REFLECTION ON THE FAMILY TODAY AND IN THE NEW TESTAMENT
(Rev. Peter Schineller, S.J. Given at the Inauguration of the Holy Family
Society at Holy Trinity Catholic Church, Maitama, Abuja on 29 September 2002)
THE FAMILY IN NIGERIA
One of the greatest joys I experience in my years in Nigeria is seeing, observing and enjoying the hospitality of the Nigerian family. I am amazed and impressed each time I see a young five or seven year old child taking care of her little baby brother or sister. I rejoice when I see the baby on the mother’s back, when the mother processes up to donate to the Sunday collection or to receive Holy Communion. I know how difficult it is for parents to make ends meet, to provide for their children – food, shelter, education. Yet they remain hopeful and dignified, proud of their family and children.
The difficulties and challenges facing the family are many. Economic, ethnic, political, social forces can militate against the peace, unity and growth of the family.
Modern media, television and the internet can be forces for good or evil – and some of their effects upon family life seem to be more destructive than constructive.
In face of such challenges, there is all the more need for each Christian family to come together within their own family, and then join with other families to strengthen their faith, to grow stronger together. As the Church reminds us, the family now and in the future will remain the ever important bedrock of communities, society, and the nation.
We all recall seeing the picture of earth from the moon and from spaceships on the way to the moon. We see it as a large blue ball surrounded by darkness. That picture reminds us that we must learn to live together on this beautiful earth, indeed as God’s one family. While we are people of different languages, cultures, nations, religions, we are all God’s children, God’s family.
THE NIGERIAN CATHOLIC FAMILY
As Catholics, and especially as Catholics in Africa, we are challenged by our bishops to be the “Family of God on Mission.” This was the theme of the First Nigerian
Pastoral Congress, held in Ibadan in 2002. Every Christian family must strive to model themselves upon the Holy Family of Jesus, Mary, and Joseph. Indeed, at a deeper level, the family models itself upon the Holy Trinity, the loving unity of Father, Son, and Holy
Spirit. At the parish level, each parish is to see itself as the local family of God on mission. The parish is then linked, united with the outstations and indeed with the entire diocese or archdiocese. In this way, the diocese becomes the Family of God on Mission.
THE FAMILY IN THE NEW TESTAMENT

Many writers have beautifully described in words, and many artists have tried to depict in paintings, the joyful, holy, life of the Holy Family of Jesus, Mary and Joseph.
From the birth in Bethlehem, to Jerusalem, to Nazareth, to Egypt and back to Nazareth, we hear the story of the Holy Family. They had their difficulties, when they had to go into exile in Egypt to escape the threats of Herod. They had their pain and anguish when
Jesus remained in the temple at the age of twelve. But through this all, they remained close to one another and to God. The literature of the Holy Family Society, their prayer books, and the Novena in Honor of the Holy Family gives much material on the virtues of the Holy Family and how we strive to imitate them.
But there is another theme in the New Testament. It is surprisingly strong in the teaching and words of Jesus. According to this theme, what is not so important is the fact that we are brothers and sisters of the same father and mother. What is not so important is that we are related to others by blood, and form a biological family. What is most important is our relation to God, and our doing of God’s will. The story and words of Jesus make this clear in a number of ways.
At the age of twelve, Jesus lost and then found in the temple. He says with respect yet with determination, that “I must be about my Father’s business” (Lk. 2:49).
Dedication to the will and work of his Father is most important in his life – even if it causes pain to his mother and foster father.
On several occasions, Jesus makes clear that our relationship to Jesus and His
Father is much more important than our relationship to our biological family. Once, the relatives of Jesus come to him while he is teaching. The disciples tell Jesus that his relatives are here to visit him. Jesus answers sharply. “Who are my mother and my brothers? And gazing around him at those seated in the circle, he continued: These are my mother and my brothers. Whoever does the will of God is brother and sister and mother to me” (Mk. 3: 33-35). While not denying that Mary is his mother, he says it is more important that Mary and his other relations do the will of God – then they are truly the brothers, sisters, mother of Jesus!
On another occasion, a woman cries out. “Blest is the womb that bore you and the breasts that nursed you!” “Rather,” Jesus replied, “blest are they who hear the word of
God and keep it” (Lk. 11:27-28). Again, Jesus does not deny that Mary is his mother.
He does not say that she is not blest. But he establishes the priority. Indeed Mary is blest not simply because she is his mother (as we all know and as Jesus knew). She is more blest because she heard, received, and kept the Word of God.
In his teaching to his disciples, Jesus makes the same point. He calls on them to put the following of Jesus Christ at the center of their lives. Nothing else should get in the way, not even one’s parents or family. Family ties are second in importance. Most important is the following of Jesus and working for the kingdom. Jesus explained this in words that most likely shocked his disciples.
“I have come to set a man at odds with his father, a daughter with her mother, a daughter-in-law with her mother-in law. In short, to make a make’s enemies those of his own household. Whoever loves father or mother, son or daughter, more than me is not worthy of me” (Mt. 11: 35-37).
On another occasion Jesus says that “if anyone comes to me without turning his back on his father and mother, his wife and his children, his brothers and sisters, indeed his very self, he cannot be my follower” (Lk. 15:26). One translation of this passage uses the

