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My 10.75 year old daughter is funny, smart, and an interesting person. She always winds up with the unexpected, unique, on-point answer. She also has a short attention span – more mentally short then physically short(ish). Her emotional connections with others are always erratic. This past week, I was contacted with a request to record my daughters in a short (under 5 minutes) testimony (or testimony-like) statement/scenario for the Virtual Primary Program being pulled together. I knew I could coach my 4 year old in to saying something cute and generic and it would be fine. I also knew that my 10.75 year old would not want to participate, so I said “No” on her behalf.
Later that day, I talked to my 10.75 year old about it and she said she would think about it.
I explained that it required talking about God in some form – maybe an example in her life of how God has blessed her or something about her relationship with God. It got quiet for a minute then my daughter half self-humorously, half sadly said that she didn’t think she had one.I think that I said that was OK, but if she thought of something, we could record her if she wanted to. I don’t think I said anything wrong, but I don’t feel that I have completed that conversation – can you guys please help me?I have mixed emotions about this. Culturally, I feel sadness and shame because she probably doesn’t have a relationship with God, because I didn’t set up habits that are supposed to instill this. As a parent, I feel relief and respect because she is being potentially honest about a difficult truth about her life. I also wonder if I will be held responsible for her lack of testimony by family members. As a person, I honestly don’t think that I have a relationship with God – so I am not interested in being hypocritical and trying to encourage one for her.
I guess I could circle around and say that if she wanted to develop a relationship with God, I can sit with her and remind her of common practices that seem to foster that sense, but that I can respect her not having a relationship with God. Any other thoughts?
AmyJ wrote:
…Later that day, I talked to my 10.75 year old about it and she said she would think about it.I explained that it required talking about God in some form – maybe an example in her life of how God has blessed her or something about her relationship with God. It got quiet for a minute then my daughter half self-humorously, half sadly said that she didn’t think she had one.I think that I said that was OK, but if she thought of something, we could record her if she wanted to. I don’t think I said anything wrong, but I don’t feel that I have completed that conversation – can you guys please help me?…
Since I don’t know your daughter it’s difficult to advise. But, I’ll give you my opinion.
I think you were exactly right. Don’t over think it. You opened the door for future discussions.
In my biased opinion, the fact that the church expects these young children with developing emotions and intellect to have a testimony of something that is so personal and complex is unacceptable and uncomfortable. You did nothing wrong. Just know that if your child is unable to “have a testimony” that they should not feel shamed for it just because “other kids their age do”. I think there are more important things to emotionally lead our children to than a scripted recitation of mormon beliefs about god. I see nothing wrong with what you did and I wish you and them the best with development 
I personally try to portray the type of God that I want to believe in. Therefore, if a child does not believe in God – That’s ok. He believes in you.
If a child does not have a relationship with God – That’s ok. He has a relationship with you and has all of eternity to help you develop your relationship with him.
If a child does can not think of a blessing from God – That’s ok. God has placed Moms and Dads on this earth to be his surrogates. We will do our best to love, support, and guide the little ones as God would want us to do. Parents are ideally tangible representations of God’s love for us.
P.S. My own daughter went to a testimony meeting as part of her girl’s camp day camp activity. She reported to me that it was ok. She did not bare her testimony and she said that she did not feel pressured to do so.
AmyJ, My #1 piece of advice when it comes to spiritual guidance of children in a mixed-faith home is to talk it over with your spouse before anything else. And because we are the spouses who have changed, the burden lies with us to make it agreeable, more so that our beloved spouses who have stayed with us in spite of our fall from grace.
Beyond that, I have found an abundance of things to love deeply in the NT — enough so to teach them in SS — even though I believe there is no God. For me, it’s much more about what I
believe inthan what I believe. And further beyond that, as a general rule, I’d suggest providing children with an environment that is conducive to finding one’s own faith, complete with tolerance for and acceptance of different views, and to let faith come and go naturally. journeygirl started a thread a few years ago about teaching in primary as a person with different beliefs. Here’s what I said then:
On Own Now wrote:
I can still remember my 11-year-old primary class. This was in the days when primary was during the week. What stands out in my memory was how we used the Bible. We all were given fairly large copies of the Bible… a large-print size. This was also in the days before the Church published its own bible, so we just had a large print KJV of the bible with basically no footnotes and no topical guide. And we had a red marking pencil. I really enjoyed looking at the scriptures in a way that I had never done up to that point. The Bible was in front of me, and I could mark passages that I thought were important, and I could learn to read it, study it, own it. Up until that time, the scriptures were something that older people read TO me. But for the first time, these were my scriptures.My suggestion is not to short-change these young people… Let them discover the meaning for themselves. I loved mom3’s suggestion to let the kids teach the lesson to themselves with you as the guide. They have heard all these stories before, this is their chance to own them.
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