along), I’d run up and down the church stairs and round the building afterward, I’d make paper airplanes of the bulletins, I’d get into the kitchen and eat all the extra communion bread… People would regularly ask my mom, “Don’t you spank him?” and she’d sigh and say, “All the time.”
The source of all this extra energy? On Sunday mornings, because Sundays were special, breakfast would more often than not consist of the usual sugary stuff, topped off with jelly donuts. We could only have two per child, but sometimes I could cajole Mom into letting me have an extra donut. Being fortified with all that sugar was bad enough, but I had a certain behavioral response to certain red food dyes, which my parents had no clue about. So I’d run amok.
Most parents, particularly new parents, have no clue either. So whenever I catch the kids running crazy at my church, I usually tell the parents my story, and next week the kids are a lot calmer… ’cause this week they had eggs for breakfast, instead of pancakes with extra syrup.
As I was edging out of the pew to walk the aisle my younger brother grabbed the back of my pants and yelled so that the whole church heard,”Where’s he going, to pee?”
Weeelll… the usual crying babies, toddlers running around the place, and such, but no real horror stories. Embarrassing for the parents when little Johnny is crawling through the altar rails and dancing in the sanctuary, but amusing for the rest of the congregation.
Of course, when me and my siblings were small, we pestered the life out of our mother. My brothers climbed on, through, under and over the pews; we used to pinch one another so that she’d have to sit in the middle and keep us apart, and one time my sister and I were reading the missalette and it said “Kneel or stand” so we thought it was optional which you did, we stood up, looked around and everyone else was kneeling so we (loudly) asked her why weren’t they standing?
We were about the worst behaved that I can remember
“I’d get into the kitchen and eat all the extra communion bread”
K.W., for Catholics, the equivalent is the altar boys getting into the Communion wine. I have no knowledge of such happenings myself, I’ll have to ask my brother who was an altar boy
I used to throw spitballs at the pastor at that Church of God I often refer to – and so did his kids!
Well, I had a male cousin who we called Uncle George because he was much older than us. At my grandma’s funeral (she was Catholic…he was not) when they rang the little bell that some Catholic churches do when the priest raises the host and says, “This is my body…” George said loudly(he was probably drunk at the time too), “It’s the ice cream man!”
He was not a child, but acted like a child and that’s my best story, so there you have it.
(Michael, one thing I like about the Catholic church is being able to watch the kids. Parents try to keep them occupied by letting them play with some small toys, but it is kind of funny when a little boy will stand up and run his little cars along the back of the pew. I haven’t seen any little kids at the daily masses I attend since I can’t attend weekend masses.)
Here is a recipe for nerve shattering behaviour: 1). 2 Year old girl who has never heard the word “no”, 2). Metal folding chairs, 3). A set of car keys. To this day, which this happened over 15 years ago, I have no idea what was going through her parent’s minds. Throughout entire morning service, she happily banged those keys on every metal folding chair around her. For 45 minutes this went on – including during the preaching. Nobody ever said anything to her, to her parents, or as far as I know, to each other! Strange stuff.
i grew up catholic.. and apparently, my parents claim, i was a “little shit” at church… once running right up to the altar and often starting sneaky fights with my little bro. for the years i spent as an evangelical, apart from going to a church where some guy brought his dog and sat right by my daughter who was scared of dogs, i only remember one child who was let to run through the church, and that was because even though he wasn’t the only one, this kids mother just let him. don’t know if she was just careless or too afraid to discipline or what but it happened several times and really pissed a lot of people off. kids are kids but for cryin out loud parents are supposed to be parents. i never really cared that a child got a little out of control as long as the parent was making an attempt to regain it. after returning to the catholic church it seemed i can’t say that i’ve really seen too much different for the lack of a nursury, though there is a room for nursing women in every catholic church i’ve been to where they can take infants. about the worse i can think of is when the parents won’t take a loud crying baby to that room, (hint:dads give the wife a break and take the kid once in a while). it can be distracting.
This is a story from a past coworker of my wife, but I think it’s worth sharing…
He was about 8 at the time, fidgeting, moving around a lot, and being a general nuissance during the pastor’s sermon. After his mom warned him several times, she took him by the arm and dragged him out of the service. As they were on their way out, he yelled so everyone could hear, “No Mom! Please don’t beat me!” (And she had never spanked him in his life).
