How To Avoid Ruining Your Children
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- Опубліковано 7 лют 2025
- In this video, I share lessons from my journey as a Christian parent raising five sons. Parenting is more than guiding behavior-it's about shaping the heart and fostering a deep connection with your children.
I cover key principles like:
The importance of unity between husband and wife in parenting.
Finding balance in discipline and avoiding extremes.
Understanding how our own struggles as parents impact our children.
Moving beyond behavior to cultivate love, trust, and virtue.
Christian parenting is a challenge, but it’s also a blessing and a sacred responsibility. I hope these insights encourage you in your journey to raise children rooted in faith and love.
May God bless you and your family.
Keywords: Christian parenting, raising children, faith-based parenting, family unity, parenting wisdom, raising godly children, heart-centered parenting.
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My wife and I are expecting our first child in late March/early April. We'll have been baptised a year, March 9th, and being so young in the faith we're just praying daily that God guides us and leads the way as we do the best we can to make ourselves better Christians first and that our daughter sees this and comes to love God.
Read St. John Chrysostom address on Vain Glory and Parenting, also his admonitions for parents.
God bless you
God Bless, man. I had my first almost 3 years ago, and I cannot describe the magical beauty of fathering. Congrats and best wishes
May God bless you! ❤🙏
My husband and I have 4 sons. Ages 1, 4, 5, and 16. We like to tell guests "Welcome to the Thunderdome!" 😅
God uses them to humble me and reflect on things daily. Then each night, they get so excited for evening prayers as a family, and I usually end up in my own prayers in tears thanking God for this immense responsibility and blessing. My biggest hope is that they'll carry a love for Christ always. I'm always terrified I'm doing it all wrong. Pray for me! I really, really appreciate this upload, Fr. Moses. More parenting videos please!!! ❤
I was one of those tablet kids growing up (20 now), i had a lot of surgeries so my parents just thought "give him screens and junk food to sedate him".
Be compassionate to the spoiled tablet kid, they dont know any better. As fr. Heers said, "dont sit a kid in front of screens for his whole life and expect when he turns 18 he will suddenly get spiritually and mentally responsible"
This is what my sister in law tried to do with my nephew but we're working against her demonic ways
i don't have children. I don't even have a partner... but I enjoyed the video so thank you for that and god bless you father
Thank you!
Same here, single and I desire to have a loving family home one day
@@avi8lass will happen. just work on yourself until the time is right and trust God's timing
Tomorrow I'm going to my first Orthodox mass in the country I live in.
When I visited the church a few days ago, I felt at home because I'm Orthodox from another country.
I saw the priest yesterday who I saw at the church yesterday and asked him what time liturgy was. I'm sure this is not a coincidence.
God bless you all
My first child will be born on March, this is incredible advice. Thank you Father.
Amazing news, gongratulations and the best of wishes!
I don't have children, I want my children to disciplined determined and successful, raised Protestant or Orthodox. Thank You for this video.
Thank you!
0:01 Harmony of a Household 🏡
0:48 Shared Vision 🤝
1:25 Don’t undermine each other, especially in front of the children.
1:52 Find a Balanced way to
3:23 Creativity.
4:01 Personality, Propensity.
**Children reflect their Parents**
4:50 We’re sinners.
5:13 Our sins (can) rub off on people around us.
6:34 “Every week I’m confessing the same thing.”
**Bad Results of Overly Disciplining and Pressuring one’s children**
6:46 Don’t put unrealistic burdens on your children.
7:09 Strict Families (can) produce rebellious children.
7:42 Home I.D. Vs Real I.D.
**Cultivate The Heart**
9:02 Love, and Growth. Cultivating and Nurturing children with Love. ❤️
10:36 Cultivate Good Temperament, Maturity.
**God Bless You** 🙏🏼
11:48 God Bless You and Keep You
Great topic, the best advice I ever received and followed was that finding a stable partner was a main pillar of happiness and that to be a husband and raise kids while maintaining God focus was the 'way'. Prayer and meditation are important now as I get older. Cheers ❤
I really wish I had a father in my life when I was growing up. I consistently have to learn things the hard way and struggle in developing a consistent identity because of the absence of a father.
Same here brother. As a kid, I used to get embarrased & humiliated by my alcholic father.
Self hate, & low self confidence destroyed my life. I've no plan to marry or have a child.
