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David Farmer David Albert Farmer, Ph.D., author of PILGRIM PRAYERS FOR SINGLE FATHERS, has written three additional books and more than forty journal articles in addition to his twenty-five years of editing scholarly publications. He is a divorced single father who took primary responsibility for rearing his two children-beginning at the time they were 10 and 8 years of age (now 22 and 20). He believes that meaningful, ongoing prayer was the major means whereby he was able to survive and sometimes flourish as a single dad. Disinterested in denominationalism and unwilling to restrict himself by any religious group's dogmatic claims, he is unwilling to be a part of religious movements that diminish the worth and dignity of persons who are divorced. A native of Knoxville, Tennessee, Farmer became pastor of Wilmington, Delaware's Silverside Church in June 2000 after an eight and a half year pastorate in Baltimore and a five year pastorate in New Orleans. He also presently serves as Adjunct Professor of Humanities at Wilmington College. For fun, Farmer enjoys playing the piano, film, chasing after his two Jack Russell terriers, and train travel (especially to New York to take in Broadway plays).

Pilgrim Prayers for Single Fathers
by David Albert Farmer
My Child Is Caught in the Middle

The holidays were approaching, and, amid all the joy of anticipating Christmas with children, there came the now-requisite frustration of scheduling with his ex-wife. When the children were smaller, the debate had centered around where the children would awaken on Christmas morning-all excited and thrilled about their gifts. As the children got older, the arguments were related to who would get the kids long enough to make a holiday trip to be at one of the ex-spouses' family gatherings. The differences of opinion on the subject caused him a range in emotional response from pseudo-cooperation to mild frustration to, "She makes me so mad I could spit!!!"
Though the once-married couple agreed every year not to get their children in the middle of these differences, they invariably did. And especially as the children got old enough to voice their own preferences, the politics of which parent would win became intense. Each parent would try to lure the children to the schedule/trip she or he preferred, and payoffs to the kids included more and better gifts at one of the two family gatherings as well as the opportunity not to hurt one grandmother's feelings.
Christmas, therefore, always seemed to have at least a small dark cloud hanging over it, and sometimes an actual storm. The issue was never resolved. Even as adults, their children were still "demonstrating loyalty" according to which Christmas gathering they chose to attend, and the time came when it wasn't unusual for the children to decide to attend different ones.

Be angry but do not sin; do not let the sun go down on your anger… (Eph 4:26 NRSV).

Gracious God,
I really thought we could do all this in a neat and tidy way. We were so level-headed at first: divorce can't be helped, we will move through it, we will affirm and encourage our child every step of the way, we will fairly divide what we owned, neither of us will blame the other for what has happened, our child will never be asked to choose sides, and all will be well.
Something's not working, though. Our children feel caught in the middle. Our children feel the need to say one of us was wrong, and the other right. Our children don't know how to be loyal to two parents who are no longer one flesh. We were always so careful to be unified in our parenting; to relate to one of us was, in most every instance, to relate to both of us. And even our time with "Mommy only" or "Daddy only" was never an experience of seeking to press them to like one of us more than the other.
Here we are. We are going our separate ways. We are still united in loving our child, but as to the direction of our respective futures and how we do everything-the little things and the momentous tasks-these differ. Our child doesn't know which way is right. Our child is caught in the middle.
Gracious God, may I find enough of your grace and an adequate measure of common sense not to allow our children to have to choose between parents? This can never be accomplished apart from your calming, healing presence. Thank you for your willingness to be here among us and for your extraordinary care for our little one who has this new and unfair burden to bear.
Amen.

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