What Does a  Father Mean To You?

Birman L. Warrick, 32
3524 Leavenworth Street
Omaha, Nebraska  68105-1919

     IT bothers me that Motherer Day comes before Fathers Day. Why not
Parents Day in lieu of either holiday?

      I sincerely believe some people subconsciously regard mother as the
more important of the two parents when it comes to molding a childs
character. Divorce courts, for instance, lend tacit approval of such a
concept by almost always automatically awarding custody rights to the
mother while the fathers visitation rights are usually limited.

     Each new generation, consequently,  produces a group of sons who grow
up subconsciously believing that the responsibility of the father in a
parent/child relationship is secondary to that of a mother. This
self-perpetuating myth continues to produce disastrous results in American
homes as children, who are innocent victims of the myth, too often grow up
to produce victims of their own.

        "A chip off the old block" is not just a trite expression. Children
do tend to be carbon copies of the attitudes of their parents. If we are
ever to break the legacy of irresponsible father to irresponsible son, we
must somehow change the destructive concepts that the father is only the
provider while the mother is responsible to shape the childs character and
moral development.

        I once knew of a small boy. He wanted a new bike. He begged and
begged his mother to ask his father if he might have one. The mother
suggested that the boy ask his father himself. "I would," said the boy,
"but I dont know dad well enough."

        There is a sharp reproof to the father in the reply of the son.
Many a father keeps his children at such a distance from him that they
never really get to know him. They have no confidence in his love for them.
To them he is king of the family. They fear him, love him, and some even
respect him, but always from a distance. They are timid about sharing with
him their wants and hurts. So they approach him through their mother.

        They tell her everything and she listens. They have a four-lane
expressway to her heart which they travel with perfect freedom.

        An aloof father misses the essence of family life and must shoulder
most of the blame if his children are afraid of him. Children should never
be kept at arms distance. Fathers do their children a life-long injury by
living with them as strangers. Many a child has been driven away from home
and often into improper situations in society because the love their hearts
craved was withheld.

        When a father refuses to share his love and tender affections with
his own children, he is nurturing discontent and distrust in that small
heart that many a child does not outgrow in a lifetime.

        "Sentence me!" This once was the cry of a father to a judge who was
about to pronounce sentence on the mans son for a crime the boy had
committed. The fathers face was haggard. His heart was broken. He pleaded
to the judge, "Sentence me! I have been so busy all my life making money,
sitting on my church board, going through the chairs in my Lodge, meeting
the right people in my country club, sitting on committees, and involving
myself in politics that I have failed to concern myself with the boy.
Sentence me! I alone am to blame!"

        Undoubtedly, many a young man sitting in prison or reformatory
could point an accusing finger at his father who spent all his time on
secondary matters to the neglect of the greatest responsibility God has
given him as a father.

        If you are a father, open your heart and your arms to your
children. Be free with them. Discover their wants and needs and deepest
desires. Laugh with them. Play with them. Most of all, truly love them.
When you do, you will discover they no longer find it necessary to use
mother as a go-between or a mediator to reach the treasures of your heart!


Birman L. Warrick serves as Senior Warden of Solomon Lodge No. 10 in  Fort
Calhoun, NE, and is a member of Scottish Rite Bodies and Tangier Shrine in
Omaha. He is a self-employed businessman  and an outdoorsman who enjoys
trips to Alaska.

WARNING!

     Warning! To all women who love a Mason who is over forty-five years of
age:

    Require him TODAY to make an appointment with his doctor for a
screening test that will reveal the amount of prostate specific antigen
(PSA) in his blood. It's inexpensive. (How much is his life worth?) It's
easy. (It could save his life!)

      To Masons: Never have a physical without a PSA test for prostate
cancer.

      Just as regular breast cancer examinations are essential to a woman's
good healthand they are essentiala man's PSA test is essential to his
life expectency.

      No article I have ever written carries more conviction than this one.
You see, I'm recovering.

Herbert E. Richards, 32, K\C\C\H\ Portland, Oregon, Scottish Rite Bodies
