I woke up at four in the morning to drive a friend to the airport. Still a little bit giddy by the night’s sleep, I opened the drawer to get a sock very slowly, so as not to wake my wife. I hurriedly got down, grabbed my sneakers and observed that I had a socks inside it. I sat down to put it on, and what was my surprise to find inside it small socks of my granddaughter, just one year old. My “Denguinho”, as I usually call her, observed that Grandpa always put his socks inside his shoes and so followed my steps, doing the same. Laugh a lot, that morning, when I saw those little socks inside my sneakers.

I kept thinking about the strength of the example, and how our children and grandchildren pattern our steps. The Bible encourages us: “Train up a child in the way he should go: and when he is old, he will not depart from it.” (Proverbs 22: 6). Our children and grandchildren will take them to old age what they learned from us. That is our great responsibility. Nothing is as strong in this learning process as the example. Our children and grandchildren will replicate in their lives, our character, values, noble feelings and everything else they see in us. From this, I ask myself: what will the adult life of our children and grandchildren be like? Our life example will answer …