May God have mercy and bless you both! ❤🙏☦️ I know what it is like to grow up with a hardcore drug addicted father who was emotionally and physically abused himself, so he had many generational issues that he passed down. I continue to pray and do the work on myself, self reflecting, bettering myself, setting goals, and striving to be a better man so these generational curses are broken at me. So much work to be done in truly, so little time. It simply can't be done alone, only by His grace will I ever be a better version of myself. Much love in Christ to you both, my brothers
Thank you, Father. This is very helpful to us. We have four young sons. It is our dream to raise them to be Christians and family orientated but we ourselves were not raised this way so we are learning.
Thank you. I have been struggling with myself lately. Often I feel like I wish I was not an adult and I had no responsibilities. Being a parent is really tough. It is 24/7 all the time. I know the thought is no good but it pushes on me. Father pray for me as I struggle with gladness.
I recommend some David Goggins
I'm 20 years old and I gave my life to Jesus Christ this year, I'm learning so much from Father Moses and has helped me in my spiritual journey as a Young Adult and I Pray that God blesses you and your family.
I pray you will become an Orthodox Catechumen, then be baptized and chrismated into the Church, and be faithful your whole life. ☦God bless you.
@laceygreenwood thank you ❤️🙏
Father, thank you for this and all the content you produce. My wife and I have five children as well. "Children so often reflect the passions or sins that their parents have cultivated." That's one of my great worries concerning generational sins and inadvertently afflicting or wounding my children with my own sins, coming from a family where my parents divorced when I was 11-despite my dad wanting to try and make it work-leading to a decade or more of confusion about myself, masculinity, and getting beaten down by addictions and destructive behaviors.
As you grow up, you learn that your own parents have also suffered traumas throughout their childhood and adolescence, and you learn to be a little more gracious. I see my sins sometimes and think I'm just like my dad when he was at his less than stellar moments, who probably learned the same things from his unfortunately abusive and alcoholic father (who himself was drafted into the Wehrmacht in WWII when he was probably 15 or 16 and somehow survived being a POW in a soviet camp on the eastern front). And then I see my oldest son acting like me in my not so best moments and I'm keenly aware of where I've failed to reflect Christ as his parent.
But as you state, when we try to cultivate the virtues, our children are also blessed by this. I believe Dr. Mamalakis said something along those lines in his "Parenting Towards the Kingdom" book, that children are children(!) and NOT fully grown adults (or should I say fully formed adults), and they are struggling and learning to acquire the virtues of the Kingdom of Heaven-it would be foolish to expect perfection from them. Especially if we are putting pressure on our kids to be something we ourselves are not. As you state, "so when the children have the decision to make their own choices, they've not been cultivated to be mature, they've just been taught that if they do the wrong thing they'll get disciplined. It doesn't mean they have an inclination for the good-it doesn't mean that they have real virtue-they just have an understanding that when they do something wrong it's linked to punishment." Sounds like my past experience in protestantism, striving to not break commandments but not knowing to strive after the virtues (because good works aren't a part of salvation, that is, a part of the participatory life in Christ). Lord have mercy on us and help us in this struggle, especially if we are teaching our children to cultivate a mask rather than their true identity as a person made in the image of God.
Brothers and sisters please pray for me. Father, thank you for your ministry.
Wow 5 sons. God is great! Congrats father.
As a child of an extremely disciplinarian conservative family described in the video (now in my 20s), I urge you everything he said is true. I am lucky to have found my way back to Jesus but, our family situation is in complete shambles and honestly unrecoverable at this point forward. I pray nobody else will go through what I went through and everyone will develop a healthy relationship with God and their familys🙏
Amen, thank you Father Moses for your timeless wisdom passed down from God.
Thank you Father may God bless you and every parent in this world praying for everyone 🙏😇💞😊🙏😇💞😊
Father, God bless your soul
the box with breathing holes got me good
I would love to hear more about overly disciplining and the bad results that come with it. I feel as a a parent I can tend to be this way. I'd love help in knowing how to help this.
This I gold! So much wisdom, love and truth in it.
