Pope Francis: better for families to be tired, struggling than isolated, seeking luxury [CWN]

[bitterhope]

Not to bash the pope, I really like him, but look how many clergy live in luxury, and they do not have families to support…
This is why I’m never keen on telling people they should be more happy struggling while others live so well.

The pope has spoken out about the clergy living in luxury. Still people should find satisfaction in what they have instead of wallowing in self pity.

 

[Xantippe]

He was speaking to the people in Mexico where they have always been caring for aging parents and grandparents while simultaneously raising their own kids and often grand kids as well.

Wait–moments ago you wrote:

“Couples have always done it alone in terms of not having family nearby. Generation after generation of many families have been far away from hometowns.”

Which is it? Both of those statements can’t simultaneously be true of most families.

 

[bitterhope]

Wait–moments ago you wrote:

“Couples have always done it alone in terms of not having family nearby. Generation after generation of many families have been far away from hometowns.”

Which is it? Both of those statements can’t simultaneously be true of most families.

It’s both. Why is that hard to understand? All families have struggles that they deal with and find the way to make it work out some how. Not all families share other families struggles. We are all given things to go through it’s how we do it that counts.

 

[bitterhope]

Living together in the same home happens frequently in Mexico. For immigrants and military families they usually have years or eternity away from family. Neither thing is new or unusual. Why is it hard to understand that? There are advantages to both ways and severe disadvantageous to them as well. When living with family, caring for multiple generations at once is certainly not easy but there is peace in knowing that everyone is being cared for. When living far from family you have the blessing of not having interference in your own home but you have the disadvantage of not having ready made support system. Just like everything you give a little take a little.

I’m thinking a big part of the isolation Pope Francis is speaking of is isolating yourself for God and His will. By chasing earthly pleasures and happiness we are isolating ourselves from the true blessings God offers us. We are being programmed to believe God’s gifts are somehow inferior or should only come in small doses and the true gifts are the prestige of professional achievements, money, housing, higher education, etc. We are choosing to isolate ourselves from Him.

 

[bitterhope]

Mexico has many families that live in cities while their families live in rural areas. Most families have at least one member who has immigrated to another country as well. So yes, it does actually simultaneously happen in most families in Mexico specifically. There is one or two siblings that take parent/grandparent care and raise their kids while doing that while the other siblings send money “home” but rarely visit due to work. They are raising their families alone without that family support (while they are supporting two families financially) but also not needing to deal with the harder parts of generational care. That is actually very common around the world, not just in Latin Anerican countries.

 

[Tablefor9]

Living together in the same home happens frequently in Mexico. For immigrants and military families they usually have years or eternity away from family. Neither thing is new or unusual. Why is it hard to understand that? There are advantages to both ways and severe disadvantageous to them as well. When living with family, caring for multiple generations at once is certainly not easy but there is peace in knowing that everyone is being cared for. When living far from family you have the blessing of not having interference in your own home but you have the disadvantage of not having ready made support system. Just like everything you give a little take a little.

I’m thinking a big part of the isolation Pope Francis is speaking of is isolating yourself for God and His will. By chasing earthly pleasures and happiness we are isolating ourselves from the true blessings God offers us. We are being programmed to believe God’s gifts are somehow inferior or should only come in small doses and the true gifts are the prestige of professional achievements, money, housing, higher education, etc. We are choosing to isolate ourselves from Him.

 

[jmjZelie]

It’s both. Why is that hard to understand? All families have struggles that they deal with and find the way to make it work out some how. Not all families share other families struggles. We are all given things to go through it’s how we do it that counts.

Yes, furthermore the same family tree can have the opposite struggles.

My sister and sister-in-law are both receiving loads of help raising their children from their mothers (my mother and mother-in-law, respectively). In both situations, the grandmothers are playing an active, day-to-day role in caring for their grandchildren.

Yet, my husband and I are 5000 miles away, raising our children alone, and always have been. We have had zero help from family for our entire married lives.

