Catholic Families

This last Tuesday we celebrated our daughter Isabella's birthday. She would be 15 years old. It was fifteen years ago, and she was with us for fifteen minutes. Fifteen minutes outside the womb, but I can still remember those minutes, and the days before and after as if they were yesterday. Anyone who has suffered a loss like that can tell you, the pain is never more than a day away. At first the pain is unbearable, and you wonder if it will ever go away. Then you worry that it will go away. Thank God it never does go away. As every year goes by there are still those moments when you remember and you get every precious minute back. In those moments the pain and the tears become a comfort. They are my memories of our precious Isabella and I think to lose them would be to lose a piece of her. Even today I look back, and it seems like it was minutes ago, or yesterday at the furthest.

We didn't know it going through the pregnancy but found out shortly before her birth that Isabella had Down Syndrome. People have asked us since, "if you knew early on, would you have kept her?" As if to say, if we had known early enough, we could have killed her before we became to attached to spare us the pain of her dying. When I look at families of children with down syndrome, rarely do I see happier people or happier children. They truly know what it is to love, and be loved as Jesus taught us to love. In fifteen minutes Isabella made it so perfectly clear to me when Jesus said "love one another as I have loved you" The lesson that love is what you give and not what you get. Children, especially those with special needs are a gift from God and welcoming them into our homes is a core foundation of the Catholic Church. It is build into our wedding vows and a promise we make at the alter before God.

We live in a disturbing time when it is acceptable in subsequent pregnancies, for the Doctor to ask, "Do you want to test for Down Syndrome? You would still go through with the pregnancy if the test came back positive?" Of course being Catholic the answer is an unequivocal "yes." but at the same time there is an underlying pressure to just quietly believe without coming out as to judgmental.  We live our Catholic beliefs but are pressured to keep them in the Church. At least we have always been able to say the Church stands up for us as a family. The Catholic Church believes in families, They encourage those of us who choose to have large families, and reserves a place of high honor and respect for those mothers who choose the vocation of motherhood and dedicate their lives to staying at home and raising the next generation of strong Catholics.

That is why the recent remarks of Pope Francis when he stated that Catholics need not "breed like rabbits" hit a raw nerve for those Catholic families that have chosen a more difficult path for the sake of their faith. The comment rocked a foundation of belief that even through the world at large may not appreciate or hold sacred the role of family, the Catholic church did. The comment gives fuel to the fire for those who want to weaken the Church's stance on everything from marriage to abortion. Catholics and families are under attack. Morality is being mutated by society into bigotry. There is, sadly, a sigh of relief from many "Catholics" when the pope makes those comments. There is a faction in the Catholic church that wants to change Catholicism to make it new, make it fit more with society. Society doesn't dictate what is right and wrong through. That can only come from God. We look to the Church to establish and hold fasts those fundamental truths. Morality can't be subjective left to be interpreted by the individual. Feeling something is right, cannot make it right.

I have heard commented by our priests many times, don't take the headline of what Pope Francis says at face value, go to the source and read the statement look at the bigger picture. So when I heard that comment, that is what I did, and sure enough the Pope did back off his statements in a clear way. Oddly, it was the SSPX news website this time that clarified the pope's view on large families. A group that is often criticized and labeled as sedevacantists and schismatics (they're not) were the ones to come to the defense of Catholic families, the Pope, and the Catholic Church. Meanwhile our own diocesan newspaper unfortunately only reported on the original comments in an article that was borderline favorable and encouraging of those unfortunate comments.

In comments to the Italian bishop’s newspaper Avvenire, Vatican Archbishop Giovanni Becciu said, “The Pope is truly sorry” that his remarks about large families “caused such disorientation.” Archbishop Becciu said the pope “absolutely did not want to disregard the beauty and the value of large families.” (SSPX)

The Pope also went on to make reparations for his comments is his General Audience on January, 21 when he stated "It gives me consolation and hope to see so many large families that welcome children as a true gift from God.”

I am grateful for those families and priests that stand up to defend family. The Catholic Church is rooted in our families, we teach our kids by example, priests, and nuns and saints start off as children in Catholic families. If we are going to win the war on morality it has to start in our families, leading through example. Please continue to pray for our Catholic families.