Excellent topic! Thank you Fr. Happy feast day for Saint Herman of Alaska, may he pray for us all ☦️
Hallo Father Moses. The new camera records beautifully, it looks very good. Also, If it is possible, can you maybe include more personal stories in your video’s that explain the topic that you teach in that particular video. I think it will be very valuable and attention grabbing. When i myself hear a good story im instantly hooked😂. Thank you for all the work that you did, and still do Father.
Children are the most beautiful thing in life. We were all once children.
We cant save them from whats coming to them we can only explain what happens. We are free to do what we want, not our consequences. Thank you father Moses for being an image of what a Godly man is.
If only ppl could care about their kids more than their cars.
Or chasing the “bag”
HAHAHAHA YOUR STORIES ABOUT KIDS 🤣🤣 so relatable! You're so blessed to have so many boys!!
Father Moses this is one of your best videos thank you for being an absolute unit
Father Moses you have opened my mind to something i am struggling with.
Thank you, Father, for your wisdom. Generational sin always reminds me of king David and his family. The scary part about raising kids is that while sins can be forgiven by His grace, it doesnt mean we will escape the consequences. God forgave David his sin with Bathsheba, but that didnt stop what happened with Absalom. I pray that none of my boys have to pay for the sins i have committed, but of course on some level they will.
I've been thinking about the day I have children a lot lately & this video has really helped me out with understanding what I have to change within myself before I do. Thank you
Words can't describe how much I appreciate this. I needed this video so much. Thank you Father Moses!!!
So many pearls of wisdom in this one. Thank you Fr. Moses.
Thank you so much Father! I think this is a huge area for many of us that is valuable. I pray you do more on parenting as many of us are struggling to know how to raise children properly and desire to guide them towards God and not later away from Him.
Another brilliant video Father Moses. This one was filled with masculine energy and the teaching of the holy fathers. Thank you for making this content ❤️☦️💪
God bless you, Father Moses, and Merry Christmas. ☦️
I love this ! Very insightful and helps me with my own parenting struggles
Great video, Fr! Thank you!
There is saying that ....our first part of life is ruined by our parents and the second by our kids.This is ultimate truth to me.
So much wisdom.
Thank you Fr🙏
Rules, boundaries and limitation are what is needed to raise proper children. Also never spoil them!
Such wise words Padre. God bless
This was fantastic counsel, thank you! We have 9 children and need these wonderful reminders of where to place our focus. ❤
👏🏻🙌🏻🙏🏻
The truth has been spoken ! Amen
Thank you Fr. God is Good.
3:48 this was hilarious, i am a young man and I grew up with 4 brothers and three sisters. Me and my 2 younger bothers shared a room at one point and we used to play blind darts. Someone had to close their eyes and spin around ten times and throw the dart with your eyes closed while the others stood in the room.
If there's one thing i can say for sure is that you can't go wrong with the one Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church (EO). They can help you with everything!
Thanks, Fr Moses. Appreciate your videos.
My only daughter, 20, is now dating a woman. I was involved in her life, prayed for her throughout her life, and tried my best to show her that I loved her. Raising boys is a joke compared to girls. One slip up from you, and they're gone. The Lord has a plan for her, I just have to wait for this phase to end.
You didn't mention her father. Where was he?
I understand your pain. I was the son aged 20 who was having hedonistic intercourse with men and women but aged 21 I had vision as to where my sin was heading (to total destruction and hell). Please know that there is hope. Please continue to pray, show love to your daughter and be an example. In time, God willing, she will turn away from her sinful ways too
@nageldev I'm her father.
@@GenX-Memories so what's her mother's story then?
@@nagesdev Sexual immortality can arise simply from being too worldly. You're not going to get an answer by quizzing the guy, stop being a weirdo.
New camera setup looks great, Fr. Moses!
Still waiting on the Fr Moses powerlifting tutorial 😬
😂🫶🏼
This needs more like... maybe it will happen 😂
I'd love a Orthodox Lifting program 🙏 if the Lord Will it ☦️
@@dudeguy7825 How would that be different than any other program? I’m just wanting to see Fr Moses moving some big deadlifts
@@kemptonbryan I don't know thats why I would like to see one
No disrespect to my mother, but my home life growing up, especially as a teenager, was just miserable. I hope I’m able to give my future children a better environment to grow up in.
The look on your face at 3:51…I felt that
Good stuff and great timing. Awesome timing actually. Thank you.
