Grandparents Central to Strengthening Family Relationships
Grandparents are an important part of the glue that holds families together in an increasingly fragmented world. “The notion of an independent, self-contained nuclear family is supported by neither social science nor the Judeo-Christian tradition,” researcher Anthony B. Bradley wrote, according to “The Epoch Times.”
He believes networks of extended family members, particularly grandparents, provide a crucial bulwark for the family and child-raising. Basing his conclusion on numerous scientific studies, Bradley said he sees close proximity to a maternal grandmother as even more important for family success than a high-paying career.
“One of the best ways a man can provide for his family is to do whatever is necessary to make sure his wife lives in the same city as her mother, assuming they have a good relationship,” he said. “While I have written before about the importance of fathers, the other essential familial role for thriving families is the grandmother, and having children within the same local context as a maternal grandmother is mission-critical if we want mothers and children to thrive.”
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Grandparents help children see where they came from while encouraging them toward the future. Although there seems to be a special role for the maternal grandmother, all grandparents can exert a strong, positive influence on growing families. Grandparents have acquired wisdom through the labor of long years, the experience of success and failure, that they can impart to their children and grandchildren. Grandparents contribute in important ways to the development of the generations beneath them.
The late Jim Dobson of Focus on the Family agreed.
“A sage once remarked that the elderly slow down and stoop over so that they can see things as children once again, so that they can hold the hands of children who toddle along on inexperienced feet,” he once wrote. “That bug on the sidewalk, the snail under the cabbage leaf, the robin pulling the worm from the rain-moistened earth — these are the things small children and their grandparents notice.”
–Alan Goforth
