June 28, 2026

Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ, 

A few years ago, I read a story about a mother who created an Instagram post for her cute toddler.  The infant has over a thousand ‘followers’ and the mother tries to capture every moment of the child’s life.  This child is the center of the universe for the parents and I wonder how the toddler will turn out as an adult. 

After reading this story, a new word came to me, paidiism.  The word for child in Greek is paidi. The word paidiism is the worship of a child.  The word does not actually exist since this is a new sense of heresy in our modern culture. 

It is easy to love children since they are innocent and the hope of our future. As beautiful as God’s creation of little children are, they are not God.  They are gifts from our loving Father. We live in a culture that either rejects the gift of children by contraception, abortion or sterilization.  The other extreme is to love the gift of children more than the Giver.   This is evident when families place a priority of a child’s activities over the Sunday Mass obligation.   Jesus tells us in the Gospel today, “Whoever loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me.” (Matthew

I believe a great model for proper love of children is Hannah in the Old Testament.  She was advanced in age and barren but desired to have a child.  She eventually gave birth to Samuel.  Once she weaned him she brought the future prophet to the temple to leave him there and said, “I prayed for this child, and the Lord granted my request.  Now I, in turn, give him to the Lord…” (1 Sam. 1:27ff). 

It is great to see so many families with young kids at Mass in Holdrege and Smithfield giving their children back to God.  Thank you for your witness!

In His Mercy,

Fr. Eric Clark, Pastor