The Six O'Clock Habit

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I and my wife have been very seriously considering doing it despite our impossibly hectic schedules. It's all worth it to have a six o'clock habit,  a time for laying everything aside and discussing the Word of God with gusto and in a relaxed atmosphere--you know, with a tall glass of iced fresh fruit juice and some fresh strawberries or grapes while in the cool comforts of our terrace overlooking the village. Every 6:00 pm.

We managed to do one successfully and are about to launch our second one. It's supposed to promote family bonding more, more openness with each other, and deeper Scripture familiarization. And health, too, especially when we also plan to do a short Zumba session right after--or something to that effect. I think every family needs to do this, I mean together, at home.

Church is good for spiritual health and gyms are superb for physical conditioning. Eating in health fast food stores is something else. But home is different. Families are grown at home. Some folks brag about always eating out with the family, some try to establish a trend doing gym with their loved ones. but still, nothing beats doing family stuff at home. Have you tried doing "church" at home with just your family?

When I was small my mom, grandma, and uncles used to have their own brand of six o'clock habit--doing a short rosary and novena I didn't understand (nor did my uncles) because it was in Latin. It did what it was designed to do--bond the family. I was close to them all, and because my dad wasn't around during the time, he made up for the loss through Saturday night rosary sessions. And we got real close then. I guess the saying, "The family that prays together, stays together," has its merits.

However, what I really believe in more is eating together, not so much praying together. I'm not saying I don't believe in praying together as a family. I do. But I believe in eating together as a family more. With eating, we have praying and bible discussions, too. But if we talk about prayer time, some people cannot imagine eating and laughing while praying. So it's better to talk about eating because prayer and bible discussions are easily incorporated into it, than talking about praying per se.

Thus, when we have our six o'clock habit, we sit casually on the cushion on the floor, some recline as Jesus' disciples did when they supped together, and then we discuss the bible. We may be eating something or plain discussing bible matters, and then talk about other related subjects, and then pray. We may also decide to sing to the Lord, if he prods us to. As they say, "as the Spirit leads."

The main thing is to join together as family in His Name.