When I was a teen (still counts as a child, right?), a buddy and I liked to sit in the back pew. We would roll up attendance cards and bend them in half to make darts. Then we would launch them in a high arc across the sanctuary using a rubber band slingshot (a rubber band pulled between the middle finger and thumb). We were never caught; I have no idea why. If I ever catch my kids doing that… I’ll laugh my butt off, and then punish them.
This one was not the child’s fault, but I do remember a new mother who sat in the 3rd row and nursed her baby (obviously) each week. Not a good idea.
Then we also had a father who brought his 5 year old daughter to church but allowed her to terrorize the unoccupied SS rooms during the service because he said it “didn’t pleasure her to sit during the service.”
We currently have a fairly new facility, but in the old one, before it was torn down, there was a furnace room. Worship in the old building predates my time at this church, but the furnace room remains an integral memory for many of the youth in our church who remember it vividly as the place of spankings. Ill-behaved children were taken, mid-scream-and-tantrum down the stairs and into the furnace room…. AAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHH{door closes} [silence].
ahh the false memories I’ve created imagining what it must have been like mid-sermon….
Grace and Peace,
`tim
About a year and a half ago as I was preaching a cell phone rang. The woman answered it, said “hello”, the a pause, and “How are you!” and proceeded to carry on a conversation while I continued the delivery of the Word.
Oldest child, then 5, in overcrowded suburban Catholic church. We’re in chairs against the back wall, so to kneel for the canon we have to go forward several feet to the kneeler behind the last pew.
The moment of the elevation; all are kneeling, all are utterly silent, all are worshipping Christ present in our midst … and my child, still sitting in her chair several feet behind me, yells out clear as a bell: “I won’t kneel! I won’t! YOU CAN’T MAKE ME KNEEL!!”
All heads turn (or so it felt) to see what insensitive mother was forcing her small child to her knees. I wanted to die.
Blaine: you get to use those words? You’re very fortunate — us evangelicals don’t, at least not publicly. Ah, the glorious freedom of the children of God.
My story has a happy ending … somehow as a tyke I had gotten into a paper-eating habit (edges of newspapers were my favorite). But that was broken one day in a low-church Episcopal service when I began to tear the corner off a page in my mother’s Book of Common Prayer. My usually calm mom went quietly apoplectic, and I got scared straight in a hurry …
We were heathens at church as teenagers. We would sit behind our friends and when everyone stood up, we’d stand up hymnals in their seats so when they sat down they’d be goosed by the hymnals. It turned into war and got out of hand. Poor hymnals…
May as well provide a theme song for the thread…
From Doctor Demento of old –
“Two Dreadful Children” by Cruella DeVille!
The one that sticks in my mind was when my youngest daughter threw her post-Sunday school Dixie cup of lemonade into another girl’s face. She never did apologize. Being a good Christian mom I’m waiting for the day she’s complaining about her own children’s behavior to bring that one up. Only kidding.
And there was the time that the autistic kid I was buddying bit right through my favorite sweater; he was aiming for my stomach, but fortunately missed. But I didn’t blame him for it, as they were giving the other kids sugar cookies that he wasn’t allowed due to a gluten allergy. Wouldn’t that send any six-year-old into a biting rage?
I was known for being a handfull in church in my younger days. The famly story is that I did not understand retorical questions. Our minister loved using them in his sermons. So he would ask a question and after no one answered for a second I would yell the answer to him after jumping up and down waving my hand in the air(like at school). I do remember thinking that no in church was paying attention because they could not answer these simple questions. I guess it was a lot of fun for the congragation.
A local Christian celeb was performing at a very large AoG my parents were attending (I was about 1 at the time). Right at the climax of her rendition of “O For a Thousand Tongues”, I let out a rafters-shaking belch. The singer was completely thrown off her game as the congregation erupted into laughter.
Not sure if there’s a difference between a nursery and a “cry room,” but more and more Catholic churches have the latter these days. Mine does not. My kids have been bad from time to time, but I have a tendency to just tuck them under my arm like a football and barrel and plow into the back of the building.
The all time worse story I’ve ever heard was about a kid…and I wouldn’t have believed this if my wife, who never lies, hadn’t told me…this kid was actually masturbating in the pew.
