Crying: Why crying is not bad behavior

Many parents have to deal with it. Their child cries in the middle of Wal-Mart. Most American parents punish and reprimand their children when they "embarrass" their parents through their tears. Many parents believe crying to be deserving of punishment in and of itself. However, the fact of the matter is that children cry when they are communicating a vulnerable need, the best way they know how.

Tending to a crying child is part of the Christian doctrine of mutual submission. See Colossians 3:20-21 KJV:

Children, obey your parents in all things: for this is well pleasing unto the Lord. Fathers, provoke not your children to anger, lest they be discouraged.

The Greek root word translated "obey" is υπακουο (Latin: hupakouo) and refers to secure, vulnerable rest in the love and submission of parents. This word ultimately refers to a secure attachment between parent and child in the family home. This secure attachment comes from parent submission, where parents are to submit to children just as they would to God, from beneath yet from above, expecting absolutely nothing in return. See also Matt. 22:35-40; 25:31-46.

The Greek root word translated "provoke...to anger" is ερεθιζο (Latin: erethizo) and refers to damages or offenses, namely the slightest of personal offense perceived by a child, including, but not limited to, the slightest of offensive touch or speech perceived by a child, stemming from entitlement. This commandment was intended by the Apostle Paul, and understood in its original context, as a moral statute prohibiting all forms of punitive parenting, including, but not limited to, any punishments, reprimands, or other controlling demeanor towards children. In the Old Testament, punitive parents were put to death by way of bloodletting, with "kidnapping" being defined under the Law as the slightest of damages or offenses stemming from hostage-taking - child punishment was seen as holding your child hostage merely for things that they did wrong, thereby treating your child as a quartered slave. Paul here was lifting up the Law in order to convict a group of Greek Christian parents who brought their pagan custom of spanking and punishing children into the church. Paul, contrary to popular legend, was anti-spanking, and opposed any and all punishment of a child in his secular writings. Paul may not have gotten along with the women of the church, but he sure loved children, and  even took in a few orphaned children during his time as a deacon.

Crying is not bad behavior in a child, at all. Most Christian mothers in the Early Church instead tended to the cries of their children. Whenever a child cried in the Early Christian church communities, mothers cooed at their children before picking them up, and from there, she diagnosed the need and met it. Maybe the child was tired. Maybe the child was hungry. Maybe the child needed mom's milk. Maybe the child needed mom, period. 

Cooing is a primal vocalization on the part of mothers, with that vocalization putting a crying child at ease. When children heard their mothers cooing at them, the cries of the child were then pacified. From there, mothers diagnosed the need, and then met it.

One way of dealing with a crying child is allow them to suckle the teat of mothers. In the Early Church, breastfeeding could happen everywhere, including even in public. Whenever the child latched onto the teat of mothers, they needed mom's milk. Breastfeeding officially ended when the child pushed away the teat of the mother, which is when parents in the Early Church introduced their child to solid food.

Most children who cry out loud are either ignored, or worse, punished. However, most crying in a child is developmentally appropriate behavior given the age and development of a child. When children don't grow up in some way, that is a sign of a developmental disorder such as autism and/or ADHD.

The depraved and entitled parents who provoke their children to anger through punitive parenting will not inherit the Kingdom of God! Let them be cast forever into the lake of fire and burning sulfur, which is the second death prepared for Satan and his accomplices! Let them descend into the abyss which is the ever-burning Hell of fire and torment, suffering God's Wrath day and night forever and ever! Repent, for the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand!