Faith

Scripture, prayer, the examen, and everyday devotion.

Praying With Your Kids About Money Without Making It Weird

Coins and seeds pour into a garden bed beside seedlings labeled “GROWTH”
~ Rich Pascual ~ Leave a comment

I used to think praying with kids about money would be simple. “Thank you for what we have. Help us share. Amen.” Neat little package. Then a child asks, “If God loves us, can we get the giant box of cereal?” and suddenly the family theology department is taking questions.

Money is awkward because it carries so many adult feelings: worry, pride, comparison, secrecy, gratitude. Children notice those feelings before they understand a budget. The goal is not to give a five-year-old a quarterly earnings call. It is to make money ordinary enough that it can be discussed without becoming either a family secret or a family sermon.

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau says school-age children are learning to save, plan ahead, wait for what they want, and connect choices with their own goals and values. It also points out that children watch us: the bargain we celebrate, the treat we splurge on, the future event we plan. The CFPB’s money-milestone guide suggests thinking out loud about those choices. That is already a kind of lesson—and, if we are paying attention, a kind of examination of conscience.

Research points in the same direction. In a qualitative study of 90 emerging adults, along with 17 parents and 8 grandparents, families described three helpful patterns: sharing financial experiences, involving children in decisions, and keeping conversations age-appropriate. The paper, “Can We Talk About Money?”, is not a command to turn every grocery trip into a seminar. It is a reminder that children learn through conversation and participation, not only through warnings delivered from the driver’s seat.

Prayer can give that conversation a gentler frame. The Catechism describes the family as a place where, from childhood, people learn moral values and “make good use of freedom,” and where members learn responsibility for one another. Read paragraphs 2207–2208 and you hear less about money as a scorecard than money as part of learning how to live with other people.

Try a three-part prayer once a week: “Thank you for what we have. Help us choose wisely. Show us someone we can help.” Then attach it to one concrete thing. We are saving for a trip. We are waiting before buying this toy. We are setting aside a gift for a neighbor. The point is not to make the child perform generosity on cue. It is to let them see that money can be received with gratitude, handled with care, and shared with love—the basic shape of Christian stewardship.

A few guardrails help. Do not make God sound like an ATM. Do not shame a child for wanting something. Do not pretend the family has no limits. Say, “That is a real want, and it is not what we are choosing today.” If the family is under financial strain, offer an age-appropriate truth without handing a child the whole burden: “We are being careful right now, and the grown-ups are making a plan.”

What happened? A money question became a prayer instead of a panic. What did it mean? The child learned that faith touches the checkout line, but does not erase reality. What can we carry forward? One honest sentence, one small choice, and one person to remember in prayer. That is not weird. That is formation, with a receipt attached.

The Audit Trail of the Soul

Priest hearing confession beside accountant reviewing FY 2023 audit, ledgers, tax docs, and invoices
~ Rich Pascual ~ Leave a comment

I have a confession to make: when I hear “financial audit,” my soul leaves the room and looks for snacks. An audit sounds like spreadsheets, fluorescent light, and somebody asking why a receipt from March is labeled “miscellaneous.” Yet confession and an audit share a surprisingly useful first move: they ask us to stop editing the story.

In the Catholic understanding, confession is not a performance of shame. The Catechism calls it an examination of conscience, followed by the honest disclosure of what we have done, so that responsibility and reconciliation become possible. The point is not to discover that a person is secretly terrible. It is to bring the truth into the light, where healing can begin. You can read the relevant sections in the Catechism’s account of the penitent’s acts.

An audit begins with a different kind of account, but the discipline is familiar. Management prepares the financial statements; an independent auditor examines them, tests evidence, and issues an opinion about whether they are fairly presented. The SEC’s plain-language guide to auditors is refreshingly clear about the arrangement: the people inside the company tell the story, while an outside professional checks whether the story can bear weight.

That distinction matters. A priest is not a CPA with better lighting, and God is not an investor comparing quarterly reports. Confession is sacramental and relational; an audit is professional assurance for people who need reliable financial information. Still, both practices resist the fantasy that what remains unspoken somehow does not count.

Here is where the comparison gets practical. In an audit, “material” does not simply mean “large.” A small error can matter if it changes the reader’s understanding. Our inner bookkeeping works the same way. The sharp comment we call “just stress.” The purchase we call “a one-time thing” for the seventh time. The resentment we file under “I’m fine.” Each item may look small in isolation. Together, they can reveal the habits shaping the whole household.