But the greatest problem I see at this point is that both my husband and I are the eldest children in small families. It is natural for the duties of caring for aging parents would fall to us. But we are 5000 miles away. So, we don’t know how that will end up playing out.

But you are right that there have always been families who leave their hometown (or homeland) and family and move far away. And there have always been those who stay put and have multigenerational households or at least live in close proximity to each other. It is not either/or. Both have always happened. I happen to think moving away and being without extended family is the harder path in life, but we have not allowed that to limit us in our family planning (to go back to Pope Francis’ speech) at all. We just make do and do our best and thank God for providing for us by His perfect timing and loving kindness.

 

[Tablefor9]

I don’t think that communities are as stable as they once were. This generation faces a ton of job insecurity. Moves are frequent in order to find or maintain employment. It is very rare that a twenty-something works for the same employer for 35-40 years.

And if you are in the military, well, I think all bets are off. I saw how many times BIL/SIL moved. Not an easy life at all.

I come from a military family and work with military wives & military docs. When the ship hits the sand, these people don’t have to have 20 years as your next door neighbor to help each other out.

 

[SilverLight]

I don’t think that communities are as stable as they once were. This generation faces a ton of job insecurity. Moves are frequent in order to find or maintain employment. It is very rare that a twenty-something works for the same employer for 35-40 years.

And if you are in the military, well, I think all bets are off. I saw how many times BIL/SIL moved. Not an easy life at all.

I agree I was born in the 90’s and I am now 24 and basically fresh out of college as of last December. I need to get a new job and I am looking to work at a bank to get my foot in the door. I don’t know what my life will be like after that knowing how the job market has been for a while even though it has gotten a little better. I don’t even know how long I would keep a new job though the one I am at now is retail and they have cut hours bad all over the board and I have been there since I started college.

 

[bitterhope]

I come from a military family and work with military wives & military docs. When the ship hits the sand, these people don’t have to have 20 years as your next door neighbor to help each other out.

Yep. You make community happen. You can’t just wait for it to happen to you. Create. Be resourceful. Reach out and offer help and others will reach out to you as well.

 

[jmjZelie]

Living together in the same home happens frequently in Mexico. For immigrants and military families they usually have years or eternity away from family. Neither thing is new or unusual. Why is it hard to understand that? There are advantages to both ways and severe disadvantageous to them as well. When living with family, caring for multiple generations at once is certainly not easy but there is peace in knowing that everyone is being cared for. When living far from family you have the blessing of not having interference in your own home but you have the disadvantage of not having ready made support system. Just like everything you give a little take a little.

I’m thinking a big part of the isolation Pope Francis is speaking of is isolating yourself for God and His will. By chasing earthly pleasures and happiness we are isolating ourselves from the true blessings God offers us. We are being programmed to believe God’s gifts are somehow inferior or should only come in small doses and the true gifts are the prestige of professional achievements, money, housing, higher education, etc. We are choosing to isolate ourselves from Him.

Very well said

 

[1990Domer]

And then there is the healthcare crisis!

 

[Xantippe]

Hope is the key word and forming good relationships. I watched my friend’s kids on numerous occasions. I even loaned him money in hard times. I and the wife of another friend, shared baby watching duties one evening, her’s and her sister in-law’s baby, both around the same age. When she had to leave for a few minutes, I was watching two babies. Her husband was at work.

We knew that forming relationships with in-laws was very important before the ceremony. It was rare for a couple to go off on their own and elope. Getting married without telling each other’s parents. Bottom line: when you marry her, you marry into each other’s families. That’s how families and outside relationships are supposed to work. Aunts, uncles, cousins, etc. Your brother, her sister. Your best friend.

Since getting married, we have always lived 2,000+ miles away from our families.

The closest we have ever come to having family in the area was once when my sister lived a four hour drive away for a year or so and once when a second cousin lived in our town. Currently, we have no blood relatives that we could recognize on the street within 2,000 miles–no parents, no aunts, no uncles, no cousins, no siblings–nobody.

