orthodoxgladness:

Let your house be a place of struggle and asceticism in virtue, so that, having studied well here, you can apply with great skill in society as well. – St. John Chrysostom.

What we teach, learn and do in our homes will be what is brought forth into the world. It will be what our children bring forth into the world as well. If we fill ourselves with the superficial and temporal things – through what we read, what we see, what we hear, what we do – then we will provide nothing to the world that so desperately needs us. We will be a simple replica of that which is dying.

Yet we can go a different path. Read the words of God and of those who have walked before us; practice the custody of our eyes and ears; seek to do the will of God. If we bring this to the world, we will shine a light in the deepest of night. We will be the star leading others to Bethlehem.