It is politically incorrect to speak of anything regarding human relationships as being ordained by God. Nevertheless, I would hold that just as male and female are ordered towards one another: "... male and female he create them" (Gen 1: 27), so the family is also ordered by God. Parents are ordered towards children and children towards their parents. This is reflected in our Second Reading for today: "Wives, be subject to your husbands, as is fitting in the Lord. Husbands, love your wives and never treat them harshly. Children obey your parents in everything, for this is your acceptable duty in the Lord. Fathers, do not provoke your children, or they may lose heart." (Col 3: 18-21) Thus, just as we can see that marriage speak of Christ and the Church: "This is a great mystery, and I am applying it to Christ and the Church" (Eph 5: 32) so we can see that the family speaks of Church and in doing it refers back to God: "So then you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are citizens with the saints and also members of the household of God" (Eph 2: 19). The Second Vatican Council states: "The family is, so to speak, the domestic Church. In it parents should, by their word and example, be the first preachers of the faith to their children." (LG 11). Just as the Church fosters and forwards the mission of the Lord so too we find the Lord and therefore have an encounter with God in a family that is given harmony and order by God through faith.
No comments:
Post a Comment