Feature Article October 2008

from Meditations from the Oratory: Experiencing the Mystery of Christ by Fr. Benedict J. Groeschel, C.F.R.

The Family of God

READINGS: Matthew 7:21–27; Matthew 5:13–16; Catechism 1655–1666

The Church has often been called the Family of God, and there is great truth to this statement. The family has its origin in the bond of love between a woman and a man. This bond is a gift of God, one hallowed by the sacrament of Matrimony. The product of this bond, the family, is holy and rests at the very heart of the Church. The Church also has its origin in a bond of love, that of God for mankind. The Church flows from the wounded side of Christ, from the source of limitless love.

Christ sanctifies the family by coming into this world as a member of a family. He lived and died as a son who loved His mother and foster father and who was loved by them. The familial aspect of Christianity was evident from the Church’s first days. Early members of the Church were often brought into the faith as a household unit; they become Christians not as individuals but as a family. The Catechism says of these early Christian families something we might say today of strongly Catholic families, that they were “islands of Christian life in an unbelieving world” (CCC 1655).

The family was shown to be holy, as an institution through which God works, even before the coming of Christ. In the Hebrew Scriptures God brings the Chosen People into being not as a nation but as a family. God calls Abraham and Sarah to follow him and through the gift of a son makes them progenitors of the people He will call His own. When their descendants are brought to Egypt to escape famine, they go as a family consisting of a father, his twelve sons, and their wives and children. In Egypt, they become a nation, but when God finally calls them from slavery into freedom, they go once again as a family, carrying the bones of their ancestors with them.

In Baptism, we are joined to the family that is the Church. Within this great family we receive the faith into our lives, making it our own. In due time we transmit it to our children. Parents are the primary teachers of their children, so it is within the family setting that we learn what it is to grow in the love of God. In this, too, the Church acknowledges and learns from what God has done throughout history. One of the most famous of the many commandments found in the Torah (the first five books of the Bible), a commandment that to this day is recited daily at every Jewish worship service, is this excerpt from Deuteronomy: “And you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your might. And these words which I command you this day shall be upon your heart; and you shall teach them diligently to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, and when you walk by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise” (Deut 6:4–8).

Here we see the transmission of faith in God to be a familial obligation of the highest order. In the New Testament we understand this same obligation to be also an act of love. St. Paul conveys this beautifully to his spiritual son Timothy when he writes, “You then, my son, be strong in the grace that is in Christ Jesus, and what you have heard from me before many witnesses entrust to faithful men who will be able to teach others also” (2 Tim 2:1-2).

In all this we begin to perceive the true nature of family as God intends it. We find our family in the people with whom we are related. We find our family in the Church which has accepted us in Baptism. We find our family in the wider world to whom we go in love to share what we have been given in Christ — we share with our entire human family the divine love.

Quotation for Meditation

The family has a special role to play throughout the life of its members, from birth to death. It is truly “the sanctuary of life: the place in which life — the gift of God — can be properly welcomed and protected against the many attacks to which it is exposed, and can develop in accordance with what constitutes authentic human growth.” Consequently the role of the family in building a culture of life is decisive and irreplaceable. — Pope John Paul II, The Theology of the Body, 565

Quiet Time and Then Discussion

Questions for Meditation

Whose responsibility is it to teach the faith to the family and one generation to the other?
In what sense is the Church a family?
Where, and in whom, do we find our true family?

Prayer

Dear Lord, may You touch our hearts and mold our character in such a special way that authentic love will be fashioned among our families and carried out in our everyday lives. Help us to love each other and express that love in ways that reveal that You are our Father. Lord, allow us to make You smile when You look upon us. Help us to be holy and filled with love for the Eucharist, our true food and nourishment. Help our Holy Priests to stand tall and separated from this world as they lead the Church into victory by authentic love expressed in their oneness with You.

Lord, I pray especially for Catholic men to become the priests of their homes, the holy men that Christ shed his Blood for them to be, that they would lead their families into the sunlight of God’s presence to overcome the darkness of our society. — Gerard J. Cleffi, Director of the Oratory of Divine Love

Meditations from the Oratory: Experiencing the Mystery of Christ by Father Benedict J. Groeschel, C.F.R. These prayerful meditations about the supernatural mysteries of Christ's passion, death, resurrection, and ascension offer individuals or small groups an opportunity to grow in their faith in God and His Church. This 240-page hardcover book is $14.95 plus S&H. Order here»