God saw everything that he had made, and indeed, it was very good.
For seven Sundays this summer we journeyed with Jesus and His apostles coming to understand that we receive Him. For the rest of Ordinary Time and the special Solemnities of our Church, Jesus discusses applying His presence within us. How do we do it?
Today, our Holy Church offers us a special Solemnity focused on the Christian Family.
Family is the perfect environment for applying the presence of Jesus within us. We might all laugh a bit and say, ‘That’s for sure.’ Family really gives me agita.
Rather than focusing on that, I ask you to imagine concentric circles, a large circle with smaller and smaller circles inside of it. That is a representation of family as we generally envision it.
At the center we find our immediate family, mother, father, children. As we proceed outward, circle after circle, we get to more distant family. First grandparents, then aunts and uncles, cousins, 2nd, 3rd, 4th cousins, one twice, three times removed. You know your priest is an amateur genealogist when he gets into that much detail.
Getting to the outermost circles we may find our fellow church members, maybe co-workers, members of organizations we belong to, neighbors, and our larger community.
The problem with this vision of concentric circles is that each of the circles is a point of demarcation, a separation, a thing that defines boundaries. That is not what God intended.
In our passage from Genesis God shows us a vision of totality. Adam, Eve, nature, and God included was all part of one big reality. There was no separation, no boundaries. All shared in everything.
God’s vision and creation is the totality of family.
We know that the problem of sin is what causes the demarcations and divisions. We set boundaries both as a way to protect us from the sin of others and as part of our own sinfulness, a guard against fully expressing Christian charity.
To get past sinful inclination we must re-vision our notion of family to come into conformity with God’s vision. We need to look at family as one big circle.
Consider this singular circle filled with the presence and light of God. See in it our entire personal families and the entire family of faith. That, brother and sisters, is what the Kingdom of God is.
This is a wonderful vision. It is so good because it is as God intends. It is also immensely attractive for those who hurt, who need family. God saw that it was very good, and so must we.