Children Come First

For three decades Dr. Howard H. Irving has championed the use of divorce mediation outside the adversarial court system to save couples and their children the bitterness of winner-takes-all custody battles. Here, he calls on his vast experience of mediating more than 2,000 cases to help couples contemplating divorce.

For three decades Dr. Howard H. Irving has championed the use of divorce mediation outside the adversarial court system to save couples and their children the bitterness of winner-takes-all custody battles. Here, he calls on his vast experience of mediating more than 2,000 cases to help couples contemplating divorce.

The Greatest Gift YOU Can Give Your Child Are you in a tumultuous relationship? Are you constantly arguing? What unselfish acts can you take to save your child? In this non-fiction memoir, Robert Pikula takes you through the trials and tribulations you may experience in and out of divorce court. You will be surprised when you know what really happens behind the scenes with lawyers, judges and child services. What Gift can you give your child? In this book you will discover: 1. How any parent can keep his or her child safe and loved in the midst of a traumatic, life-changing experience. 2. How to overcome the confusion involved with child services and family court. 3. Successful ways to address the feelings of abandonment experienced by a child who has lost a parent. 4. Understanding the emotional chaos of two little girls who fight against all odds to be together. 5. A couple fathers doing the right thing for those little girls. Robert Pikula has been a single parent for over 20 years. He raised his daughter since she was 5 months old with full, sole and legal custody. He has been in and out of court more that 10 times to keep his daughter safe. This book is the definitive resource for parents who want to protect their children from the negative influences inflicted by the other parent. The court system is very confusing, but the children can be spared the agony and pain of this process simply by using the strategies outlined in this book. For far to long, the legal battlefield involving child custody has been without a guide for parents who want to help their children. Our Children Come First is the resource every caring parent has been searching for. 159 pages, 70,951 words Author/Publisher/Consultant: Robert K. Pikula Ghost Writer/Artist: Danielle Weinhold www.ourchildrencomefirst.com

Explore what faithful parenting might look like today In Let the Children Come, Bonnie J. Miller-McLemore explores the question, What does faithful parenting look like today? As she addresses this query, she updates outmoded and distorted assumptions about and conceptions of children in popular US culture. She also shows important insights and contributions religious traditions and communities, Christianity in particular, make as we examine how to regard and treat children well. Miller-McLemore draws on historical and contemporary understandings of Christianity, psychology, and feminism to push back against negative trends, such as the narcissistic use of children for adult benefit, the market use of children to sell products, and the failure to give children meaningful roles in the domestic work of the family and the life of wider society. Miller-McLemore views children as full participants in families and religious communities and as human beings deserving of greater respect and understanding than people typically grant them. In particular, the book rethinks five ways adults have viewed (and misperceived) children--as victims, sinful, gifts, work (the labor of love), and agents. Reimagining children, she proposes, will lead to a renewed conception of the care of children as a religious practice.