Honor Thy Father and Mother?

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WingsOfEagles

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We are commanded to honor thy father and mother, but what do you do as you get into your 20s and don’t always agree with them? Does respecting them as people while silently disagreeing with some of their actions keep the commandment? What about verbalizing disagreement with their actions (let’s say it is in clear violation of a Catholic teaching)?
 
The scripture also tells parents to “raise up a child in the way he should go” and warns them “not to provoke your children.”

In the case you stipulate, it is acceptable for a child to tell his/her parents that their actions are contrary to Church teaching and that he/she will not participate. They should refrain from arguing over the matter, however.
 
My mother and I get along horribly. Even long after I moved out she goes out of her way to prevent me getting a car or scaring off my dates or other nonsense.

I’ve told her on no uncertain terms she needs to back the hell-out of my affairs.

I don’t show her an ounce of respect because she does these things. I know its not the right thing to do but she has no right to hinder my life. I want to but shes far to self righteous to stop much less say sorry.

Costing your children time and money is not easy to fogiv.Maybe I break the 4th daily but I know not what to do. I leave it in the lords hands.
 
I was also wondering about this. What is the morality of this when it comes to following their final wishes? Neither of my parents are apart of the church anymore and both have said that under no circumstances are they to be on any form of life support. My dad says if he is a vegetable he wants the plug pulled. I am the executor of his estate as my parents are divorced. What do I do in this situation? Follow his wishes?
 
scc11 said:
I was also wondering about this. What is the morality of this when it comes to following their final wishes? Neither of my parents are apart of the church anymore and both have said that under no circumstances are they to be on any form of life support. My dad says if he is a vegetable he wants the plug pulled. I am the executor of his estate as my parents are divorced. What do I do in this situation? Follow his wishes?
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If you can’t then you need to be fair and tell them you can’t.
 
scc11 said:
I will do it for them if it is morally acceptable by the church for me to do.
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I know. But if it isn’t you need to be upfront with them about not being able to carry out their end of life wishes.

You also need to make sure they put everything in writing. Otherwise you may not have a say at all.
 
scc11 said:
I was also wondering about this. What is the morality of this when it comes to following their final wishes? Neither of my parents are apart of the church anymore and both have said that under no circumstances are they to be on any form of life support. My dad says if he is a vegetable he wants the plug pulled. I am the executor of his estate as my parents are divorced. What do I do in this situation? Follow his wishes?
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The minimums are food and hydration. It is okay to have a “do not resuscitate” order and to avoid other extraordinary life prolonging techniques such as breathing machines. Make sure your father knows this.
 
WingsOfEagles said:
We are commanded to honor thy father and mother, but what do you do as you get into your 20s and don’t always agree with them? Does respecting them as people while silently disagreeing with some of their actions keep the commandment? What about verbalizing disagreement with their actions (let’s say it is in clear violation of a Catholic teaching)?
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Honoring one’s parents can be difficult. If it was always easy we wouldn’t need a commandment to remind us.

I look at it this way. Even if we have a miserable life we are expected to be thankful to God for the gift of that life. The creature owes existence to the creator and the debt is paid by living out our subordinate purpose.

Our parents cooperated in our creation (even if that cooperation did not go beyond the cellular level) so we owe them a certain amount of gratefulness. At the very least we can honor them by acknowledging the role they played in creating us. If you consider that the main reason our parents created us was to continue the species then we can conclude that our parents are honored when procreate and act as good parents to our own children. (Obviously we will not all marry and/or have children of our own but we likewise honor our parents by being being the best people we can be.)

We owe our parents for all they went through in caring for us when we were young. We would hope to reciprocate by providing for their basic needs if they are unable to do so for themselves. We can gently point out when our parents fail to follow God’s rules but we should make an effort not to embarrass them in front of others in the process. And we shouldn’t expect that our parents will happily obey us just because we know better than them.

One of the stickiest issues for honoring parents takes place when the parents differ from the adult children about how to treat the grandchildren. Grandparents often want to treat the grandchildren in ways that make life difficult for the parents by “spoiling” the grandchildren or having the grandchildren engage in activities that are uncomfortably outside of the children’s routines. I think adult children owe it to their parents to suffer some discomfort in order to grant the grandparents and grandchildren access to each other. But if grandparents are truly causing harm to grandchildren or are causing harm to the nuclear family of the adult child, then honoring the (grand)parents means the adult child does what is best for the grandchild.
 
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