Claim. True parental love hopes children will outshine the parents and carry the family tradition higher.
Elaboration. SMM says parents never want their children to be second-rate; even an attractive mother rejoices when someone says her baby is better-looking than she is (CSG 4.8 §2, 41-281, 1971.2.17). The same principle should govern family and nation: parents and rulers should desire successors greater than themselves. If parental love is to continue forever, children must inherit and develop its tradition. True parents therefore burn with hope that children will surpass them and “sacrifice everything for the sake of their children’s happiness” (Blessed Family 1002). The Kingdom of Heaven emerges naturally where children love their children more than their own parents loved them.
See also. personhood