Our modern culture isn’t built for big families. I mean, when has a game show ever given away an all-expenses-paid trip to an island for a family of eight or ten or more? Two parents (maybe), two children (three, tops) is what is considered acceptable nowadays.
I believe there are a number of reasons for this.
In a vicious cycle, starting with expensive college loans, we set up our lives to require two incomes from the beginning, and so to pay for bills accumulated in college (because so many of us believe that we each need to go to college), both Mom and Dad have to work – usually full-time and away from the home. Which means, childcare, and paying for childcare for more than one or two children at a time is borderline impossible for most of us. I’ll tell you what, it was physically painful to give away half of my take-home pay for the first five years of motherhood to pay for childcare while I worked a job I didn’t want to in order to pay for college loans that I wished I didn’t have.
We’ve also become a culture of death, which includes the use of birth control, making it seem as if the number of children we have is something completely under our control and so making it irresponsible if a family has “too many.”
“How can there be too many children? That is like saying there are too many flowers.” ~ Mother Teresa of Calcutta”
– Saint Teresa of Calcutta
We’ve also become generally selfish. I used to calculate nearly down to the day until “I got my life back” after children. Of course that changed when I converted to – and fully embraced – Catholicism. Now I am pleased to willingly give up my illusion of control and let God stay in charge of my life. If we have more, we have more. His will be done.
Which is a very good thing, but, like…how? How do we have big families? Who can we turn to for advice when most everyone around us as few, if any, children? Where do so many people sleep in one house?? How do you feed so many mouths???
These are questions I have myself seeing as I have “only” four children of my own. So I turned to someone who is the mother of many – blogger Rosie Hill, mother of seven under the age of 11 – to ask her for ideas and tips on the practical side of big family life.
We cover the following topics and more:
- Food and eating: Snacks, family mealtime
- Sleeping arrangements
- Homeschooling
- Date nights
You can download the episode here or listen to it on iTunes, Stitcher, Google Play or iHeartRadio.
And be sure to connect with Rosie on Instagram @RosieHill425 and on her blog, A Blog for My Mom.
Other Episodes of The Catholic Mama Podcast that You Might Like
EP 120: Teaching Children about Theology of the Body with Moira from Modern Catholic Mom
EP 119: From Wearing a Veil to Breastfeeding – An Episode for the Catholic Mamas
EP 117: How to Get Children Engaged – Not Just Behaved – in Mass
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