Our youngest is a 3-year-old. My beloved younger sister has a 1-year-old. We try to talk once a week. I have lately often thought how nice it would be for us to be able to get together from time to time and to help each other, but we are 2,000 miles away, and I will be lucky to see her for a week a year.

With friendship, it’s something that is continually going to have to be built and repaired, and the more you need friends, the less likely you are in a good position to set about the laborious business of making new friends. I was doing very well just a year and a half ago, with two close friends in town with children the same age as my youngest. But then one moved. My youngest was about 18+ months at the time, entering into the prime rambunctious toddler years, and I no longer had the heart to go to potlucks at the homes of people I didn’t know very well, being able to exchange at best 10 words with a new acquaintance before dashing off to catch the toddler. The same was true with school events for the big kids where I was finding that I knew fewer and fewer people–or they seemed to know me, but I couldn’t remember anybody’s name. I no longer went to optional school stuff (or I sent my husband and stayed home with the toddler). I didn’t notice it at the time, but my social life was getting very peaky looking.

About about a year and a half, I realized what was happening and I started to do some stuff. But it was a very slow and frustrating process. I recently went to a mother’s Meetup at an open gym and went around asking "are you with blah blah blah mom’s group"and went around asking, only to discover that I was the only person from the group that had actually come. I went to another event of the same group (also at a play gym), and it took me half the open gym time before I managed to bump into anybody from the group. I did better with a zoo trip, but it has been disheartening. I have actually booked an event myself for the group for this week, but I am trying to manage my expectations. All in all, attempting to find friends as a mother is not unlike attempting to date as a single person.

The good news is that my youngest is 3 now and I think we’re within reach of a time when we can take her to big social events and it not be miserable. Plus, once she starts pre-K, that will be yet another good opportunity to make friends and meet people.

But none of this is easy, and it is possible to become isolated without noticing it happening, especially when dealing with stuff at home.

T

 

[jmjZelie]

My family is military and has been for a few generations on my side. My husband is an immigrant. We’ve never lived near family and including the three years he got out of the Army before going back in, this is the longest we have ever lived anywhere (3.5 years). It isn’t easy but as long as you’re resourceful it can work quite well. We learn to hit the ground running each time we move. Start by establishing drs and finding a parish. The rest is just making yourself available to meet people and get to know them.

Yes! We aren’t military but this is how we do it, too.

We have moved about a dozen times in our marriage. We search for a place to live. We find a parish. We find the parks and playgrounds. We find our doctors. We join moms groups and now, homeschool groups. We try to build up a network of acquaintances right away. Hopefully some of those become friends. I am better at hitting the ground running now, compared to how I was the last few moves, and we are better off for it. We have to make our own family now. This last move was the farthest yet. And there is really no going back. We are too far to be able to visit our old friends and we can’t drive to visit family and we cannot afford to fly us all home. The new family we make now is all we will have in a crisis.

On the plus side, it has caused me to be less self-conscious, and more outgoing and better able to pick up on the strengths and uniqueness of others. I can’t waste any time anymore with pursuing people in friendship or make excuses for allowing myself to become isolated.

 

[1990Domer]

My family is military and has been for a few generations on my side. My husband is an immigrant. We’ve never lived near family and including the three years he got out of the Army before going back in, this is the longest we have ever lived anywhere (3.5 years). It isn’t easy but as long as you’re resourceful it can work quite well. We learn to hit the ground running each time we move. Start by establishing drs and finding a parish. The rest is just making yourself available to meet people and get to know them.

My apologies, but I don’t know what drs stands for. In our case, we are active and always have been in our various parishes. However, I think you can be an introvert and live a holy life. We are active in our current parish but we have never established close relationships with any parishioners or neighbors. It’s really the way God made us. As for having a large family, fertility issues put a stop to that. I certainly hope the Pope would not see our family as self-absorbed. And even if we wanted to adopt we couldn’t because we had a biological special needs child.

 

[jmjZelie]

Since getting married, we have always lived 2,000+ miles away from our families.

