Quote:
Originally Posted by Indy Coug
Well there is a rule and there are the exceptions to it. If you're going to address people generally, like in a GENERAL CONFERENCE, you should be concerning yourself with the rule, rather than the exceptions to it.
If I'm an oddsmaker, I'm going with a stay at home mom over daycare. After a billion trials or so, I'll come out ahead.
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I'm going to chime in in accord with Indy here. There a lots of things we hold up in the church as being the ideal. That doesn't mean you get the ideal all the time, but not always getting it does not mean we shouldn't continue to uphold it.
There are lots of kids who come through abusive terrible childhoods and wind up fine in life. That doesn't mean that a normal childhood is not preferable to an abusive one. Its an extreme example that illustrates the point.
I think the decision of whether or not to stay home with the kids is up to each couple. I think even the Proclamation on Families recognizes that individual adaptation to circumstances is expected. On the other hand, I think that it is right for the church (and I'm not saying the talk that has gotten so much run here does this) to suggest to its members that there is an ideal and that we all ought to examine whether our current arrangement is best for our children and whether our motives are their best interests or whether they are selfish.
I am biased because I came from a home where my mother who was never going to be happy being a homemaker. She had a career before my brothers and me. While we were little she worked out of the home, had a framing business, mortgage business, was a realtor, but was nearly always there when we got home from school and always saw us off in the morning. Work happened when we were at school. We had a parent parenting us rather than (sorry) warehousing us somewhere. I'm certain this was a financial sacrifice as well. When we were all high school age, mom completed her graduate degree and went back to work full time. She still works.
To me, the ideal is that parents should only have children that they intend to raise. That doesn't mean, to me, that either shoulders that burden any more than another. But, IMHO, if your kids are in day care and it would not be a financial hardship to have them out with one or both parents "at home" some of the time, that is a selfish decision. It is a decision that gratifies the parent rather than reflects the child's interests. I get that sometimes it just can't be avoided.
I think the problem lies, in large measure, is in a culture that tells us we can have it all. That both parents can have career and family and that neither will suffer. Reality is different.