Today, the family is being assaulted from every side, even from the men of the Church! Why? Well, the family had always been assaulted. First, in the garden of Eden, where Adam and Eve demonstrated how not to be good parents. And God, after having expelled Adam and Eve pronounced an eternal warfare between the devil and his co-horts and the woman and her children. Why, that’s an eternal warfare between the devil and the family.
Have you not noticed that all the problems of the Church today are demonstrative of that conflict? Homosexuality, gay marriages, abortion, family planning, and contraceptives are aimed at the destruction of the family. The very secularistic system of our society militates against the family. When the child leaves the home early to go to school, the father goes to work, when the mother goes her own way, isn’t this a disruption of the family life? Our generations is spiritually mained to fight the battles of life.
The family is the target of destruction by the very brains in hell because, it is the natural place destined by God to be the workshop wherewith a soul can work out the salvation of his soul. Though the convents and monasteries are very good alternatives, the home is the God-given first choice. Then, of course the family must work out each member’s sanctification within a family that is within the Church, Pope Benedict reminds us in an address in St. Paul outside the walls.
The holy family is an eloquent model for us. Besides, the family is the only place where man can maintain his sanity amidst this world that has gone mad, G. K. Chesterton reminds us.
It is a place where man and woman can find their fulfilment and where each member can experience the freedom that the world cannot offer. Why, that sounds like heaven. And that was God’s mind in creating the family, to be a foretaste of heaven here on earth. Chesterton, again, reminds us that the family is the only institution on earth that is entered into with complete freedom by both parties and created out of love… and for the purpose of child-bearing for the kingdom of heaven. And the promises made in the Sacrament of Matrimony and the very natural institution of marriage are directed towards the welfare of the child.
The child is important. Because he is a reminder on what is necessary to enter the kingdom of heaven. Christ said:”unless you become like little children…” There is the model for adults.
Now, do you wonder why the devil hates this institution so much? And do you wonder why the Church is so easy in granting annulment? Well, Pope Paul VI, warned us that the devil had entered the Church. And his presence is all over: among dissident priests and nuns, among some Catholic media… but I think they have all gathered around the marriage tribunals that show greater enthusiasm in annulling marriages rather than in preserving them.
Pope Benedict XVI had mentioned this anarchy that had enterered all aspects of Catholic life, including Matrimony. The bases for the annulment is hardly 50 years old. That makes it a little older than the younger heresy, the liturgical novelties, that has devastated the Church. Well, it could’nt be a teaching of Christ or the apostles if it is only 50 years old.
Homosexuality, the falling of priests, family planning, abortion, women who want to be priests… all these problems wouldn’t have arisen if these Catholics had good family lives. These evils are symptomatic of the absence of family life. The seminary and the convents should have solved these problems, but unfortunately, those running the seminary were fruits of the same non-existing family life syndrome. So what can you expect?
God had already warned us of this impending battle even from the time of creation. We were not ready; we were not equipped for battle. The way things are now, it will be a continuosly losing battle.