What makes a Family?

[CutlerB]

With same-sex “marriage” making its way into many states, no-fault divorce and a lot of single-parenting around, I found myself wondering today how the Catholic Church would define “family”.

I believe she doesn’t recognise two men or two women with either adopted or previous children as a family, but am not sure about single mums or dads.

The question thus is: What makes a family?

 

[thistle]

With same-sex “marriage” making its way into many states, no-fault divorce and a lot of single-parenting around, I found myself wondering today how the Catholic Church would define “family”.

I believe she doesn’t recognise two men or two women with either adopted or previous children as a family, but am not sure about single mums or dads.

The question thus is: What makes a family?

CCC 2207 The family is the original cell of social life. It is the natural society in which husband and wife are called to give themselves in love and in the gift of life. Authority, stability, and a life of relationships within the family constitute the foundations for freedom, security, and fraternity within society. The family is the community in which, from childhood, one can learn moral values, begin to honor God, and make good use of freedom. Family life is an initiation into life in society.

 

[JimG]

CCC 2207 The family is the original cell of social life. It is the natural society in which husband and wife are called to give themselves in love and in the gift of life. Authority, stability, and a life of relationships within the family constitute the foundations for freedom, security, and fraternity within society. The family is the community in which, from childhood, one can learn moral values, begin to honor God, and make good use of freedom. Family life is an initiation into life in society.

Yes, in the normal course of events men and women marry to form families. There are those who are widowed by the death of a spouse, there are also families headed by a single parent, but single parent families are in greater danger of poverty. Thus the normal mom-dad-kids family is the foundation of society.

But it has been severely undermined of late. Catholics caved in on contraception, which broke the essential link between marriage and children. To a large extent, they caved in on divorce, they caved in on pre-marital sex, cohabitation, gay marriage. What’s left of the building block of civilization? It still stands but very precariously and in a quite weakened state. When the building blocks crumble, so does the social structure.

 

[thistle]

Yes, in the normal course of events men and women marry to form families. There are those who are widowed by the death of a spouse, there are also families headed by a single parent, but single parent families are in greater danger of poverty. Thus the normal mom-dad-kids family is the foundation of society.

But it has been severely undermined of late. Catholics caved in on contraception, which broke the essential link between marriage and children. To a large extent, they caved in on divorce, they caved in on pre-marital sex, cohabitation, gay marriage. What’s left of the building block of civilization? It still stands but very precariously and in a quite weakened state. When the building blocks crumble, so does the social structure.

The Catholic Church has NOT caved in on any of the things you mentioned. Whether individuals Catholics are in a state of mortal sin that is a different matter.

 

[CutlerB]

The Catholic Church has NOT caved in on any of the things you mentioned. Whether individuals Catholics are in a state of mortal sin that is a different matter.

He didn’t say the Church had caved in.

 

[JimG]

True, the Church has not caved in, and never will. But many Catholics have effectively apostatized from Catholic teaching when it comes to sexual matters, most particularly in the areas of contraception, teachings on marriage, and same sex marriage.

 

[dedo]

Although the Catholic Church disagrees with same sex relations, I am not aware of any disagreement with people of any sex caring for each other.

To me that is what a family is – a group of people who love each other, and consciously choose to look after each other’s well being.

 

[JimG]

Although the Catholic Church disagrees with same sex relations, I am not aware of any disagreement with people of any sex caring for each other.

To me that is what a family is – a group of people who love each other, and consciously choose to look after each other’s well being.

Like sisters living in a convent, or monks in a monastery. But they do not get to claim each other as dependents or file joint tax returns.

 

[EasterJoy]

Although the Catholic Church disagrees with same sex relations, I am not aware of any disagreement with people of any sex caring for each other.

To me that is what a family is – a group of people who love each other, and consciously choose to look after each other’s well being.

Disagrees? You make this sound like a matter of opinion, as if there is some doubt about how nature set up the sexual faculty. Where homosexuality exists in nature, there are no offspring. Contemporary same-sex marriage advocates want to pretend otherwise, and those who object that biology does not work that way are shouted down as if they were bigots because they know where babies come from!

Yes, well, since the gay marriage activists in our state rejected the idea of unions that were explicitly not sexual in nature, I don’t believe the “we just want to be a family like anyone else” rhetoric. They don’t want to give the legal rights of marriage to people who are setting up two-person convents. They want to same-sex sexual partners to be treated as if they are identical in every way to married people.

