Children’s Day, 90 years ago
It was in 1924, 90 years ago, that edited the Decree number 4867, which elected the 12th October as the commemorative date we know as Children's Day, which is celebrated in different countries, although this occurs under different dates.
The origin of Children's Day in our country dates back to 1923 when the city of Rio de Janeiro, the Federal Capital, hosted the 3rd South American Child Congress. The following year, taking the impact of the past event, the congressman Galdino do Valle Filho drafted the project that originated the decree to which we refer.
The matter remained, however, ignored for a long time, until, at the initiative of a toy industry, with support from other businessmen linked to the area in the 1950s, it revitalized the commemoration of the 12th of October, going so, Children's Day to integrate the calendar of holidays in the country.
As today is October 12th, there is no better chance to remember what the spiritual doctrine tells us about the child and the importance of childhood in the development of the creatures and society itself.
First, Spiritism teaches that childhood is common to all the planets that have not reached the pinnacle of the evolutionary process, making them as easy to understand, a necessary transition.
What is, for the Spirit that gets back to reincarnation, the usefulness of spending by the state of childhood?
This question was formulated by Allan Kardec, who got the disembodied instructors the following answer:
“Embodying, with the goal of improving, the Spirit during this period is more accessible to the impressions that receives, which are able to assist its development, which should contribute to the charge of educating it." (The Spirits’ Book, issue 383.)
A little later in the same work the spiritual teachers added other information that lets us understand why we should take the utmost care and attention to our children:
"Children are the beings that God sends to new stocks. For they cannot impute excessive severity, it is given them all aspects of innocence. Yet when it comes to a child of evil inclinations, cover up his/her wrongdoing with the cover of unconsciousness. This innocence is not real superiority with respect to what they were before, no. It is the image of what should be and if they are not, the consequent punishment falls solely on them." (The Spirits’ Book, issue 385)
"It was not, however, only for them that God gave them the appearance of innocence; it was also and especially by their parents, whose love needs weakness that features them. But this love is greatly weaken the sight of a rough and intractable character, while judging their good and docile children, parents give them all the love and surround them with the most care. Since, however, the children no longer need the protection and assistance were waived them for fifteen or twenty years, it comes to them the real and individual character in all the nakedness." (Work cited, issue 385)
"Childhood has another utility. Spirits only enter the body lifetimes to improve themselves, to get better. The delicacy of child age makes them soft; accessible to advice from experience and from those who should make them progress. This stage is when they can reform their characters and suppressing their evil inclinations. Such a duty that God has imposed on parents, a sacred trust that must give account." (Work cited, issue 385)
In a known psychographed work by Francisco Cândido Xavier, Emmanuel alluded to the subject, and also highlights the importance of the infantile period in the evolutionary process of the human creature:
"The youth can be compared to a hopeful output of a boat to an important trip. The childhood was the preparation; old age will be the arrival at the port. All phases order the lessons of experienced sailors, learning to organize and end the trip with the desired success." (The Way, Truth and Life, chapter 151)
Preparation! Here is the name that Emmanuel defined the state of childhood, confirming a very old thesis that tells us that the citizen is formed inside the house and that, therefore, if we want a better, fairer, more equal and more particularly fraternal society, we must cultivate it within our homes, preparing early those who will one day be in charge of institutions, companies and the country itself.
