Good morning, 

My wife is Novus Ordo Catholic and quietly (but stubbornly) attends a "Resistance" chapel with me. Sometimes she will wear the chapel veil, but she is constantly losing them. She is surreptitiously avoiding wearing them. While she dresses conservatively by Novus Ordo standards, she will still sometimes wear skirts at knee high length (though she avoids wearing pants to the chapel). In public, however, she wears pants all the time. 

Meanwhile, my children, who are very small and very impressionable will sometimes imitate me and sometimes imitate their mother. My son, who is three years old is more cooperative when it comes to saying his daily prayers. My daughter, who is five years old, and who means the world to me, often refuses to say her morning and evening prayers. She will even kick and pout. It is extremely troubling to me. 

When I was her age my mother would say prayers with me and it was always a time of tranquility and peace. I did get rebellious in my teenage years, but not at five! 

So it is especially disturbing to me that a five year old (and sometimes her brother too) will refuse to say simple prayers. 

If I attempt to say even a decade of the rosary they both lose attention immediately and it is almost impossible for me to muster their attention. So I try when they are in car rides. My wife has a hard time because she tries to pray along, but she is almost inaudibly quiet during the Rosary. She does try to encourage the children to join in. She is a kind hearted women, but she was raised Protestant and ultimately I get the sense that the Rosary is just foreign to her. (Which I know is by no means the case with all Protestant converts). 

My approach has been to pray like crazy. To try and set a strong and yet gentle example for my family. I usually can command respect and get results with the family when I need order in the home.

Except in this area of prayer and practice of the Catholic religion. This troubles me. 

This is my cross...I know I must bear it. Is it is a punishment for my sins? I don't want my family to suffer for my failings as a father... 

So here is my question: What should I do? Am I being too lenient? Should I spank the children if they do not pray? (I fear this because I do not want them to associate prayer with punishment and then resent me and resent prayer and  grow-up and reject the faith as soon as they have the chance to do so...but am I making a fatal error in judgement?) In other areas I can verbally command and get results (usually). Why is this an area of such resistance for my children? Is the key their mother? And how can I get her to come around except for prayer, fasting, penance, etc. I have heard some advise corporal punishment for the wife (but that seems like a recipe for driving her away and possibly destroying my family). 

And yet idly watching this unfold seems like I am allowing my family to be set-up for an even more disastrous fate in the after life. 

I have encouraged my wife to homeschool. While I have made headway--she is not ready. She cries. The local parish school is just as bad or worse than the local public school. My wife is getting ready to send my daughter to public school next fall. I don't work all day, all week, and all year to have my child sent to an indoctrination prison. 

Yet, if my wife is ill prepared and unwilling to homeschool--what do I do? 

So I pray. But lately I have even been growing weary in my prayers. I desperately need the help of the Mother of God. My family needs her help. Mother of Perpetual Help at thy feet a wretched sinner! 

Please pray for me friends. And any practical advice you have is greatly appreciated. God bless. 

What Matthew said.

Also, women, regardless if they admit it or not, want to be dominated. Her acts of resistance and stubbornness could be a cry for you to be more aggressive towards her, and more assertive about the rules of your kingdom (household).

Many times, these women need to experience a crucible set forth by a man or, if they're married, their husbands, so they will clearly see and accept natural law and order with Divine Law as its foundation.

I've given some thought to your question.  I'm not going to presume to give you advice on how to treat your wife!  You know her best, you're a man, and every situation is different. 

That being said, I'd like to offer some thoughts about your children--I feel more qualified to answer your question in that area since I have 9 myself, and I homeschool.  Children need consistency.  They thrive on it, actually.  I don't know your circuмstances...are prayer times occasional, as you see fit or are able to squeeze it in?  If it becomes routine that right after supper, say, or just before bed, there are family night prayers, things will become easier.  It may be hard at first, but with consistent discipline (NOT punishment!) you should see positive results. 

Then there could be the matter of timing.  Hungry, tired, or interrupted children are certainly not at their best.  Although at 5, they should be learning to control those emotions somewhat.  That said, is she closer to 4 or 6?  That makes a difference too...One thing we do with our children is give them a warning.  "5 more minutes and then we're saying night prayers."  That seems to help, rather than just swooping in on their play with, "It's time for night prayers, NOW!" 

Are prayers a family thing, or just you and the children?  Unfortunately, at their young ages, the mother does have a huge impact on their behavior.  Children know how to manipulate adults, and they don't hesitate to do so.  If your daughter sees/senses that dad wants A (prayers) and I do B (crying), mom will do (C) give in and comfort me, it's a lost cause.  Children do tend to imitate, so if mom isn't participating...if she's at least kneeling with a Rosary in her hands, that would be better than nothing!  Something we do with our children (not always) is allow them Religious books or Holy Cards to look at during the Rosary.