One problem with this is that it is already resulting in men being employed as nothing more than sperm donors for their children, for the convenience of lesbians, and women being employed as nothing more than broodmares for their children, for the convenience of gay men. It was wrong when infertile couples treated other people as if it were OK to let them be anonymous gamete donors to their own children, and it is wrong when gays do it, too.

The other problem with “but we’re a ‘family’ too” is that it is not stopping where you imply. It is not just “we are a group of people who love and care for each other.” No, it is “we are people who parent, because it is only the people who change the diapers who are relevant. Biological parents are irrelevant.”

How people fail to see that it does in fact do harm to marriage to implant this attitude into the national psyche with even more concrete than what no-fault divorce already surrounds it…that is beyond me. I do not buy the argument that marriage is dead or never existed, and therefore a few more stabs into the corpse do no harm. Marriage needs an ICU, not a few more mortal blows.

 

[Book_Worm]

Why would anyone think there is one, all-inclusive definition of family?

The CCD book I use to teach my class constantly refers to our “Church family.”

Many of us have close friends who have become family; “Aunt Mary” and Uncle Joseph," with whom we share no blood ties but who have been with our family for every glad or sorrowful event, who have offered support and love throughout our lives and to whom we are closer than those to whom the title actually belongs but are far from us in distance or emotion.

Why do discussions like these devolve to who ISN’T a part of a Catholic family, rather than those who are?

Is this further evidence of the truth of the Pope’s condemnation of our obsession with homosexuality rather than Jesus’ message of love, mercy and compassion.

 

[JimG]

Why would anyone think there is one, all-inclusive definition of family?

The CCD book I use to teach my class constantly refers to our “Church family.”

Many of us have close friends who have become family; “Aunt Mary” and Uncle Joseph," with whom we share no blood ties but who have been with our family for every glad or sorrowful event, who have offered support and love throughout our lives and to whom we are closer than those to whom the title actually belongs but are far from us in distance or emotion.

Why do discussions like these devolve to who ISN’T a part of a Catholic family, rather than those who are?

Is this further evidence of the truth of the Pope’s condemnation of our obsession with homosexuality rather than Jesus’ message of love, mercy and compassion.

What you are talking about here is extended family, adding other relatives to a basic family unit. But as Easter Joy explains in the preceding post, biology is not just incidental to family, it is essential. Once sex is separated from procreation, marriage is mortally wounded. And marriage is essential to civilization.

 

[EasterJoy]

Why would anyone think there is one, all-inclusive definition of family?

The CCD book I use to teach my class constantly refers to our “Church family.”

Many of us have close friends who have become family; “Aunt Mary” and Uncle Joseph," with whom we share no blood ties but who have been with our family for every glad or sorrowful event, who have offered support and love throughout our lives and to whom we are closer than those to whom the title actually belongs but are far from us in distance or emotion.

Why do discussions like these devolve to who ISN’T a part of a Catholic family, rather than those who are?

Is this further evidence of the truth of the Pope’s condemnation of our obsession with homosexuality rather than Jesus’ message of love, mercy and compassion.

They call NFL teams a family, but the quarterbacks aren’t trying to get legal marriage to their favorite wide receiver. Have you noticed that when these discussions do not “devolve” into a concrete definition of what a “family” is, the discussion is one question away from asking either a) why can’t gays marry, then? or b) who needs marriage to have a family, then?

Do not imagine that Pope Francis does not consider this a serious issue for all of civilization. He is there to remind us that there is a center place on the question of homosexuality:

*Cardinal Jorge Mario Bergoglio, the Archbishop of Buenos Aires and Primate of Argentina, has said that if a proposed bill giving same-sex couples the opportunity to marry and adopt children should be approved, it will “seriously damage the family.”

He made the statement in a letter addressed to each of the four monasteries in Argentina, asking the contemplatives to pray “fervently” that legislators be strengthened to do the right thing.

He wrote: “In the coming weeks, the Argentine people will face a situation whose outcome can seriously harm the family…At stake is the identity and survival of the family: father, mother and children. At stake are the lives of many children who will be discriminated against in advance, and deprived of their human development given by a father and a mother and willed by God. At stake is the total rejection of God’s law engraved in our hearts.”