And neither process ends with noticing. The AICPA explains that an audit provides high, but not absolute, assurance; it produces a report that helps others make decisions. Confession, too, is aimed at a future—not merely a perfectly itemized past. The AICPA’s explanation of audits emphasizes evidence and judgment, not magical certainty. The Catechism pairs confession with satisfaction: repair what can be repaired, accept a penance, and practice a different way forward.

What happened? We hid, minimized, or misclassified something. What did it mean? The hidden line item was forming us, quietly and faithfully. What can we carry forward? Try a ten-minute weekly review: name one financial choice, one relationship, and one habit without defending yourself. Then choose one small repair. No dramatic vows. Just an honest ledger and the next faithful entry.

“What confession has in common with a financial audit.”

Advent Is the Season That Teaches Us Not to Grab the Gift Too Soon

Lit candle in metal holder with pine branches and red berries on wooden table
~ Rich Pascual ~ Leave a comment

I have a small Advent problem. By the time the first purple candle appears, I am already trying to skip ahead. I want the party, the presents, the good news — preferably now, and with free two-day shipping. Waiting feels like a clerical error in the calendar.

But Advent is not merely Christmas with a slower loading screen. The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops explains that Advent begins the Church’s liturgical year and covers the four Sundays and weekdays before Christmas. It carries two directions at once: remembering Christ’s first coming and looking toward his return. The season is preparation, expectation, and — here is the tricky bit — joy that has not arrived in full yet.

That makes Advent a surprisingly good lesson in delayed gratification. Not the grim version where we grit our teeth, deny every pleasure, and congratulate ourselves for being miserable. The better version says: a good thing can be worth waiting for, and the waiting can shape the person who receives it.

The history is older than my annual attempt to buy gifts before Thanksgiving. Britannica notes that the Council of Tours mentioned an Advent season in 567, while the season’s length and customs developed over time. In other words, Christians have been practicing the art of not rushing Christmas for a very long while. I find this comforting. My impatience is not innovative.

Waiting also exposes what I think the gift is supposed to do for me. If I believe Christmas must rescue the month from every awkward conversation, unfinished project, and tired child, I am asking one day to carry too much. Advent gently puts the question back on the table: What am I actually hoping for? More stuff? More control? Or a way of being present to the people already in the room?

Pope Benedict XVI once described Advent as a time when faith becomes one with the human experience of waiting, and asked what our hearts are waiting for. That Vatican reflection lands because it does not treat waiting as dead time. Waiting reveals our loves. It gives them a shape we can inspect.

A small household practice might be enough. Pick one ordinary desire and let it remain unfinished for a week. Do not fill every quiet minute. Leave one purchase in the cart. Let the children count the days without turning the countdown into a performance review. Use the space to notice what rises: gratitude, anxiety, boredom, maybe an idea that has been waiting for you.

This is not an argument for becoming a holiday monk. Advent has candles, music, cookies, and the occasional aggressively cheerful sweater. The point is not to flatten delight. It is to let delight arrive as a gift instead of treating it like a package we can force onto the porch.

What happened? The Church made a season out of waiting. What did it mean? That preparation is not the opposite of joy; it is one of joy’s ways of becoming deep. What can I carry forward? I can practice receiving one good thing without demanding that it solve everything. Maybe that is enough for today: stay awake, leave a little room, and let the gift come when it comes.

The Sabbath Lesson for a Busy Dad

Rustic wooden table with bread, butter, jam, a lit candle, and a coffee mug near a window
~ Rich Pascual ~ Leave a comment

I once tried to take a day off and spent most of it explaining to my family that I was taking a day off. I answered one “quick” email, fixed a cabinet hinge, checked the weather three times, and somehow ended the afternoon more tired than when I began. Rest, it turns out, is not simply the absence of paid labor. It is a skill. I am still in remedial class.

That is why Sabbath feels less like an antique rule and more like a kindly interruption. The command in Exodus 20 does not reserve rest for the impressive or the spiritually organized. It names sons and daughters, servants, animals, and the resident alien. The household stops. Even the ox gets a weekend, which is a strong argument for humane management.

Rest says I am more than my output

A busy dad can turn every hour into a tiny performance review. Did I answer enough? Earn enough? Parent well enough? The Sabbath answers with a stubborn “not today.” Not because the work is worthless, but because the worker is not a machine with a family subscription.