I can understand why it would be troubling to have your 5 year old kick and pout when it comes time to say her prayers.  Be consistent, firm, and calm.  Eventually she'll realize you're in charge and be more compliant.  It won't be easy, though. 

One word of encouragement: the role of the father in religious matters is so important!!!  The fact that you're willing to try to do family prayers, homeschool, and do what's Catholic...wow.  The fact that you're praying, sacrificing, and fasting for your family won't go unnoticed by Our Lord and His mother.  The devil's going to try to stop whatever you're doing...just try to carry on against those temptations.  Have you tried blessing your children with Holy Water in the mornings/evenings?  Or before prayers?  That might work wonders, too. 

Best of luck...I'll keep you in my prayers.  We all have our crosses in these modern times; but God NEVER sends more than you can handle.   

See if there is a cooperative home school in your area where you can visit and get acquainted with the parents and children.

My son at 5 was very happy to meet the children at the cooperative home school. He loved the activities and the well-behaved children. There were no bullies, but a few of the parents had bad attitudes, so we changed to another cooperative. At first we could not find a Catholic cooperative and had to settle for the Protestant one, which did accept Catholics.

We would meet at public parks or occasionally at a church during the weekdays or sometimes on Saturday when more of the men of the families could be involved. There were always men at all the events because some guys worked the evening shift or overnight shift at work while their wives worked the day shifts.  Other guys were full time home school teachers while their wives worked as attorneys or doctors during the day, so it varied.

Then we found a loose knit group of Catholics (not officially a home schooling group) who were homeschooling their children. They were very disorganized and did not have that many events as the group leaders had health problems.

Finally, we were able to find an SSPX group, but they soon relocated to Idaho to join a real school run by SSPX nuns.

Good evening, 

This is the OP. 

Thank you all for the advice, words of encouragement, and prayers. 

I was not sure if I should post what was troubling me this morning, but I am glad that I did. 

Not one word of bad advice. Its clear that some of these posts contain some very valuable words of wisdom and some practical experience. 

These words have given me new energy to pray, teach, guide, and lead. 

Thank you and God bless! 

Be patient , and very grateful to God. You have a beautiful family and a wife who obediently attends a Resistance Mass with you, even though she would rather not (right now). These are big steps for her and she is not at your level or devotion . It takes time and patience . Our Lady will get her there. Knee length skirts are fine as long as they are not immodestly tight , and in time she will remember where she put her veil...pretend not to notice. It needs to come from her, and it will. Your job is to set the example, lead, pray and not waiver. Your faith and strength will provide the order you seek for your family.
As far as your children, you may have to start very simply with short prayers. An Our Father, Hail Mary and Glory Be, a few times a day. Pray the Rosary at night with your wife and let the children stay close and play quietly. Eventually they will slowly join in, but no matter it will be a family Rosary. Kids watch everything their parents do.

My feelings about school are as everyone else's here- don't let them go to public/Novus Ordo schools! Better that they never start. All the advice about home schooling cooperatives are excellent. This is a hard one, but do the best you can- it's certainly the place to draw the line in the sand. Statistically home schoolers are the best and brightest- plus schools insist on vaccinations. There are many good online Catholic programs that engage the children with other students in a classroom styled participatory environment . I know kid who take these classes and love it. Worth looking into.

Beware of public schools. What they are teaching is so immoral!  What I learned during educational classes was abysmal!
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Most of the public school texts and testing are produced by Pearson Education (run by a Rothschild family monopoly).
These corrupted texts, and there testing service offering the PSAT, SAT, GRE, etc, are used in local public schools and parochial schools as well. The immoral propaganda begins in kindergarten or even in pre-school by teaching the following:

* ɧoɱosɛҳųαƖity is an acceptable lifestyle, and that it is perfectly okay to have two mommies or two daddies
* it is perfectly okay to kill a baby, especially one that may be deformed or has Down's syndrome, so abortion is okay
* it is okay to go to your doctor and ask him to terminate your life if you are in a lot of pain, emotionally or physically by giving you an injection or an overdose of pills, thus euthanasia is okay.
* if euthanasia is okay, then ѕυιcιdє is okay - is it surprising that so many preteens and teens are committing ѕυιcιdє or assisting their friends to commit ѕυιcιdє or euthanasia?
* explicit sex education is okay without parental education, so masturbation is taught in kindergarten to calm the kids
* since sex feels so good, it is okay to engage in fornication and other acts of sɛҳuąƖ immortality, just make sure to use
birth control and if that fails, then use abortion.
* Christianity is biased, but Islam, Judaism, Buddhism, and other pagan religions are good.
* the ancient religions of the Aztec were good. Yes, they had human sacrifices
* guns are bad and gun control should be enforced, so children report any guns in the house to your teacher or call 911
* corporal punishment in the homes is bad, so children report any spankings to the school nurse.
* it is perfectly okay to join in school and in public demonstrations to support pro-choice abortions.
* it is perfectly okay to join public demonstrations against gun violence and push for gun control
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In addition, Planned Parenthood counselors frequent public and private novus ordo Catholic school to teach sɛҳuąƖ immorality starting in kindergarten.
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I could go on and on as I was in teacher training for several years. When I completed and earned my credential, I shared what the textbooks taught with my confessor, and he urged me not to teach because beginning teachers cannot choose their own texts but must abide by the decisions of the school principal. My credential is now nonexistent as I had decided not to teach.
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In addition, when I took Pearson's Graduate Record Exam (GRE) to take graduate courses, I was horrified. One of the questions in the reading comprehension section was promoting abortion. The other reading selections were not much better. The entire test was propaganda.

Yes, many childbearing-age adults today think back to their own public school years, and think "it wasn't so bad".

But this is 2018, not the 80's or 90's when we were in K-12 school.

Today we have cell phones (allowing for all kinds of communication, sharing of images, etc. that simply wasn't possible when we were young), the Internet, and the world in general has taken several dozen steps forward on its march away from God.

When I was in school, you'd have kids tease you or you might have whispers that so-and-so likes you. Certain types of student (the more shy, less popular, etc.) would almost be "preserved" from getting romantically involved (and thus, corrupted) with the pagans around them, due to them not having the guts to go up and ask various people out. But today, it's so easy with chat, cell phones (which everyone has) and everyone has their own private phone number! Those things are so basic today, but when I was a teenager, I remember any phone calls I got would go to my home phone -- which would ring all the phones in the house. That made me think twice about dating the wrong person. Today, your child (if he has a cell phone) could get calls from ANYONE, including 50 year old men, and you'd never know it.

In the 80's, sex ed started in 5th grade, the parents had to sign a waiver, and the first class was NOT CO-ED. They divided the boys and girls into 2 rooms. Now I think that stopped the next year, but still...

In the 80's being gαy was something to be ashamed of -- "gαy" was even used as an insult. Today, ɧoɱosɛҳųαƖity is almost a synonym for holiness in this upside-down, black-is-white world we live in.

The whole PC train had barely left the station back in the 80's. We called black people "blacks". The homo groups were fringe and not respected at all. There were 2 genders. Pretty much everyone believed in "binary gender".

The propaganda (anti-gun, put your head down and obey, we're in perpetual war for perpetual peace, war on terror, etc.) has been turned up to 11 since I was in school. They are forming the children to be comfortable in a 1984-esque world where they are constantly probed, scanned, ID'd, and living in terror of the boogeyman "terrorists" under every rock. Extracting my children from this ALONE is worth the hundreds of hours we have to spend (both my wife, and I) and all the expenses related to homeschooling.

As an aside, even though I work full time and fill the traditional male gender role, there are more things I have to do when I get home *because* my wife is constantly trying to keep up with homeschooling. There are chores/tasks that might be on her plate instead of mine (theoretically) if we weren't homeschooling, and/or if we had fewer children. This is what they mean when they speak about "your spouse supporting you" in your decision to homeschool. Imagine my wife's stress if I was against her homeschooling our children: I would consider every hour spent on homeschooling as an hour wasted (e.g., spent watching youtube videos) -- and I would add chores and tasks to her list accordingly.

So just like with religion, politics and money, it's critical that you and your spouse agree on how to school your children. If you disagree about this, it means you're not together on other things as well (religion, attitude towards the world, etc.)

So obviously it works so much better if both parents are on board. If we sent our kids to public school, we'd both have much more free time -- our life would be more pleasurable and easy, until our children start displaying the consequences of our short-sighted decision!

In the end, we would regret it if we didn't homeschool. So however hard it is, we have to do it. If even ONE of our children were lost (to Hell) because of our choosing the "easy route" we would have intense regret, and maybe even lose our souls when we are judged by God. What would we have, anyhow? Maybe I'd have created 1 extra video game for the world? Maybe a few more outdoor projects completed? My wife would have more time to read Mommy Blogs and various online articles? We'd both have more time to kill on CathInfo? How can those activities even be compared to the value of a single soul!