I sometimes feel anxious about my children’s futures. I sometimes watch the news and wonder how on earth my children will make their way in this broken world. Someone once advised me, though, that rather than wringing our hands with worry over our children’s futures, we should instead get busy praying for those futures:
1. Pray for your child to know his/her vocation and to be open to the will of God.
2. Pray for your children’s future spouses. Don’t wait until the engagement to start praying for your future sons and daughter-in-laws. You might not know them yet, but you can start praying right now that the people whom your children will marry will avoid bad influences and seek to know, love, and serve God. Pray for their moral safety and right judgment. Ask Mary to keep them close to her heart and ask their guardian angels to protect them from harm and help them grow in virtue.
We can’t control our children’s futures, but we can beg God’s grace for them and their futures every day — starting now.
O God, the father of mankind,
Who has given me these, my children,
And committed them to my charge to bring them up for You,
And to prepare them for life everlasting;
Assist me with Your heavenly grace,
That I may be able to fulfill my sacred duty and stewardship.
Teach me both what to give and what to withhold,
When to reprove and when to praise.
Make me gentle, yet firm, considerate and watchful,
And deliver me equally from the weakness of indulgence
And the excess of severity.
Grant that both by work and example,
I may be careful to lead them in the way of wisdom
And true piety; so that at last I may,
With them, be admitted to the joys of our true home in heaven.
Amen.
(Catholic.org)