I’ve experienced kids who were louder and more disruptive, but that takes the cake.
I did pulpit supply at a Baptist church yesterday–mostly older people, but with a middle-school aged boy there as well. The boy sat through the sermon respectfully (or at least quietly). Afterward, some members of the congregation were telling me that it was not always that way with this boy. One time, when he was about six years old, he apparently threw such a maniacal fit (throwing himself onto the ground and screaming and whatnot) that it took four grown men to haul him out of the sanctuary (one per limb) as he continue to throw his fit . I’d never heard anything quite like that before.
So I guess you’ve met my kids then?
I have two stories, probably not competitive though. The first a couple of years ago my oldest son was jumping around in the pew and ignoring my warnings so I dragged him out to discipline him and bellow at him but I didn’t drag him out far enough. I took him only into the vestibule and because it was the 7:15 am quiet no choir mass everyone got a good earful, although they’re way too polite to say anything. My wife was mortified of course. Second story is very recent, this time it involved our second son who is 18 months and displaying the terrible two temper tantrums and hating to be restrained when he’d rather walk. I’m ushing this time so I’m no help, halfway across the Church, when she has to scoop him up to get in the communion line. This time it’s a Saturday evening mass and it’s very full. The choir sings one song during communion and the congregation is quiet in thankful prayer when the second half, those in the back, go up to receive. Naturally number two son starts to wail and squirm in Mom’s arms and resists every soothing attempt. You might’ve have thought it was an abduction if you didn’t know better. All the way up to communion and back.
I was fairly good in church but my brother was different story. When he was a teenager he was sitting on the second aisle right in front of the preacher. I don’t know what he was doing but my dad could tell it was disturbing the preacher at the time. My dad during the middle of the sermon got up walked down the center aisle pulled my brother by the scruff of the shirt took him back to where my parents were sitting and made him sit in the floor in the aisle. To this day our whole family remembers that story and none of us ever acted up in church again.
The preacher commended my dad for what he did.
I recall visiting a church in our college town during my freshman year. When the pastor called the children up for the children’s sermon, a handful of kids went up and sat around his feet. As the pastor got underway, one little fellow looked back, and realizing that all eyes in the sanctuary were on him and the other children, his embarrassment level began to soar. With his hands in his jacket pockets, he had soon pulled his jacket up over his head, trying to hide from all the observers. But that wasn’t enough! Apparently still feeling exposed to be up front, he began to crawl backward back down the aisle, with his jacket still over his head, until he reached his parents’ row, and they were able to snatch him up out of the aisle. I’m not sure that a single adult in the service heard a word the pastor shared with the other children! And no doubt that little fellow is carry a wound that he’ll need some inner healing to dispel, now that he’s an adult!
My wife’s parents were missionaries, then pastors, on the Navajo rez. Her little brother was something of a terror. One Sunday he did some kind of loud misbehavior during the service, so Mom goes back to deal with it. As she is hauling him out the back of the church to administer justice, li’l bro (who couldn’t pronounce his S’s at the time) shouted out “Hock it to me, momma! Hock it to me!” I think it effectively ended the service.
I go to a PCA Church. Sunday, a week ago, at the second service, I was sitting behind a row of three boys (two brothers and a friend) about 8-10 years old, a couple of 30-something Moms and some other assorted children. Our church uses movable upholstered chairs.
The Elder Boy of the brothers proceeded to tear his bulletin into tiny, little pieces and launch them around. Flip his flip-flops off his feet to see how far they would go. Crawl in, around, and under the chairs. Push his chair back, inch-by-inch, until it rested against the empty chair next to mine. The other Boy, next to him, was trying to behave better. At one point, he told him, soto voce, to knock it off, so he pulled his chair back, and flopped his head against the back and started kicking the seat in front of him.
Well, this got the attention of Mom, several seats down, who tried to get *his* attention. This went on for 5 minutes. Finally, gently explained to him that what he was doing wasn’t very nice; could he please stop? Thank you. Smile.
A few minutes pass, and it all begins to escalate again…this time with Little Brother in tow. Now there are two Boys climbing in, around, and through; shooting flip-flops and paper wads into the aisle, the seats, the folk around them. Mom gets up. Walks over to her Boys, and walks past them, oblivious. She’s going to the Ladies Room! By now, I am trying to decide: take the Boys in hand myself, get the Mom, leave, ask for God to intervene, WHAT?!?
