Remember Your Guardian Angel

Every family with small kids has its bedtime rituals. As kids, my five siblings and I would lay in bed with our doors open while Dad led the Rosary from the hallway. A friend of mine does a dramatic reading of Kipling’s “Rikki-Tikki-Tavi” for his kids if they sit through night prayers. My sister and her husband sing the “Regina Caeli” with their toddler. We have always ended our bedtime routine with the simple invocation, “Guardian Angels, keep them safe,” as we close the door.

The little prayer was created one night when my oldest was just able to talk and was going through a bout of nightmares. My husband told her the story of God creating the angels in all their choirs: thrones, dominions, powers, etc. At the end, he told her about guardian angels and how God has assigned every believer an angel to watch over him or her. When the nightmares woke her up, all she needed to do was ask her guardian angel for help.

My children believe in the power of their guardian angels so forcefully that if we happen to forget (or they happen not to hear) the little invocation before bedtime, they will loudly clamor for my husband and me to come back, open the door, and call upon the angelic forces of Heaven to remember their duties.

My children mostly think of their guardian angels at nighttime and as defenders against nightmares. But guardian angels have a much more significant role than calming a child’s fears.

Children—and adults—should remember their guardian angels and develop a pious friendship with their heavenly protectors. It is one thing to remember occasionally that we have one and another to have a robust devotion to our guardian angel.

Knowing that we have our own guardian angel constantly watching over us is a beautiful realization that God loves each one of us and cares for us, even when we feel utterly alone. As a wife and mother, I try to foster a devotion to my husband’s and children’s guardian angels—get them on my team, so to speak!—so that they can guide me in my attempt to fulfill my vocation toward my family.

I want to foster a similar sort of devotion in my children, so that their guardian angels cross their minds more often than just at bedtime. My kids are voracious readers (and read-aloud listeners), so I was delighted to discover that Patrick O’Hearn has just released a children’s book about guardian angels, Angel of God: Devotion to the Guardian Angels for Children (Sophia Institute Press). What intrigued me about his book is that it is not just an illustrated children’s book that teaches about angels; it is also a devotional book for children to draw closer to their own guardian angels. My kids can learn about what angels are and how they watch over us, along with a recurring devotional meditation that we can slip into our bedtime ritual.

My family homeschools, so when I read a book out loud, I have an audience of many comprehension levels and attention spans. It is a rare treasure to find a book that can appeal to all of the kids at once. What is nice about Angel of God is that there is something for all of them, and the book is clear enough for the younger kids to follow while serious enough that my eldest does not feel too old for it. The pictures, too, are traditional, classic, and calm—something I appreciate as a mom who ends up reading picture books on repeat and who is sick to death of loud, gimmicky art!

The prayers focus around the seven special duties our guardian angels perform for us. They have a nice repetition from one to the next that give them the feel of a novena or the Stations of the Cross—and I appreciate that some of the traditional prayers, such as the Angel of God, are given in both English and Latin. My kids can pray through the book with me in one sitting, giving us an opportunity to talk and reflect about the seven duties that our guardian angels perform. Or we can go bit by bit through the book, praying each section together one bedtime after the next. It is the sort of book that I will keep in my special stack of books intended for my easy access, rather than risk it getting lost in the general stacks of children’s books that dominate our living room.

We have an icon of the guardian angels hanging in our house. It is a very busy icon with a ton of little figures arranged like a comic strip up and down on either side of the large central figure of the guardian angel. My kids love this icon because the little figures depict, on the right, the life of the man who calls upon his angel for help in his need. On the left, there is the man who ignores his angel and falls into the various traps set by the devil. At the top of the icon, the two angels are presenting the souls in their charge to Christ in Heaven. The happy right-hand angel holds a huge scroll of all the prayers and good deeds his man has done. The sad left-hand angel holds an enormous handkerchief and is weeping into it. It is a delightful icon, but it is also rather sobering because it reminds us that there is nothing but sorrow if we forget to invoke the protection of our guardian angel.

St. John Bosco, patron saint of children, told his schoolboys:

When tempted, invoke your angel. He is more eager to help you than you are to be helped! Ignore the devil and do not be afraid of him; he trembles and flees at the sight of your guardian angel.

May our own guardian angels always keep us safe.