Once a year, the Church celebrates family life. The readings for Holy Family Sunday teach us a clear lesson, one that anyone with children or grandchildren should be aware: trusting in the Lord bears fruit. Children are gifts from God, and they always belong to God. Parents do not own their children. They are guardians who are responsible before God for their education and upbringing.The second reading gives a great recipe for successful family relationships. What makes a family "holy"? It's all so simple! Just love one another and keep the commandments!
Of course, simple answers like that are the hardest to accept! Our families would find their disagreements, stressful relationships, and resentments that spoil the joy of family harmony so much easier to solve by imitating the faith and loving trust of the Holy Family.
The Scripture lessons for family life are made even more important in the light of our Holy Father, Pope Benedict XVI's recent encyclical, Caritas in Veritate (Charity in Truth). In it, he teaches that many of our economic, social, and political problems are a result of the absence of strong family life.
Virtues such as honesty, generosity, and loyalty are first learned and practiced in families that are obedient to the Creator's commandments. The habits thus engrained in individuals flow naturally into the public life of society.
Pope Benedict calls the family "the primary vital cell of society." We cannot, then, separate the private world of family life from the success or failures of the public life of money and power, the economy, business practices, politics, and the way that nations treat world poverty, joblessness, the environment and immigration.
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