I know a man whose wife nearly divorced him not because he did anything wrong, but his adult conversion to faith began to wear her down. He then got advised to become less zealous (at least outwardly) but he is living proof that no matter how hard you try, even just reconciling with going through all of the spiritual motions by yourself, it may still not end up bringing your spouse on to the same page, as it were. How much love and care can you possibly provide, before something "clicks" in the other person? Even priests nowadays are not immune to this problem, most unfortunately.
Truth. My stubborn Catholic wife refuses Orthodoxy and clings to silly, superstitious beliefs instead, even when they are clearly irrational. They say even if the pope were the devil himself, they would follow him, that's how ignorant these people have become. May God open the eyes of spouses everywhere ☦️
God Bless you Sir. Great camera quality
Something to ponder:
The authoritarian parent has to have good leadership by example. The nurturing parent has to have discipline.
Temper your iron or it cracks when you most need it.
Thank yoi for always sharing these ideas and love
Great video Father. Parenting is the hardest job in the world. I hope to do a good job, but it takes decades to see the end results.
Excellent father thank you!
I failed step 0, I have no children.
I dont even know where they come from :(
@@turbodiesel2961
Real
I don't have children yet :(
Then you can't ruin them.
As someone who has only been an adult for a few years and has made more than my fair share of mistakes already, i wish my parents had made more of an effort to shield me from the world. Thats the biggest thing that destroyed my innocence, access to anything and anyone online from a young age, going to public school, watching secular tv... Also if they could have spoken to me more about how to grow spiritually and be close to God. Any religious talk was restricted to church once a week, and i suppose they thought that was enough. I was baptised at 12 and then left to fend for myself. I started asking some big questions around 16, started to doubt and lost my faith. I'm only now truly trying to rebuild my faith. My parents had a lot on their plate, my father got sick with cancer when i was around 15 and died the year i turned 18, but I wish those things were different 🙏🏽 Now with a daughter myself i have an overwhelming sense to protect her and give her lots of attention and love & teach her about God ❤
Father Moses. My wife and I recently lost our 2nd child at 17 weeks miscarriage and are struggling with the pain. Could you please make a video about this topic? We continue to raise our first child in the faith. Thank you
30 something years ago, my little brother also peed on the towels in the towel closet. It happens to all of us, Fr.
Needed this reminder and encouragement Father thank you 🙏🏼 Are there any books that you recommend for this kind of parenting? Or any saints who spoke about parenting? ☦️
St. Paisios’ book Family Life
Good stuff!
I love your videos. These are so relevant and important right now! Getting all of our kids excited about this kind of stuff has been such a process and blessing all around. I am a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, i wear a cross or rosary every day. I think it's silly when people think you can only do good in one church, or that light/ Christ can only be found in one church.
It is everywhere even in people that are not religious at all. Christ can come through all people that are accepting and willing. Keep fighting the good fight my friends!
Jesus Christ pulled me out of a life ending addiction, trauma, broken relationships, single motherhood while working multiple jobs to make ends meet. So many times i just prayed to God to just let me die. Though i overdosed multiple times, i am still here and boy am i grateful to have this opportunity to stand with God during this epic end times battle. 🙏🏼✝️❤
Thank you, father but I have an extra problem: I have a daughter and I am divorced. I live the sermon you mention by St John Crisostom and I want to implement those principles in my family life.
Father, I would love a video on the orthodox view of the Protestant idea that you are saved through faith alone.. and that Christianity isn’t about following rules.”
I had to leave my family behind. Just because they go through the motions, go to confession & receive the Eucharist don’t be deceived or end up leaving the church. It has seriously tested my faith seeing someone filled with a legion of demons with glazed over sinister eyes can receive the body of Christ without bursting into flames.
The rub is that the shared vision always changes when one party pulls the rug.
That's one of the best parenting videos ever made. Much better than the alpha bs out there, thanks!
"They will put their brother in a box and stab it to create breathe holes so the brother can be in a box." Ahahahaha 😂 it's bad, but you have to admit that looking back on it, it's funny because kids genuinely don't know that what they're doing is bad.
But seriously, the part about putting too much emphasis on behavior is accurate. For my daughter, I simply let her explore and do what she needs to do. The only time I intervene is if there truly is a problem. Other than that, it's best to let kids do what they need to do so they learn to solve their issues independently.
Brother you are looking jacked with the traps popping! What does your workout plan/diet look like?
