Taking the Tube Underground
Anne Marie Waters on Removing the Television from the Family Hearth
Mom, there is something I want to tell you.” My usually thoughtful, and occasionally lucid, little boy waited dramatically with a grave expression on his pink, sweaty five-year-old face as I unpacked the recently delivered moving boxes. Jack had been playing outside in the August heat and meeting the other young residents of our new neighborhood.
“It’s something I’ve noticed, about us, that is different from the other kids,” he said somberly. Here goes, I thought. We homeschool. We say grace. We go to church. Well, it was bound to come up sometime. “Mom, everyone else has their TV on the main level in the family room. And, mom,” he paused once more for effect, “ours is in the basement.”
THIS ARTICLE ONLY AVAILABLE TO SUBSCRIBERS.
FOR QUICK ACCESS:
Anne Marie Waters is a freelance writer and former associate editor of The Campaign Insider, a trade publication for political consultants. She and her husband recently moved from Washington, D.C., to Birmingham, Alabama, with their three boys. They attend St. Matthew's Anglican Church.
A Journal of Mere Christianity—Delivered to Your Door with Full Online Access
- Essays on theology, culture, and the Church
- Contributors from across the Christian traditions
- Six print issues per year
- Full digital archive access
Subscribe (Print + Online)
Get six issues (one year) of Touchstone PLUS full online access including pdf downloads for only $39.95.
Subscribe (Online Only)
Get a one-year full-access subscription to the Touchstone online archives for only $19.95.
bulk subscriptions
Order Touchstone subscriptions in bulk and save $10 per sub! Each subscription includes 6 issues of Touchstone plus full online access to touchstonemag.com—including archives, videos, and pdf downloads of recent issues for only $29.95 each! Great for churches or study groups.
Transactions will be processed on a secure server.
more on family from the online archives
34.1—January/February 2021
Jesus' Astonishing Other Teaching on Marriage by James Ware
33.2—March/April 2020
Encounters with Faith & Forgiveness in Communities of Faith by Nicole M. King
more from the online archives
28.3—May/June 2015
Whittaker Chambers's Lonely War Against Godless Collectivism by Hunter Baker
calling all readers
Please Donate
"There are magazines worth reading but few worth saving . . . Touchstone is just such a magazine."
—Alice von Hildebrand
"Here we do not concede one square millimeter of territory to falsehood, folly, contemporary sentimentality, or fashion. We speak the truth, and let God be our judge. . . . Touchstone is the one committedly Christian conservative journal."
—Anthony Esolen, Touchstone senior editor