Soon, Little Brother is stretched out on the floor, under the seats, ready to take a nap. There are torn up bits of paper everywhere. Shoes are scattered about. And the elder Brother is on the move again, as is his chair. Mom returns, steps over her Boys, their shoes, and the paper detritus, and returns to her seat.
Huh. The amazing “Spirit-filled” chair is next to me again, the Kid underneath, barefoot, and chewing on the paper bits. The Friend is sitting quietly, looking around, looking at his Mom, like, “Help?!?”. Elder Boy’s Mom is listening intently to the sermon. Finally, Friend’s Mom, who is sitting next to these boys’ Mom, calls the kid over, and puts her arm around his shoulder, and calms him down. The place is a mess. But quiet descends upon all.
The 90 minute worship service is now about over. And all people say “AMEN!!!”
When I was about 15, we had a guest preacher who was particularly animated in his sermon. Being on the stoic end of the spectrum, our CoC congregation was not particularly used to that. We teenagers were sitting, as was customary, in our back-row pew when this preacher began with the arms-flailing “THUN-DAAH, AND-UH LIGHT-NIN’-UH!” in describing Noah’s flood and the perishing of the sinners.
All of us bums could hold it in no longer as we giggled cracked at each crescendo-ing grunt and scream. At one point it was full-out laughter. At that time the preacher called us out from the pulpit, “Knock it off–you’re distracting me!”; which of course got the rest of the congregation to start snickering.
Distraction, indeed. Not a single one of us was reprimanded in any way, that I know of.
Hmmmm…didn’t grow up going to church, and when I first became a Christian at 24, I went to a church where all the kids were sent out to “kid’s church”, so if they were unruly, we didn’t see it.
Now we’re Catholic. I think all of my kids had naughty moments from time to time, but they usually weren’t intentionally naughty. Like the time the priest was being rather enthusiastic in making a point and about shouted “Do you understand?” In the dramatic pause that followed, my 2-yr-old shouted back, “NO!”
That was the youngest. When she first learned to walk, it was really hard to keep her contained. Once she slipped out of the pew and was marching down the aisle toward the altar. I scurried after her and grabbed her just before she lifted the hem of Father’s cassock to see what was under there. Thank goodness I got there in time!
The middle one learned to say “Bye-bye” at about 9 months. We would sit in the back row to make quick exits with a crying baby or toddler, of course. There’s this THING about some Catholics leaving Mass right after receiving the Eucharist. They aren’t supposed to unless it’s an emergency — the priest is supposed to be the last one into Mass and the first one out — but people get in bad habits. Anyway, we were sitting back by the door, and as people left right after receiving the Eucharist, my daughter would smile and shout, “Bye-bye!” at each one of them. The early-goers got so embarrassed, some turned around and slipped into a back pew. Father asked us to sit by there every week!
My oldest took the cake. He was maybe 18 months old, and we weren’t Catholic yet, but visiting lots of denominations to figure out where God wanted us. He was restless — Church can feel like an hour of time-out after all, no matter what denomination you’re in. We had some soft toys for him to play with that wouldn’t make a sound if he dropped them, but he picked one up and threw it as hard as he could, whacking a lady in the back of the head. She was a mom herself, so she was very forgiving, but I was absolutely MORTIFIED.
Anyway, the nice part about being Catholic is that children are welcome, even the little ones that have little self-control and might do naughty things…or distracting things…or things that would be fine at home but have comedic effects at Church. I was always met with sympathetic smiles instead of condemnation, which wasn’t the case at the other churches. In one place, all my son did was say “Amen! a little too loud and a little too late, and boy, did we get GLARES. At another, on Easter Sunday, the preacher held up a large loaf and tore it in half, and our tot said, “Uh-oh — he bwoke it!” We were told to take him out and spank him. My goodness, he was still a toddler! At least he was paying attention.
Now all my kids — ages 9, 6 and 5 — are not only well-behaved but actively involved in Mass. They sing, pray, watch everything very closely. I sometimes get compliments on their behavior, and I always remember how difficult they were when they were tiny. But I’m glad we didn’t shuttle them out, because as young as they are, they can and do participate in the liturgy (which means “work of the people”). If we kept them out of church until they were “old enough” — jr. high at my former church — they wouldn’t know how to participate, and that’s a lousy age to make them go through all the awkwardness of not knowing their place or what to do.
