And these words which I command thee this day, shall be in thy heart:
And thou shalt tell them to thy children, and thou shalt meditate upon them sitting in thy house, and walking on thy journey, sleeping and rising.
And thou shalt bind them as a sign on thy hand, and they shall be and shall move between thy eyes.
And thou shalt write them in the entry, and on the doors of thy house.
And when the Lord thy God shall have brought thee into the land, for which he swore to thy fathers Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob: and shall have given thee great and goodly cities, which thou didst not build,
Houses full of riches, which thou didst not set up, cisterns which thou didst not dig, vineyards and oliveyards, which thou didst not plant,
And thou shalt have eaten and be full:
Deuteronomy 6:6-12
Catholic men, have we become cowards? Do we not honour our own manhood? Have we allowed the enemy into our homes while we lay sleeping; exhausted from a life of debasement, self-indulgence and waste? Have we let others take and destroy what we were given as a gift by God to guard, nourish, grow and lead – our families? The Lord waits to greet our families with open arms, and we squander this gift for 30 pieces of silver? Have we traded the eternity of life offered to our families for a handful of minutes?
There are no excuses for our abandonment of our fatherly responsibilities as Catholics. It is a conscious choice we have made, for we, as men and fathers, were given our marching orders by God Himself. We have been shown how to live and suffer by them through our Lord Jesus Christ. Our fatherhood was paid for in blood. We recompense the Lord in vomit!
How crude you say! How self-righteous of me to speak these words. My brothers, I too am mired in the filth that we have allowed to invade our families and our homes. We, as fathers, have let our guard down and allowed satan into our sanctified homes. Through the television shows we allow to enter into our homes and our children’s minds; through the music we allow our children to listen to and learn about debased life; through the multi-media hook-ups that take our place as fathers and men. Fathers we have betrayed our Catholic calling, our Catholic vocation and our Catholic families. Our families suffer greatly for our sin.
How do we make this right and just?
Tonight, as I was attending Eucharistic Adoration at my local Chapel, I was deep in prayer and meditation. I was contemplating this very post you are reading right now. I was distraught at the fact that there are many fathers that have not taken up the Lord’s mantle and have failed to become Catholic leaders in their own families. I had not completed this thought when I was roused out of my prayers by some quiet commotion and heard some footsteps enter the foyer of the Chapel. As I continued to pray and mediate, a father and his young son – a son no older than 7 or 8 – walked into the main room of the Chapel. The father, holding his son’s hand, guided him towards the front of the chapel and led him to a chair and kneeler. Immediately the child knelt down, made the sign of the cross and started to pray. What was truly deeply moving was watching his son look over at his father as his father was deep in prayer. It was not a simple distracted glance, but a genuine long look of admiration for his father. I could see him taking in every detail of watching his father kneeling; deep in prayer. The young boy then turned his head and focused on the Holy Eucharist before him. He too was now deep in prayer.
Fathers, this is the way it is done. You take the word of God and turn it into action. You set the example for your children and your family. You make the necessarily sacrifices in those examples; looking to the Lord’s suffering as your guide and standard.
This particular father, in a simple gesture of kneeling and humbly submitting himself before our Lord Jesus Christ, in the presence of his son, spoke to his son, his own flesh and blood, through millennia of Catholic teaching, in that one instant. Powerful!
What was also powerful, was that his example moved me and stirred in me a resolution that I too would need to draw from a deeper portion of my soul. Without even knowing, this father was not only leading and guiding his son to God, but also moving me into deeper, uncharted waters of my faith.
May God bless this Catholic father and his Catholic son.
Copyright 2016, Luciano Corbo
Luciano Corbo
Luciano Corbo holds a Master of Arts - Integrated Studies from Athabasca University. His major interests are Culture, Work, Organizations and Leadership, within a context of Catholic Social Teaching Principles. He writes from Canada.
2 responses to “Catholic Fatherhood”
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Always a timely article Luciano. I like your point – Lead by example and ensure our children observe. Because they take in everything.
Greetings Peter!
Thank you for you comment. Yes they truly do. They are the next generation of Catholic leaders in the
world.
God Bless
Luciano