What if you had to raise your child alone and they are now adults? How do you help them?
What about other's children Father Moses? I work with youngsters and I hear all the time from experienced people, that children these days are especially hard to work with. Talking, individual approach, fun, games, light discipline and fierceness does the job only temporarily for some of the extreme cases, it seems like they won't do anything anyone tells them for any reason.
Should I just be extremely angry whenever they become disobedient in important cases, or should I keep being patient, more lightly treating their bad behaviour and only give them a loud voice or a desk slam once in a while if it gets really bad.
I know it's not enough information probably, but any wisdom from you regarding any of the above topics would be much useful for me.
Thank you
I'm worried I'll pass on my physical deformity to my first child, not sure if ill have a family because of it
Beautiful
great video, also don't give them devices.
Father Moses, is there a way to audio download your speeches and sermons that isnt youtube? Thankyou for your work making these.
Dammm I didn't know till now how I missed your videos thankyou❤
Hi i just have a quick question. I love competitive sports, but when i am part of them and as i get better I always develop more pride. How do I learn humility, despite progress or being more capable than some of my peers?
can't ruin your children if you never have any
Greetings Fr.Moses, what camera do you use for the videos? thanks
Having grown up in a conservative Christian community I could write a book on what kind of issues myself and the other kids I know developed as a result of bad parenting and church leadership
Imo at the end of the day probably the number one way to screw up your kids relationship with their parents is parents lying to the children
For example many Christian parents desperately painted a picture that all public schools, all colleges, all non Christians in general are all evil and outside of the family/chosen church community
No real sense of perspective or scale of evil or what it looks like, just incredibly binary, very unrealistic, no nuance
Then with the "outside world" set up as awful, the parents are able to justify their abusive controlling rules and behaviors
Basically "my enemy is ontologically evil so any action I take is justified"
Really screwed up alot of people I knew, getting a job, moving out etc and seeing that everything in the world was much more nuanced then what they were raised to believe
There are many more issues but imo if lying to your kids is not off the table, do not be surprised when they move out and stop talking to you for a few years
Similar background. I think another issue is that parenting for a lot of people isn’t focused on making kids good as much as it makes them compliant. Kids don’t become good because they have a good moral compass, they become good purely because they are instructed as such. It can look really similar but it tends to break down when the kids have to make their own decisions and don’t know what the “right” answer is.
@@brycenlanager1216 Ha sounds like you do have a similar background
Loads of overbearing and control is very common, comes out of fear
Which is strange because so many parents claimed this great peace from trust in god, but took many actions out of fear
I remember hearing the phrase "well if you dont have anything nice to say dont say anything at all" from alot of parents back in the day
Which really was their catch all for telling their kids to shut up
But you are correct, the pinnacle of morals should probably be to do the right thing
Sometimes in life doing the right thing means doing something which is not nice
And to have niceness as a moral imperative hammered into childrens brains really underprepares them for dealing with not nice people
Taking perceived "mean" actions off the table sets them up for huge failures, really takes alot of tools out of their moral toolkit
Frequently the people who buy into the "nice" moral system lack discipline because they mistake that as bullying
And frequently pursue things which sound good or sound nice on the surface without digging any deeper I have noticed
😂 at least they cared enough to make breathe holes.
That's looking for the silver lining in every situation! lol
How to remain celibate whilst lifting heavy? It seems to uprise libido so effectively that a relapse is inevitable
"Pray and it will go away"
Did I misinterpret his comment about not being saints? I thought we were all called to be saints and holiness.
Father what do you mean God wants to deify us
Father which church are you from if you don't mind me asking
He is a Priest in ROCOR (Russian Orthodox Church Outside Russia) I believe his parish is in Texas
Father can you explain why all 3 of my siblings are Narscisst? If I said anything to my mom about the abuse, she got mad at me. From a good Catholic family.
Much more detail is required.
camera upgrade? it’s looking good Father
can you guys mention me in your prayers my name is Hector
It is hard to follow this principle if your partner is a narcissist.
1John3:9
Dude i want you on my podcast
🤎💙🩷💜💖❣️💓♥️💛
I scrolled so fast I misread it as genital scars 😅
Father Moses you have childrens ?
I’m a married Eastern Orthodox priest, married over 20-years, and 5-sons.