Perhaps this violates the no-cuteness rule here, but when my sister was in 1st grade, she was not having a particularly cooperative day in church. Nothing terribly out of line, just the general kicking against the pew in front of us, and standing up and sitting down at the wrong times and talking out loud and bugging mom and dad for kleenex/gum/cereal and playing with her dress and just…everything.
Finally my dad had enough and he stood up, picked her up from the pew, and carried her out of the sanctuary into the narthex. When he set her down on the floor out there and kneeled down to her level to look her in the eye, he couldn’t help but notice that something was missing. “Where are your shoes?” he asked her. “They came off” she answered with tears in her eyes. This was her first time wearing slip-on shoes, and dad had apparently snatched her up from the pew with such force as to actually pull her right out of her shoes.
Well, after that, there was no way Dad could punish her, and instead had a good chuckle in the narthex before returning to the service.
Sparki,
I still get a grin when I remember your story about your son saying, “He broke it”. That’s one of the stories that stays good.
When i was 7, my Sunday school teacher told us “You too can be a missionary to your friends! You can have church with your friends!” So i invited some kids over for a bible study. I led them in prayer and we read the bible, and then I went and got a bowl and passed it around and had them give me money. My mom happened to pass by at this point and made me give them their money back.
When my little brother was about 5 or 6, he had a talking Alf doll. Alf went to church with us on a regular basis. It wasn’t my brother but Dad himself leaned over in the pew one Sunday morning and Alf started talking. He didn’t go to church with us anymore.
(No Michael, not my dad.)
I recently visited my in-law’s church (PCUSA)where I was treated to the “special” music of their tone deaf choir. I understand that they really were trying and have no doubt their efforts did bring glory to God, but at least one pre-schooler disagreed with me when she cried out in the middle, “Daddy, I can’t take it anymore!”
My young cousin Nigel was in a church that used a common cup for communion. Wine, not grape juice. As it was passed down his row, he drained it before his parents could intervene. I am told he was a little tipsy for the rest of the afternoon.
I do not have one about kids but my family looks after handicapped people. One day when the pastor was greeting everyone as they left he very kindly took one of our ladies hand and asked “how are you dear?” which she responded to ” Eat Sh*t A**hole.” he then said “thank you have a nice day”.
I just about rolled out of the church with shock and laughter.
I grew up in a Mennonite church and we had communion on Sunday evenings. Communion services tended to be a lot more serious than other Sunday-evening services. One member had a habit of wearing very tight, and very bright, polyester pants (you know like the ones that retirees in Florida wear pulled up to their armpits). But this guy didn’t pull them up to his arm pits because his stomach prevented him from doing so.
The entire congregation was standing in the pews as they waited to go forward and take the bread. There were some teens in the pew behind this man and as he stood there his pants were so tight that they highlighted a certain part of his posterior.
Well, this reminded one of the young people of something in particular, so wishing to call his friends’ attention to this, he pulled out his wallet and then took out his ATM card. He held the card out towards the man’s rear end and made an up and down swiping motion in the general vicinity of the center of the man’s butt.
A number of people who witnessed this came close to having heart attacks from trying to stifle their laughter.
This one is also not really the child’s fault: When my sister was about 3 (I would have been about 14) we were rushing to get out to church as we often were. We somehow forgot to put panties on my sister, so we’re sitting in church and she’s laying on the pew kicking her legs all around and we’re trying to keep her covered so everyone wouldn’t see she had no panties on. But, then after church when people were being social, she just lifted her skirt and poo’d on the front lawn of the church.
My sister will never ever forgive me if she finds out I told that story on her.
As a kid I remember sitting on the front steps of the podium after church chowing down on the communion leftovers with my friends – it was fun to drink lots of little cups of grape juice.
I didn’t “act up” in church. My parents’ goal in child rearing was to prepare us (my big sis and me) to live in an adult world and behave properly. This doesn’t mean I was an angel. In Jr. Hi. I learned the wonderful during-sermon (my dad’s) leafing thru the hymnal and adding “between the sheets” after each title; i.e. “His Hand is in it All” “Nearer, Still Nearer” etc.
