Family Spirituality

Living Faith: a collection of columns from Catherine O’Connell-Cahill that appeared in At Home with our Faith.

What’s your spiritual IQ?

Today we’re going to talk about brains. The kind you think with, not the kind you eat if you’re one of those exotic-eater types. You’ve probably heard about the research that says we’re all using only 10 percent of our brains. The other 90 percent of those gray cells sit there unemployed, probably wishing they could have been assigned to the brains of Albert Einstein or Leonardo da Vinci or someone who would have given them some challenging work to do. I mean, balancing the checkbook just doesn’t cut it for these cells.

Now, this kind of information always makes me feel lousy. I feel perhaps I should put these cells to work relearning the causes of World War I, or renewing my efforts to understand calculus.

Finally, I’ve heard something that has caused me to drop these depressing plans for brain-cell deployment. It also can help us as parents. In their forthcoming book Simple Ways to Pray for Healing, authors Dennis, Matthew, and Sheila Fabricant Linn reveal that brain researchers now suggest that the other 90 percent of the brain is meant not for more memorization or calculation, but for another task entirely: spirituality and higher consciousness, "that which transcends space and time," say the Linns. "... Our brains develop most completely when we pray." (The Linns make great use of this information in their book, but more on this next month.)

Back to the brain. So 10 percent of our cells are perfectly adequate for learning math, history, science, how to program the VCR, etc. The other 90 percent is for wisdom, spirituality. We also know from brain research that if your cells don’t get fired up early in life, they sit around dormant for the rest of your days. If that 90 percent never gets any action, you’re left with only the other 10 percent to conduct your whole religious life. That might leave us trying to do our faith the way we do our math: black and white, subject to rules and formulas.

I talked to Father Richard Rohr, O.F.M., who has spoken with groups of parents about this revelation. Rohr says that religion should prod us to use that 90 percent of our brains to grapple with things like grace, mercy, paradox, mystery, unjust suffering. "That’s why religious leaders speak in symbols and parables–to break down our addiction to the 10 percent brain," says Rohr.

So how do we encourage those wisdom cells in the small people God has entrusted to our care? The possibilities are endless, and you may do many of them already without thinking about it: eye contact, even with our tiniest babies; the importance of touch (especially as our children get older, and during difficult ages like two, four, or you name it); the power of music to set a mood and to express what words cannot. Sustain and encourage those simple rituals that grow up in your family life: we always sing this song on the way to Grandma’s; we spend a moment praying and snuggling before tucking our children into bed; we light a candle to pray for someone each week at church. Just think of these as the ABCs of spiritual wisdom for your kids. And never underestimate their ability to deal with the mysteries and paradoxes of life–they might be able to show us a thing or two. COC

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