God often makes children little apostles for the conversion of others. A person in Paris gave the following account of his conversion: “I had been brought up,” he said, “in ignorance of the truth, with no respect for religion, and hating the Catholic Church. I had a little child, which was wild, passionate, and stupid. I was cross and severe to this child. Sometimes my wife used to say to me: ‘Wait a little, the child will be better when it makes its first communion.’ I did not believe it. however, the child began to go to Catechism, and from that time it became obedient, respectful, and affectionate. I thought I would go myself to hear the instructions on the Catechism, which had made such a wonderful change in the child. I went, and I heard truths which I had never heard before. My feelings towards the child changed. It was not so much love as respect I began to feel for the child. I was inferior to it, it was better and wiser than I was. The week for the first communion was come: there were but five or six days remaining.
One morning the child returned from Mass, and came into the room where I was alone. ‘Father,’ said the child, ‘the day of my first communion is coming, and I cannot go to the altar without asking your blessing and forgiveness for all the faults I have committed and the pain I have often given you. Think well of my faults, and scold me for them all, that I may commit them no more.’ ‘My child,’ I answered, ‘a father forgives every thing.’ The child looked at me with tears in its eyes and threw its arms around my neck. ‘Father,’ said the child again, ‘I have something else to ask you.’ I knew well, my conscience told me, what the child was going to ask. I was afraid, and said, ‘go away now, you can ask me to-morrow.’ The poor child did not know what to say, so it left me, and went sorrowfully into its own little room, where it had an altar with an image of the Blessed Virgin upon it. I felt sorry for what I had said; so I got up, and walked softly on the tips of my feet to the room door of my child. The door was a little open; I looked at the child, it was on its knees before the Blessed Virgin, praying with all its heart for its father. Truly, at the moment, I knew what one must feel at the sight of an angel. I went back to my room, and leaned my head on my hands, I was ready to cry. I heard a slight sound, and raised my eyes—my child was standing before me, on its face there was fear, with firmness and love. ‘Father,’ said the child, ‘I cannot put off till to-morrow what I have to ask you—I ask you, on the day of my first Communion, to come to the holy Communion along with mamma and me.’ I burst into tears, and threw my arms round the child’s neck, and said, ‘Yes, my child, yes this very day you shall take me by the hand and lead me to your confessor, and say, ‘Here is Father.’”
So this child converted its father. Little child, if you have parents who do not lead a good life, God looks to you for their conversion. But what can you do? The good example of a child speaks to the heart of a parent. Then there is prayer—will God turn a deaf ear to the prayer of a child, praying for the conversion of its father or mother? No; the Hail Mary, which you say every day for their conversion, the prayer you say for them each time you hear Mass, the holy Communions you offer for them, the sighs of your heart, all rise up before God, and are not forgotten by him; and the day will come when God will send down from Heaven the grace of conversion into the heart of your parents.