Along this line, my dad was fired from one preaching job after telling an elder’s daughter, a senior in HS, to move away from the rest of we highschoolers and sit beside her mother. She did with very red face, knowing she deserved such.
Some of these stories are funny, but some of them make me sad. Some of the moments I regret most in my short 6 1/2 years of parenting have been on Sunday mornings trying to get my young kids to cooperate with the whole church thing. I remember one time a couple years ago, I went to drop my oldest daughter off at Sunday School so I could get to my class (My husband and I were leading a class at the time. So not going was not an option). She had been to Sunday School plenty of times, but never really warmed up to it. If you met her, you would say she is the sweetest, quietest, little thing you ever met. And, she is. It’s just that she has never liked me dropping her off in group settings (Sunday School, Bible Study, Pre-school etc.). She is very shy. Quite often she would throw an enormous tantrum when I left her…even at 4 and 5 years old. I never could predict when it was going to happen and I waivered back and forth between thinking I should discipline her for this behaviour and wishing I could get in her head to figure out a way to fix it. Anyway this particular Sunday when i went to drop her off at her class, she fell apart (falling on the ground, screaming at the top of her lungs, crying etc). Because my husband had to be at church early to practice on the worship team, I was responsible for getting our three small children ready and off to church myself (all under 5). It’s not an excuse and I’m not whining, but I was often at the end of my rope by the time I got to church. That day, I lost it with my daughter. I drug her off to the bathroom disciplined and spoke to her too harshly. It broke me.
I have since taken a big step back. I want her to find Jesus at home and at church and for me that meant re-evaluating the Sunday morning routine. She is in Kindergarten this year and has grown tremendously in this area but she still doesn’t want to go to Sunday School or Children’s Church. I don’t make her go anymore. We go to “big church” together and she sings with me, then sits quietly and colors or puts her head in my lap. I am really enjoying that time with her.
So, that’s my horrible, terrible child in church story, but it’s really more about her horrible, terrible mom
.
I remember one Sunday a group of us lads got hold of a remote controlled fart machine, which we slipped under the youth workers chair and kept setting off during the least appropriate moments of the service!
We had one little girl who liked to run up to certain people, me being one of them, and flip their skirts up into the air. She thought this was terrably funny, I was in junior high and thought quite the opposite.
Well, we were sitting in our hard wooden pews on Sunday morning, with our eyes squinched tight trying to do justice by the 20-minute silent prayer time the new pastor had instituted during the service. Someone in my row passed exuberant gas, right into that acoustically welcoming pew. This was considered rather vulgar in my family (”fart” was the F word for us), and I was 12, so I especially sought the Lord’s help in controlling my laughter. Okay, I forgot about praying at all. THEN, we all just lost it when my 4-year old sister (always a lady) said: “excuse me.”
Two stories:
Back in my church of Christ days I helped teach the toddler Sunday school class. My niece was about 3 and was in the class that day. She broke a crayon and used a blasphemous profanity. I managed to hold it together long enough to ask where she learned that word. She told me her mommy said it and I explained that I didn’t care what her mommy said at home but nana and Aunt Sara didn’t like to hear that word. I then excused myself to the ladies room and laughed until I cried.
My cousin’s little boy got kicked out of his Sunday school class on Mother’s day when he was three for throwing a chair at the Sunday school teacher. Apparently he didn’t like to do crafts and they tried to make him.
My boss and I spent about five minutes cracking up laughing about, “Uh-oh he bwoke it,” this afternoon.
Kids, church and I don’t mix very well anymore. When I was a kid we were taught the skill of sitting still for long periods of time without being fidgety and without talking (still useful when attending, say, the symphony or even the movies.)
In the last church I attended, there’s a little area where SMALL children can play quietly or be entertained with some plush toys during church. After awhile, this kid who must have been about 10 or 11 would go to the toddler area every Sunday during the sermon, sprawl out on the floor like it was his family room, and proceed to color in the coloring books (seemed a little old for ALL those activities). Kid was perfectly normal, but I can’t say about his parents–that’s what living in Calif. does to you.
I finally had to start going to another church–honest.
A couple of weeks ago, the preacher mentioned that Jesus said we must love our enemies. Quick as a flash, and clear as a bell, our six-year-old shouted out the obvious correction: “No, not our ENEMIES!”
I wonder how many of the rest of us were silently thinking the same thing …