Families must reflect the trinity

Since returning from the World Meeting of Families in Milan, Italy, last month, I have felt quite severely challenged to bring the message back, take it home and put my money where my mouth is.

Pope Benedict greets families during the 2012 World Meeting of Families in Milan. (Photo: Maria Grazia Picciarella via CNS)

It did cost a lot of money to take us there and even a great deal more to fund such an event where 6000 attended the theological congress and a million people gathered to celebrate the closing Mass with the Holy Father.

The meeting was a celebration of solidarity of worship. Appropriately, on Trinity Sunday the Holy Father spoke of the family and its role to emulate and model the love relationship of the Trinity, in whose image we are all created, as people in relationship.

Families are a resource if they emulate that relationship, striving for harmony, unity, practising reconciliation, being the first educators of their children, caring for and supporting one another, old and young.

Work is an essential form of support, but ideally should be at the service of the members, not make them its slaves. It is now generally accepted that men and women hold down jobs and this calls for careful consideration of the work-family balance.

A challenging question for all families, especially in these tough economic times to reflect on is this: “Do you live to work or work to live?” What do the children think?

The message of the family as the model for the Church is developed through family ministry, and family catechesis is a part of that. The media is a resource through materials produced by the Family Desk, Marfam and other local family organisations as well as the internet and more.

The bishops long ago passed resolutions that every diocese should have a family office or desk, and every parish should have this portfolio on its pastoral council, along with catechetics, liturgy, youth and so on.

Families need to be served, to have their needs met for marriage preparation and enrichment, counselling, training in parenting skills and so on—but as the first evangelisers formation is essential too.

How family friendly is your parish?  Does it have a family desk, programmes for families and parish family celebrations? Are resource materials promoted and sold? Is there some form of investment in family ministry, for training and resources?

It is a source of serious concern for me when parishes, including those that are affluent, claim they cannot invest a minimal amount of money in formation or subsidising even simple inexpensive publications that present Church teaching, from the latest sources and relevant documents, and offer the possibility of family enrichment.

Equally a concern is the situation when family people are not using or demanding the resources they need. What kind of Church are we aiming for or planning for, or expecting to have in future?

In many cases throughout the world, as we heard in Milan, grandparents are the ones who are passing on the faith to their grandchildren. Parents are often too busy with work and other commitments—even church ones—or are themselves poorly formed in their faith.

Grandparents doubtless have more time, perhaps a more mature spirituality and one of their very important contributions is prayer support for their children and grandchildren.

That is one of the miniprojects of the Family Life Desk, especially for the month of July with the “Day by Day with God and Family” theme. However, living the faith in the family can be done only by the family themselves.

Ideally a married couple mirrors the Trinity to their children, all families celebrate at their own dinner table—if they still have one—as an introduction to the Eucharist, the family meal of God’s people. Happy and hurting families of all kinds teach and model sharing, caring and reconciliation in their daily lives.

One of the most important tasks of parishes, the various families themselves whatever their composition, their priest, PPC and PFC, is to ensure that their vision of the Church is explored. Is it focused sufficiently on the role of the laity and their task in the world?

It should be seen as essential that a vision of a family-centred Church model is adopted, that an investment of time, money and personnel is made, that structures exist and resources and programmes are available.

That is the way to build a family-friendly Church and society which is so needed in the world of today.

For me, and I believe for the other delegates coming back from the World Meeting of Families, that is the way to put my money where my mouth is. And for you?