Over at Aleteia this past weekend I took in How To Train Your Dragon 2. For reasons I get into during the review, I was kind of taken with the film’s depiction of Stoick and Hiccup’s father/son relationship. What can I say, I’m a sucker for stories with that kind of theme. After all, it’s not easy being a good dad. Even the best ones need advice every now and then…
You know who would have appreciated the last lesson on that list? G.K. Chesterton. He had a thing or two to say about the “monotony” of raising a child:
“Because children have abounding vitality, because they are in spirit fierce and free, therefore they want things repeated and unchanged. They always say, "Do it again"; and the grown-up person does it again until he is nearly dead. For grown-up people are not strong enough to exult in monotony. But perhaps God is strong enough to exult in monotony. It is possible that God says every morning, "Do it again" to the sun; and every evening, "Do it again" to the moon. It may not be automatic necessity that makes all daisies alike; it may be that God makes every daisy separately, but has never got tired of making them. It may be that He has the eternal appetite of infancy; for we have sinned and grown old, and our Father is younger than we.”
I hope all you dads out there who manage, like God, to get up and keep doing it again every day, had a happy Father’s Day. The galaxy is a better place for your efforts.
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