Family Eyes on Lent and Easter

The theme of Looking with family eyes is another way of explaining the family focus I always preach about, and it is clearly more than being nice and friendly to families.

Take the recent ordination of Bishop Victor Phalana. He has been a very popular priest and so there have been many photos of him published in The Southern Cross, Johannesburg’s Archdiocesan News, Facebook and elsewhere. A favourite of mine was him in full regalia in a donkey cart in one of the rural Klerkdorp parishes. I hope he will repeat that act for Palm Sunday.

But the aim of featuring his ordination on the cover of MARFAM’s Family Matters magazine is to highlight that bishops come from and belong to families too. So I acquired a photo of the bishop, who was adopted, and his family, looking happy next to his mom with an array of proud siblings and sundry younger children.

Looking with family eyes is to see everything has to do with families. The joys of one are the joys of all. His pains and joys are their pains and joys, even though he will be having a wider family too who will share their pains and joys with him.

That applies to all of us in all our life situations.

On a national radio programme the other day the question was asked, How close are you to your mom? Some callers said they were very close, saying they even called each other a few times per day. Some mothers are closer to one child than another. Some are closer to daughters than to sons, or daughters-in-law.

Father Vince Carroll of Tzaneen diocese has a quirky way of spreading the Good News according to Luke. He sends daily messages in SMS-speak that really try to reach young people. His simple message of February 28 read (and I leave the deciphering of it up to you): J lovd hs mum ws1! They were opresd thenasnow. He made 1happy by givg life 2hr only son! Anothr happy home!:-) the ppl were greatly impresred! 7:11-17.

Yes, at this time we celebrate feasts of his mum and dad, St Joseph and the Annunciation. These are not about plaster saints but flesh and blood people who ran their daily lives in a small town, worked and made decisions about matters big and small.

As we go into Holy Week soon, we’ll find Mary accompanying her Son through his Passion. She does so as a mom, alone, without a husband but supported by friends. In MARFAM’s two booklets of the Stations of the Cross for families and for widowed, that human touch is brought out very simply. How do we in our families feel when we are betrayed and unjustly judged, or when at a time of loss we really need the support of our loved ones? When a loved one dies who is the closest support for the longest time?

I believe that love begins in the home, a picture Pope Benedict XVI painted beautifully when he wrote: Children learn to know the face of God inasmuch as they receive a first revelation of it from a father and a mother full of attention in their regard.

Hurt and pain begin there too. By reflecting on our own situation we learn about love and about life and can experience emotions and so feel more personally and intimately about more abstract or remote situations. That can apply to the Passion and Resurrection story of Jesus which many of us have heard told for up to 50, 60, 70 years or more.

We can learn to relate to the passion and suffering of others around us, near and further away. There is so much suffering shown on TV that we might have suffering-fatigue. But when a situation is closer to home it is easier to relate, as we saw clearly seen with the recent fires in Cape Town.

The Native Americans had a famous saying, You need to walk in someone else’s moccasins. Taking it a step further, an African proverb reads: Perhaps you do not understand me because you do not love me.

The family theme for March is the commitment to promote family rights. Is it possible in our busy, self-focused lives to feel what others feel who are dispossessed, deprived of their rights and more?

This Lent and Holy Week, as we contemplate the passion and compassion of Jesus and Mary and our own hardships, may these help us grow in compassion for others and finally share together the fruit of Resurrection joy.

There are many opportunities to celebrate the liturgies of the season at home too for all ages. Subscribe to the Family Matters e-newsletter by contacting or www.marfam.org.za.