The Catechism of the Catholic Church describes Sabbath as a respite and “a day of protest against the servitude of work and the worship of money.” That line lands differently when the laptop is open beside the cereal bowl. Rest is not laziness wearing nicer shoes. It is a refusal to let productivity become a god.

Rest is also a gift to other people

Notice the social shape of the command. I do not keep Sabbath merely by declaring myself unavailable while quietly making everyone else serve my “day of renewal.” The biblical vision makes room for the people whose labor usually props up my convenience. That may mean cooking simply, sharing the cleanup, choosing a walk over a shopping marathon, or not creating an emergency that somebody else must solve.

There is a bodily wisdom here, too. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommends at least seven hours of sleep for adults ages 18–60. Sleep is not the whole of Sabbath, of course. But it is a useful reminder that the body keeps receipts. We can call exhaustion dedication for a while. The invoice eventually arrives.

What happened, what it meant, what to carry forward

What happened? I kept treating rest as something I could earn after finishing everything. What did it mean? I had quietly accepted the idea that my worth rose and fell with the task list. What can I carry forward? A Sabbath need not be elaborate. Choose a block of time. Put the phone in another room. Let one meal be slow. Give the people around you permission to stop, too.

For this week, I am trying one small practice: when a non-urgent task appears on the day of rest, I will write it down instead of obeying it immediately. The list can wait. Maybe I can, too. What would your family learn about God—and about their own dignity—if you let rest be a shared gift rather than a reward for finally becoming caught up?

The Catholic Case for Boring, Patient Investing

Tree on hill changing through winter, spring, summer, and autumn
~ Rich Pascual ~ Leave a comment

I have a confession to make: I find “boring” reassuring. Give me a quiet Saturday, a pot of coffee, and an investment plan that does not require me to check my phone every twelve minutes. My younger self wanted a financial life with plot twists. My current self would like fewer plot twists, please.

That is one way into the Catholic case for patient investing. It is not a promise that markets will behave, or that every fund deserves a halo. It is a question of formation: What kind of person does my money practice me into becoming?

Patience is not passivity

Patient investing still makes choices. You decide what the money is for, how much risk you can bear, and what you are unwilling to support. The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops’ investment guidelines hold those pieces together: responsible financial stewardship, a reasonable return, prudence about risk, and attention to human dignity and the common good.

That is a sturdier picture than “maximize everything.” A return matters because resources support real obligations: a family, a parish, a future act of generosity. But the return is not the only question. The old Catholic word is stewardship, which means the money is entrusted to us, not enthroned over us.

Slow is a strategy

In practical terms, boring often looks like regular contributions, broad diversification, and a long time horizon. Investor.gov defines dollar-cost averaging as investing equal portions at regular intervals, regardless of market ups and downs. You buy more when prices are lower and less when they are higher. It is not magic. It is a way to keep one anxious afternoon from running the whole household.

FINRA explains that asset allocation and diversification can help manage investment risk by spreading money among and within asset classes. That does not make losses impossible; it does make the portfolio less dependent on one heroic bet. Even the phrase “heroic bet” sounds like something that ends with a lesson and a repair bill.

None of this means ignoring companies, communities, or conscience. A patient investor can read a fund’s holdings, ask how a manager votes, and decide which harms are incompatible with the family’s principles. Patience gives discernment time to work. Speculation often gives impatience a costume.

What is being formed?

What happened? I put money into a future I cannot see, then watched prices wiggle as if they knew I was watching. What did it mean? The account was never just a scoreboard; it was training my attention, my appetite, and my sense of enough. What can I carry forward? A simple rule: automate what serves the plan, review what deserves discernment, and refuse to confuse excitement with wisdom.

Perhaps the most countercultural investment move is not finding the next miracle. It is becoming the kind of person who can keep a promise across an ordinary Tuesday. What is your money asking you to practice: patience, prudence, generosity, or a little less phone-checking?

The Examen and the Expense Report: A Better Way to End the Day

Open journal with handwritten notes, lit candle, smartphone, books, and cup of tea on wooden table at dusk
~ Rich Pascual ~ Leave a comment

I have two end-of-day rituals, at least in theory. One is spiritual: the examen, that quiet Ignatian habit of looking back over the day with God. The other is financial: opening the bank app and asking where the money went. One sounds holy. The other sounds like a small punishment invented by a spreadsheet.