The closest we have ever come to having family in the area was once when my sister lived a four hour drive away for a year or so and once when a second cousin lived in our town. Currently, we have no blood relatives that we could recognize on the street within 2,000 miles–no parents, no aunts, no uncles, no cousins, no siblings–nobody.

Our youngest is a 3-year-old. My beloved younger sister has a 1-year-old. We try to talk once a week. I have lately often thought how nice it would be for us to be able to get together from time to time and to help each other, but we are 2,000 miles away, and I will be lucky to see her for a week a year.

With friendship, it’s something that is continually going to have to be built and repaired, and the more you need friends, the less likely you are in a good position to set about the laborious business of making new friends. I was doing very well just a year and a half ago, with two close friends in town with children the same age as my youngest. But then one moved. My youngest was about 18+ months at the time, entering into the prime rambunctious toddler years, and I no longer had the heart to go to potlucks at the homes of people I didn’t know very well, being able to exchange at best 10 words with a new acquaintance before dashing off to catch the toddler. The same was true with school events for the big kids where I was finding that I knew fewer and fewer people–or they seemed to know me, but I couldn’t remember anybody’s name. I no longer went to optional school stuff (or I sent my husband and stayed home with the toddler). I didn’t notice it at the time, but my social life was getting very peaky looking.

About about a year and a half, I realized what was happening and I started to do some stuff. But it was a very slow and frustrating process. I recently went to a mother’s Meetup at an open gym and went around asking "are you with blah blah blah mom’s group"and went around asking, only to discover that I was the only person from the group that had actually come. I went to another event of the same group (also at a play gym), and it took me half the open gym time before I managed to bump into anybody from the group. I did better with a zoo trip, but it has been disheartening. I have actually booked an event myself for the group for this week, but I am trying to manage my expectations. All in all, attempting to find friends as a mother is not unlike attempting to date as a single person.

The good news is that my youngest is 3 now and I think we’re within reach of a time when we can take her to big social events and it not be miserable. Plus, once she starts pre-K, that will be yet another good opportunity to make friends and meet people.

But none of this is easy, and it is possible to become isolated without noticing it happening, especially when dealing with stuff at home.

T

Yes. I hear you. I thought I had noticed a tinge of loneliness in your posts lately. It seemed out of character. When I used to correspond here as mommamaree (my old account from years ago) you were more upbeat and positive. It sounds like we have been going through some parallel trials. It is hard. I am glad to hear you keep trying. I keep trying too. It is a lot like dating, but I actually struggle more with making deep friendships than I ever did in dating. But I refuse to give up on myself any more. My older toddler is 3 next week and between some maturing she has done in the past couple months and our success with potty training, I began to realize that her very challenging toddlerhood had led to me having some mental health issues. As we have more children in the future (if God wills it) my husband and I intend to be very proactive on those issues to keep our family life from collapsing in on itself again and leading to me feeling suffocated at home.

 

[jmjZelie]

My apologies, but I don’t know what drs stands for. In our case, we are active and always have been in our various parishes. However, I think you can be an introvert and live a holy life. We are active in our current parish but we have never established close relationships with any parishioners or neighbors. It’s really the way God made us. As for having a large family, fertility issues put a stop to that. I certainly hope the Pope would not see our family as self-absorbed. And even if we wanted to adopt we couldn’t because we had a biological special needs child.

Of course he would not say you are self-absorbed. Perish the thought!

 

[Convert_in_99]

Oooooooh NO!!! Not another “family size” thread…:banghead:

They need to make this a banned topic as it never EVER turns out pretty and most times winds up locked while heated tempers and hurt feelings abound.

 

[jmjZelie]

Oooooooh NO!!! Not another “family size” thread…:banghead:

They need to make this a banned topic as it never EVER turns out pretty and most times winds up locked while heated tempers and hurt feelings abound.

Tell that to Pope Francis. He started it.

 

[Convert_in_99]

My two cents?

We have no kids and have experienced many many struggles that even those with a dozen kids will never experience.

ETA: I am more isolated than ever in my life and also am poorer than I’ve ever been in my life. The two don’t always go hand in hand.