Faith, Family, and the Land

There is a documentary film by Daniel Cohen which everyone should see called The Jesus Diaries: Everyday Life in the Time of Messiah by DOKO MEDIA LTD. At the time I write this it can be found on YouTube but make sure it is in fact this title and follows the life of Jesus in Nazareth and the community there that still lives this way of life. Another film that should be watched and can be found on You Tube is the 2015 film Full of Grace directed by Andrew Hyatt. The main portion of the film I recommend watching is the section beginning 35 minutes into the film and including the section at around minute 42 with the apostles discussing the Jewish and Gentile relations within the Church. That conversation is powerful. We can't really live out our faith and know Jesus without those Jewish roots. We also need those Jewish roots before the faith can properly expand out to all the other various cultures without loosing its roots. The faith informs culture and holds on to the truth while disposing of any lies. The Catholic faith, Church Teachings and Traditions are the means through which the Holy Spirit guides the people of God. These two movies have profoundly influenced me. The first by striking me to the very core of my being with its beauty in that it shows a connection I am deeply passionate about, namely faith, family and the land. This has been dramatically lost in many generations that have moved away from the small country churches, deep family connections, and farming the land along with their Catholic faith expressed through their various cultures in family rituals. The second film mentioned really emphasizes the need to not loose the Jewish roots of the faith in order for that faith to find expression into the various cultures the Gospel is preached to. The Jewish culture is rich in traditions, rituals, family expressions of the faith that bless the family deeply and keep the people strong in the truth. Jesus was born into this very rich family and fulfilled all the Jewish observances elevating that which would remain and ending in the one Sacrifice of His very life that which would pass (for example the temple sacrifices). But He did not come to do away with the moral core and called us to be even more faithful in this love of God and love of neighbor. Jesus answered when asked which is the greatest commandment in the Torah, “'You shall love Adonai your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind.' This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it, 'You shall love your neighbor as yourself.' The entire Torah and the Prophets hang on these two commandments” (Matthew 22:37-40). And later Jesus says regarding this second commandment that he gives a new one, “love one another as I have loved you” (John 13:34-35; 15:12). He is preserving what is the core while elevating it all towards this new covenant relationship with Him. We are entering into the very family of God through Him.

There is a way to preserve our roots and expand from them into the various cultures without loosing the core values and moral truths. In an age where family is intensely under attack, especially families who believe in Jesus and follow Him, we need these roots. There is no reason why as Catholic families we can't incorporate the Jewish traditions and also expand from them into our own family traditions as long as these are always guided by the Church. In other words there's sacred boundaries for families just as there were in the Old Testament. God guided the very family life of Israel with boundaries to keep them from following the secular and pagan culture around them and to enrich their life with family rituals and the worship of the Him alone. So there is no reason why a Catholic family can't practice some of these beautiful rituals of the Jewish roots such as the door scroll looking at it as a reminder that there is indeed one God and we are to worship and obey Him alone. In fact the Shema prayer is in the Liturgy of the Hours of the Roman Rite Catholic Church every Saturday night at Compline (Night Prayer). If we understand and value the roots of faith in the Jewish traditions we can better live out our calling as families to be the “domestic church”. We have much to learn from the 30 years Jesus spent in Nazareth in his rich family life (especially as shown in the first film I mentioned). His life had that deep connection of faith, family and the land. He was a man of prayer, hard work in the trade of his earthly father Joseph, and rich in the Jewish culture and life of the land from its olive trees to its seasons and cycles of sewing seeds and reaping the harvest. In this modern age so far removed from that simplicity yet hard work of the life of Nazareth, perhaps we can re-enter and re-commit to that “school of prayer, and that “school of nazareth” that is the life of Jesus of Nazareth and the Holy Family (mentioned by Popes Paul VI and Benedict XVI). We need this even more in the very hearts and homes of the domestic church as secularism has even spread into some parishes and into life and education. The faith is best preserved in the family itself. I leave you with the words of Pope Benedict XVI saying, “The New Evangelization depends largely on the domestic Church...In our time, as in times past, the eclipse of God, the spread of ideologies contrary to the family and the degradation of sexual ethics are intertwined...And just as the eclipse of God and the crisis of the family are linked, so the New Evangelization is inseparable from the Christian family” (ewtnnews.com/vatican/pope-new-evangelization-depends-on-good-catholic-families).