word, “hate” father and mother, rather than simply “turn his back on!” The priority is clear. Discipleship, the following of Jesus takes precedence over family ties, over family love.
Again, when Peter explains that he has given up everything (including his family) to follow Jesus, Jesus promises Peter:
“I give you my word, there is no one who has given up home, brothers, or sisters, mother or father, children or property, for me and for the gospel, who will not receive in this present age a hundred times as many homes, brothers and sisters, mothers, children, and property – and persecution besides – and in the age to come everlasting life: (Mk: 10: 29-30)
We do have, as we mentioned, the beautiful images of the Holy Family of Jesus,
Mary, and Joseph. But on a few occasions in the gospels, the extended family of Jesus is not portrayed so positively. In Mk: 3: 20-22, Jesus is teaching in a house, and
“When his family heard of this, they came to take charge of him, saying “He is out of his mind;” while the Scribes who arrived from Jerusalem asserted, “He is possessed by Beelzebul.”
What a statement – from his own family, that Jesus is crazy “is out of his mind!”
Indeed, not all of his relatives understood who Jesus was and what he asked of his followers.
The gospel of John has a similar story. Jesus is in Galilee and delays going to
Judea because of opposition there. His brothers advise Jesus to go to Judea so that people can see his good works. Jesus does not follow their advice and stays in Galilee a bit longer. Then John the evangelist adds that “as a matter of fact, not even his brothers had much confidence in him” (John 7:5). Even his own family members did not believe, or put trust in Jesus!
Finally, to make the point that our relationship to God and the Kingdom takes priority over human, family, blood relationships, we read in the gospel of Matthew and
Luke of one occasion.
“A disciple said to Jesus, “Lord, let me go and bury my father first. But Jesus told him, “Follow me, and let the dead bury their dead” (Mt. 8:21-22).
Surely this would shock the Jewish people (and Nigerians!) for whom the burial of the dead, especially one’s parents, was a most sacred obligation. Again, we must be clear.
Jesus is not destroying family, not speaking against family unity and values. But he is very clear that the true meaning of God’s family is not blood relationships, but the union and communion of those who do God’s will, who hear and practice God’s word, and follow Jesus. The human family is not denigrated or abolished, but in a sense it is extended, from blood relationships to all those who do the will of God. A new and larger family, the family of God, is created.
The Acts of the Apostles, and the letters of St. Paul emphasize the new Christian family created by Baptism and Eucharist, the family that hears and practices the Word of
God. The challenge we face today is that each and every biological family, human family, will be composed of those who do the will of God.

THE TEACHING OF JESUS AND THE HOLY FAMILY SOCIETY
And so we return here to the importance of the Holy Family Society. This Society aims to educate, train, challenge each and every human family to be more than a human family, to be a family that has God at its center, and the service of God as its goal. The
Holy Family Society challenges families to look beyond themselves to the parish, and to the larger family of humankind and make their contribution to the betterment of parish life, family life and the larger society.
Jesus gives us the way to do that, namely the way of the ten commandments and the way outlined in his Sermon on the Mount (Mt. 5-8). In much of his teaching, Jesus showed reverence and respect for the biological family. In the parable of the prodigal son,
Jesus showed how the family must always be a place of forgiveness, of welcome and celebration. Jesus welcomed the children and blessed them. He showed how each child is a precious gift, loved by God and to be cared for by parents and friends. In fact, we are to learn from the children. Adults, if they want to enter the kingdom of heaven, must become like children!
On many occasions, Jesus shows compassion for the parents of a sick children - the synagogue official whose daughter is dying, the royal official with a sick son, the widow at Nain, the Syrophoenician woman with a daughter who is ill, and the father with a boy seemingly possessed by epilepsy. In all of these gospel incidents we see that Jesus takes a deep interest in the family life of others.
Jesus in the gospels is reminding us that our families cannot be narrow-minded, closed in on ourselves, on our biological family. While charity may begin there, it does not end there. Rather, our concerns must be as large as those of Jesus Christ himself as he went about proclaiming the kingdom of God, and working to create a new social order, a new family of God. Jesus wants there to be peace and harmony in the family. But that peace and harmony comes not simply by paternity and maternity, but by the common effort of each and every member of the family to do the will of God, to follow the way of
Jesus.
In many ways, this is a revolution that Jesus is calling for. Jesus did challenge some of the foundations of traditional family and traditional society. He set out to create a new social order – based on the family of God, the family whose members follow the teaching of Jesus, and this live a life of holiness.
Is not this the aim of the Holy Family Society? Let us work and pray that the
Holy Family Society grow in extent and in depth. By starting with the family in the home and in the parish, may the Society contribute its part to the building and growth of the Catholic Church as the Family of God on Mission.