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June 20, 2021 - Pastor Message

03/28/2024

THE YEAR OF ST. JOSEPH CHRISTIAN FATHERHOOD (cont.)

“Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name” (Matthew 6:9).

Continuing our monthlong reflection on Christian fatherhood, we turn this Father’s Day weekend to the greatest image of fatherhood from whom all fatherhood comes, God, our heavenly Father. It is no accident that Jesus instructs his disciples to call God “Our Father”. In fact, he uses the intimate term, Abba, to address the Father, the term a child would use, rather than a more formal address (Mark 14:36). That is the intimate relationship he invites us as his brothers and sisters to share with the Father: “For those who are led by the Spirit of God are children of God. For you did not receive a spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you received a spirit of adoption, through which we cry ‘Abba, Father’” (Romans 8:14-15).

If fatherhood means giving in a receiving way, as we have discussed previously from William May’s article “The Mission of Fatherhood” (at christendom awake.org), then God’s personal giving of himself in order to receive us, his wayward children, into complete communion with himself for all eternity is the perfect model of fatherhood. He gave us his divine life in creation, creating us in his own image and likeness, and then, when we strayed through sin, he gave his only Son for our salvation to reunite us to himself in a whole new, and better, way, making us his sons and daughters in Christ. Perhaps the best image of this is the parable of the prodigal son (Luke 15:1132). While we tend to focus on the wasteful, ungrateful son in this story, it is really about the loving and constantly giving father, who gives his son life, who provides for his needs, and, when the son insults him and takes half his possessions, squandering them on wine and women, he forgives him and welcomes him home, restoring the son to health and security. The father does nothing but give in the story in order to receive his son into his love and care, the very meaning of fatherhood.

St. Joseph certainly models this same form of giving in a receiving way with Jesus, his adoptive son. Swallowing his pride and taking Mary and her unborn son in when Mary was pregnant out of wedlock, pulling up stakes and moving to completely different towns and lands on a moment’s notice to protect Mary and Jesus, and providing for Mary and Jesus through the backbreaking labor of a carpenter, always giving, all the time, to receive what he believed in faith but did not live to see in this world, the salvation Jesus was born to bring. That is what Christian fatherhood means, giving oneself completely for one’s family, modeling our loving Father in heaven for them, following in the footsteps of Joseph, to receive for oneself and for one’s family the fullness of life Christ gives us. So, to all the fathers out there of any kind, on behalf of our entire parish, I wish you a blessed Father’s Day, and may the blessings of our Father in heaven be yours here on earth and beyond through the carpenter’s son, Jesus Christ.

Fr. Marc Stockton

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