Cardinal Bergoglio continued: “Let us not be naive: this is not simply a political struggle, but it is an attempt to destroy God’s plan. It is not just a bill (a mere instrument*) but a ‘move’ of the father of lies who seeks to confuse and deceive the children of God.”
from
ncregister.com/blog/edward-pentin/cardinal_bergoglio_hits_out_at_same-sex_marriage#ixzz2fqvcIZJo

He is trying to tell the truth! Homosexual partners cannot form a sexual union according to God’s plan, but homosexual persons are children of God just like everyone else. The idea that one must either oppose homosexuals as persons or else accept the quest for some homosexuals to pretend marriage is possible between two people of the same sex is a false dichotomy being sold by “the father of lies who seeks to confuse and deceive the children of God.”

It is the deceived (and in some cases, perhaps, deceiving) media that wants us to think this issue has only two sides, that it is a black-and-white question to answer where everyone who rejects the claim of gays that they can marry must hate gays or be “obsessed by homosexuality.” It is the homosexuals who are obsessed with and covetous of marriage, with pretending to do what is not in the nature of their relationships, but no one seems to want to see it that way.

 

[Kamaduck]

With same-sex “marriage” making its way into many states, no-fault divorce and a lot of single-parenting around, I found myself wondering today how the Catholic Church would define “family”.

I believe she doesn’t recognise two men or two women with either adopted or previous children as a family, but am not sure about single mums or dads.

The question thus is: What makes a family?

I’m not really sure how a single mom or dad & children could be anything other than a family.

I suppose I would say that a nuclear family is a mom, a dad, and children, but that a family that loses certain members is still a family. And then there are extended families, and people with weird situations like myself. I’m not even sure who my immediate family is anymore.

 

[EasterJoy]

I’m not really sure how a single mom or dad & children could be anything other than a family.

I suppose I would say that a nuclear family is a mom, a dad, and children, but that a family that loses certain members is still a family. And then there are extended families, and people with weird situations like myself. I’m not even sure who my immediate family is anymore.

Absolutely, yes. Families aren’t autonomous “institutions”. They living organisms meant to live in an ecosystem that includes the extended family, the Church, co-workers, neighbors, the greater civilization, and so on.

We have to be very careful not to let words* define *the situation, instead of using words to *describe *the situation. To say, “A family that loses one of the parents is still a family” is not the same as saying that a family that loses members feels no loss. When a family prospers via the heroic efforts of one parent, that does not prove that the lost parent wasn’t necessary, which is how many arguments are going today. “Oh, I know someone who lost their dad, the children are wonderful grown-ups, and therefore there is nothing wrong with a mother having to get by without a husband or children not having a dad.”

There are also some people who define “family” as if a family with members that are failing in their role within the family is no family at all. At that point, to say that a group is a “family” is more of a compliment than a true description, and a compliment that has already begun to rob the word of its most fundamental definition.

 

[Kamaduck]

Absolutely, yes. Families aren’t autonomous “institutions”. They living organisms meant to live in an ecosystem that includes the extended family, the Church, co-workers, neighbors, the greater civilization, and so on.

We have to be very careful not to let words* define *the situation, instead of using words to *describe *the situation. To say, “A family that loses one of the parents is still a family” is not the same as saying that a family that loses members feels no loss. When a family prospers via the heroic efforts of one parent, that does not prove that the lost parent wasn’t necessary, which is how many arguments are going today. “Oh, I know someone who lost their dad, the children are wonderful grown-ups, and therefore there is nothing wrong with a mother having to get by without a husband or children not having a dad.”

There are also some people who define “family” as if a family with members that are failing in their role within the family is no family at all. At that point, to say that a group is a “family” is more of a compliment than a true description, and a compliment that has already begun to rob the word of its most fundamental definition.

Oh, yes. There’s a definite loss when a family member is lost or missing. It’s just that the individuals left over are still a family. They don’t become a collection of unrelated individuals. They’re a family with a hole in it, and as the years go on, the hole may gradually heal, and people will learn to walk around it. At the same time, though, it’ll always be there.

Not having a dad is rough. It’s workable, but it makes everything a lot harder. On the other hand, right now I’d be happy with just one functioning parent. As they say, you don’t know what you have until you’ve lost it.

But even if my family’s a little (OK… a lot) scattered right now, and the various members are having problems caring for each other, and one of us is missing… we’re still a family. A family doesn’t stop being a family when it runs into problems.

