Spiritual Books on Parenting and Caregiving

Armstrong, Thomas; The Radiant Child
This is one of my favorite books. Armstrong believes children are closer to remembering their spiritual origins and therefore have access to healing energies and different forms of awareness that adults have forgotten. By nurturing children’s spiritual development, adults also access their own healing powers.

Brendtro, Larry K, Martin Brokenleg and Steve Van Bockern; Reclaiming Youth at Risk: Our Hope for the Future.
There are so many theories about what is wrong with our alienated, violent-prone youth; this book provides hopeful, inspiring yet practical techniques for healing our alienated youth through the use of Native American wisdom of bringing youth back into the circle of courage and connectedness.

Brooks, Robert and Sam Goldstein; Raising Resilient Children: Fostering Strength, Hope, and Optimism in Your Child.
This is a wonderful book about stopping the prevalence of treating children by what we label as wrong with them. Instead, fostering “islands of competence” and “charismatic adults” in children’s lives is encouraged.

Chopra, Deepak; The Seven Spiritual Laws for Parents.
This is classic Chopra on tending to one’s own spiritual healing to find inner peace for oneself and thus be able to encourage the discovery of inner peace for your children.

Doe, Mimi with Marsha Walch; 10 Principles for Spiritual Parenting: Nurturing Your Child’s Soul.
This is perhaps the most well-known book on spiritual parenting. Doe provides excellent insights, meditation, and affirmations on healing oneself while nurturing the spiritual lives of our children.

Fuchs-Kreimer, Rabbi Nancy; Parenting as a Spiritual Journey: Deepening Ordinary and Extraordinary Events into Sacred Occasions.
This is another excellent book on what it means to parent from a spiritual place. She describes how parents find meaning and sacredness in ordinary as well as painful and stressful events and how this can be conveyed to our children.

Greenspan, Miriam; Healing Through the Dark Emotions, The Wisdom of Grief, Fear, and Despair.
Greenspan is a psychotherapist who shows us how to transform grief, fear, and despair into gratitude, joy, and faith in life. Parents of children with special needs will identify with Greenspan’s struggles through the grief and fear concerning her child with a disability.

Hallowell, Edward M.; The Childhood Roots of Adult Happiness: Five Steps to Help Kids Create and Sustain Lifelong Joy.
Best known for his work with children with special needs particularly children with ADD, Hallowell’s recent books have focused on the importance of family and making connections for nurturing children’s souls.

Kabat-Zinn, Myla and Jon; Everyday Blessings: The Inner Work of Mindful Parenting.
This book describes a Buddhist approach to parenting with excellent and thoughtful ideas for parenting in the present moment.

Lindbergh, Anne Morrow; Gift From the Sea.
This is a timeless classic about what it means to be a mother and also nourish one’s soul.

Martin, William; The Parent’s Tao Te Ching

Following the Tao Te Ching,,Martin distills Lao Tzu’s ancient wisdom to the tasks of parenting in beautiful poetic verses.

McClure, Vimala; The Tao of Motherhood

McClure provides brief, poetic and inspiring passages adapted from the Tao Te Ching to give support and guidance in order to parent from calm and joy.

Moffett, James; The Universal Schoolhouse: Spiritual Awakening Through Education.
One of the most visionary books I have read about individualizing and spiritualizing the education of our children as essential for healing our world.

Patton, Sally; Don’t Fix Me I’m Not Broken, Changing Our Minds about Ourselves and Our Children. This is a spiritual parenting book about learning to heal our own woundedness so we can see past diagnostic labels to the perfect child within and parent fron love instead of fear. Please click here to order from amazon.com.

Pearce, Joseph Chilton; The Magical Child: Rediscovering Natures Plan for Our Children.

Pearce, Joseph Chilton; The Biology of Transcendence.
These are fascinating books about the spiritual development of children form a biological perspective. InThe Biology of Transcendence, Pearce describes the biological development of the brain and how it is affected by the spiritual nurturance of the mother. The survival of the species depends on our own spiritual healing and the nurturing or our children.

Pransky, Jack; Parenting from the Heart

This is my absolute favorite spiritual parenting book.  I love the emphasis on recognizing that children and parents are always doing the best they can with the information they have.  This is a book about nurturing the soul of your child and not judging.

Prather, Hugh and Gayle; Spiritual Parenting.
Although out of print, this is one of the best books on spiritual parenting. Both Hugh and Gayle Prather are ministers who offer their own insights about their struggles to parent from a spiritual place. You can find this in most libraries and the out of print resources at Amazon.

Spangler, David; Parent as Mystic, Mystic as Parent.
I loved this book. Spangler calls us as parents to be as mystics, bridging the everyday with the sacred in parenting our children thus being a part of the healing cycle of connection as part of the whole.

Wapnick, Kenneth; Parents and Children, Our Most Difficult Classroom Parts One and Two

For those of you who are students of A Course in Miracles, this is a wonderful book for applying the Course philosophy to parenting.