Listen to your children. Give them your time, even the time that you have reserved for yourselves. Show them your confidence; believe whatever they tell you, even if sometimes they try to deceive you. Don't be afraid when they rebel, because, at their age, you yourselves were more or less rebellious. Go to meet them half-way and pray for them. If you act in this christian manner, they will come to you with simplicity, instead of trying to satisfy their legitimate curiosity by taking it to some rough or vulgar friend. Your confidence, your friendly dealings with your children, will receive an answer in their sincerity in dealing with you. Then, even if there are quarrels and lack of understanding, they will never amount to much; and this is what peace in the family and a truly christian life mean.

"How can I describe," says a christian writer of the early centuries, "the joy of a marriage united by the Church, strengthened by the dedication of husband and wife, sealed with a blessing, proclaimed by the angels, and accepted by God the Father?… Husband and wife are as brother and sister, servants of each other, and nothing separates them, either in the flesh or in the spirit. For they are truly two in one flesh, and where there is one flesh there should be one spirit… Contemplating such a family, Christ rejoices and sends his peace. Where there are two together, he is also present; and where he is present, there can be no evil."