But they have more in common than I expected. Both are practices of attention. Both ask us to stop guessing and look honestly at the day we actually lived—not the day we intended to live, or the budget we intended to keep.

The daily review is not a courtroom

The Jesuits describe the Ignatian Examen as a prayerful review: become aware of God’s presence, give thanks, notice what happened, and look toward tomorrow. The point is not to produce a perfect scorecard. It is to become more awake to where we were alive, distracted, generous, anxious, or quietly carried.

A financial review works best with the same posture. Start with the facts: the grocery run, the subscription renewal, the restaurant charge that seemed harmless until it joined its twelve little cousins. Then ask a gentler question than “What is wrong with me?” Ask: “What was I seeking?” Convenience? Rest? Belonging? A reward after a long day? The numbers are not a moral verdict. They are clues.

Attention turns into agency

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau recommends tracking spending for at least two weeks, or even a month, so patterns become visible. That is a wonderfully unglamorous form of freedom. You cannot choose what to change until you can see what is happening.

This is where the spiritual and financial reviews meet. In the examen, I might notice that a certain conversation left me impatient. In the ledger, I might notice that the same kind of day ends with delivery food and late-night shopping. Neither observation is the whole story. Together, they might reveal a need for a better pause before I reach for the easiest relief.

And “better” does not have to mean dramatic. Investor.gov suggests keeping track of income and expenses and including savings in the picture. For tonight, that could mean writing down three purchases, one gratitude, and one small adjustment for tomorrow. No overhaul. No financial monasticism. Just a little light.

What happened, what it meant, what to carry forward

What happened? I spent the day making choices, some deliberate and some automatic. What did it mean? My attention—and my money—moved toward whatever felt urgent, comforting, or important in the moment. What can I carry forward? A five-minute review, done without self-contempt, can turn a blur into a pattern. A pattern can become a choice.

Tonight, before closing the banking app, try one question from each practice: “Where did I receive a gift today?” and “What did my spending say mattered?” The answers may not match perfectly. That is not failure. That is information—and information is a decent place to begin again.

The Riskiest Servant in the Bible Might Be the Hero You Forgot

Single coin buried in soil, light above
~ Rich Pascual ~ Leave a comment

I always assumed the “bad guy” in the Parable of the Talents was obvious — the servant who buried his money in the ground, out of laziness. Then I actually sat with the text again in Matthew 25:14-30, and I noticed something I’d skipped for twenty years: the master doesn’t scold him for being lazy. He scolds him for being afraid.

“I knew you were a hard man,” the servant says, basically accusing his boss of being the kind of guy who’d fire you over a bad quarter. So he did the safest thing available — he buried the money, kept it exactly intact, and handed it back penny for penny. No loss. No embarrassment. No risk.

And that’s the servant who gets called “wicked and slothful.”

Here’s the part that stopped me mid-coffee: the two servants who doubled their money took real risk to do it. First-century “trading” wasn’t a savings account — it meant loaning capital, backing ventures, betting the harvest would come in. As The Catholic Herald points out, this parable isn’t really a finance seminar in disguise. It’s a parable about fear disguised as caution.

I think about this every time I explain to my kids why we don’t keep all our savings under the mattress — and also every time I catch myself doing the spiritual version of burying a talent. Not using a gift because someone might criticize it. Not writing the song, not sending the blog post, not saying the prayer out loud, because staying safe feels responsible.

Ray Stedman’s reading of this parable puts it plainly: the sin here isn’t losing money. It’s refusing to risk anything at all in service of something bigger than yourself.

That reframes stewardship for me. I used to think good stewardship meant protecting what I’ve been given — keep it safe, don’t waste it, hand it back in one piece. Turns out the parable’s definition of good stewardship is closer to the opposite: put it to work, accept that work carries risk, and trust the One who gave it to you in the first place.

What happened: I reread a parable I thought I already understood.

What it meant: the “safe” choice in the story wasn’t safe at all — it was the only choice that produced zero fruit.

What I’m carrying forward: the next time I feel the urge to bury something — a dollar, a talent, an idea — I want to ask whether I’m being prudent, or just scared with better branding.

(And if you’re the one in your family who still keeps cash in a coffee can — I see you. I’m not judging. I’m just going to gently suggest an index fund.)