 

[dedo]

Why would anyone think there is one, all-inclusive definition of family?

The CCD book I use to teach my class constantly refers to our “Church family.”

Many of us have close friends who have become family; “Aunt Mary” and Uncle Joseph," with whom we share no blood ties but who have been with our family for every glad or sorrowful event, who have offered support and love throughout our lives and to whom we are closer than those to whom the title actually belongs but are far from us in distance or emotion.

Why do discussions like these devolve to who ISN’T a part of a Catholic family, rather than those who are?

Is this further evidence of the truth of the Pope’s condemnation of our obsession with homosexuality rather than Jesus’ message of love, mercy and compassion.

Agreed!

 

[Book_Worm]

Are a single man or woman and the (unwanted? handicapped) children s/he adopts a family?

We’re my mother and I a family after my father died?

I believe the original question was “What is a family?”

Why do we muddy the waters by throwing in non-related comments about NFL teams getting tax breaks and divorces?

It was not the media that described us as being obsessed by homosexuality, but the Pope himself. If we cannot answer a question about what constitutes a family without immediately inserting a caveat that homosexual partners and their children cannot be a real family, I think that’s a textbook definition of obsession.

 

[EasterJoy]

Are a single man or woman and the (unwanted? handicapped) children s/he adopts a family?

We’re my mother and I a family after my father died?

I believe the original question was “What is a family?”

Why do we muddy the waters by throwing in non-related comments about NFL teams getting tax breaks and divorces?

It was not the media that described us as being obsessed by homosexuality, but the Pope himself. If we cannot answer a question about what constitutes a family without immediately inserting a caveat that homosexual partners and their children cannot be a real family, I think that’s a textbook definition of obsession.

Um, the original question specifically brought up gay marriage. Why does answering in that context make us “obsessed by homosexuality”? When someone talks about Pope Francis mentioning obsession with homosexuality, is it out of place to show that even he says that “gay marriage” poses a serious damage to the family, so that it is obvious he means something other than that he wants to ignore these political campaigns?

Was this some kind of a set-up, or what?

 

[EasterJoy]

Why do we muddy the waters by throwing in non-related comments about NFL teams getting tax breaks and divorces?

Like the word “love”, the word “family” is used in both the broadest and narrowest contexts in these discussions, as it is convenient, with outrage being expressed when some group of people who love each other and take care of each other are not included under the umbrella of family, followed by the “aha! then, if they are a family, then why can’t they marry?” argument being trotted predictably behind that one.

People who would never say that a convent of the Missionaries of Charity taking care of handicapped children were a family–as if there is not enough love or commitment there?–express outrage when other unrelated people bringing up orphaned handicapped children under other circumstances are also not included in the most narrow definition of a family. Again, I’ve seen political campaigns where gay activists trot out the “we just want the benefits we need” argument–which I don’t quibble with!–but then don’t want a legal situation set up for them that would be open to other adults not in a sexual relationship.

IOW, this isn’t about letting loving people take care of each other. That is a lie, and I know it is a lie because when the opportunity to have that is offered without the word “marriage”, it is not wanted. It is the status of “married” that is wanted, it is room to pretend that homosexuality is the same as heterosexuality that is wanted, it is a twisting so that two people who by their very natures cannot procreate as a couple can pretend that their relationship is of the kind that can possibly procreate that is wanted. Perhaps “wanted” is not the right word. “Coveted” is more like it. They do not want heterosexual marriage to be recognized as the unique thing that it is…and yet they accuse those who simply recognize the most obvious truths of biology and the fundamental nature of the family unit as bigots obsessed with homosexuality.

Again: I’m getting tired of these false set-ups and the phony rhetoric that keeps trying to obscure this contemporary twisting of the truth.

 

[m_crane]

bio mom, bio dad, kids - a family
adopted mom or dad, kids- family
husband, wife - no artificial contraception ,no kids- family
single parent, divorced- broken family
single parent, never married - broken family
single parent, widowed - family(grieving)
other relative raising kids for reasons other then death of parents- broken family
death of parents- family(grieving)

husband, wife, contracepting- ?
two moms -are you kidding?
two dads -don’t go there-?

As for these blended families ,I, having come from a broken family of divorced parents, my father married into another broken family, a divorced mother with children. All I can say is it didn’t work for my family.