Pope Francis
had called for an “Extraordinary Synod of Bishops,” which was held in October
in Rome. The group discussed the family and its relationship with
evangelization. At completion of their 2 week meeting, they issued a statement
called, ‘Synod14-"Relatio Synodi"
of the 3rd Extraordinary General Assembly of the Synod of bishops:
"Pastoral Challenges to the Family in the Context of
Evangelization" (5-19 October 2014). Zenit has an English translation of the final document HERE.
The Synod has
focused on the family as the male-female-child unit (nuclear family), but
the whole Church is also sometimes referred to as a family (Church family). Though
I’ve seen quite a few references to what Jesus Christ said about divorce, here
I want to point to another quote concerning what He said about family.
Jesus had been speaking to a crowd and someone told him
that his mother and brothers were outside seeking him. The Lord asked,
“Who is my mother? Who are my brothers?” And stretching out his hand toward his disciples, he said, “Here are my mother and my brothers. For whoever does the will of my Father in heaven is my brother, and sister, and mother” (Matthew 12:48-50 NABRE).
God’s will is
something Christians strive to do in our imperfect way, and our efforts have
many aspects. If we are Christians, our nuclear families are to be considered
in the greater context of what it means to follow Christ. In doing this, we try
to understand the meaning of Christ’s words with the help given to us by the
writers of the Bible and Christian leaders. But if and when possible, we also
try to connect with God in an interior way. We pray to Him, we think about Him,
and this already is beginning to make that interior relationship. Then, some of
us feel movements deep within that lead us to believe God may be present. They
evoke emotions of awe or love or other spiritual dimensions. They seem to us
beyond those felt every day, perhaps as a part of special events of life or even deeper and wider than these.
Catholic
leaders encourage young people to seek their vocation, meaning to try to follow
God’s will. They also mean it in another way, since “vocation” stands for a
life in specific religious service. I’ve often read of priests, religious or
deacons who felt they had followed God’s will in pursuing their vocation. This
effort to hear God’s call is an interior communication with God.
Romance books
always have scenes of persons starting to notice each other and becoming aware
that they react in a different way to each other than to anyone else. As most
people know, these feelings can be very vivid and energizing. And of course if
thwarted, they can lead to heartbreak and great pain.
The Psalms in
the Bible are a reminder of the communion King David had with the Lord, with
emotions not exactly the same but comparable to the romance books. Often he
expresses anguish, but also joy and awe at God’s creation. Many people have
experienced a great joy when they have first become Christians. But after time,
the going can get tough. Saints have talked about their “dark nights of the
soul,” and so it can be a little like the human relationships we experience.
Christians in
general experience difficult relationships among each other, easily
demonstrated by the number of denominations we have and even the infighting
inside each of these. And certainly we have problems relating to
non-Christians.
All
relationships can be joyous on one hand and terribly difficult on the other. How
do we get to the right place in these relationships? I’d like to say I’ve
figured it out, but my rapport with others can be as rocky as anyone else’s.
Yet I do have an ideal that I try to follow in my life, and it has to do with
discernment and prayer.
I know for Catholics,
especially devout ones, that saying the Rosary is next to being in heaven.
However, I’m a convert, and I don’t have the same connection to it that they
do. I’m not saying they shouldn’t continue with it, but I personally prefer a
prayer which expresses thanks, awe and supplications more specifically. I do
this as my life rolls along, often praying for specific situations.
I’d like to
see that happen in our Church families, with groups praying, discussing, and
discerning together. Right now, we pray in the mass, which is good, but it
sometimes feels like the prayers are done for us instead of including us. Group prayer certainly should be done in mass, but prayer should also be part of the
community beyond the prayers of mass and the small number of devout people who
daily or weekly repeat the Rosary.
Now, I say
this having experience with group prayer in other settings, and it takes a lot
of commitment and patience. What can happen is that it can devolve into
politics, with people praying for their party to win. Members would have to
remember the Church is not the same as the state. Another problem is there can
be almost as much repetition as with the Rosary, because people pray the same
things over and over. This is not necessarily bad, but it is where other
crucial elements should come in: frank but civil discussion to express individual
differences of opinion and evaluate progress toward agreement. The idea is not
that everyone has to do everything one exact way, but that if we are
disagreeing about serious subjects, we are not hearing God’s perfect will. (We thereby
discern what subjects require further discernment.)
Group prayer
should focus on listening to God and not to the individual desires of the
members. That is where the discipline of discussion, prayer and discernment is
distinguished from personal power-grabbing. When discussion reveals that
members do not agree, they should go back to prayer and ask God for His guidance.
Then, after a waiting period, there would be another discussion and if
necessary the cycle repeated until agreement is reached.
And that is
where it gets very tough, because many people, including priests and Church
leaders, do not seem to understand the difference between what they want and
what God wants. Any time anyone disagrees with them, they automatically assume
they are right and the other is wrong. This is the very reason for the
desperate need for discerning prayer in the Church family, as well as the
male-female-child nuclear family.
Being the
optimist, I think that prayer such as this is possible though it takes faith
and great patience. In fact, it is a life-time commitment. We’ve heard the
phrase, “Families that pray together, stay together.” If the people of the
Church could pray together sincerely, specifically and with a heart to listen
for God, we could communicate with the Lord and each other. Prayer would
include praise and thanks but also supplication for spiritual, emotional, and physical needs, such as
those which each family experiences. And on all levels we could seek solutions for problems and help against the temptations of
separation experienced by Christians.
