Tuesday of the Twenty-fifth Week in Ordinary Time
The idea of family and familial relationships has become the fodder for conversation and editorial comment. What was once a presumed notion of familial relationships has now become a debated point. In today’s gospel the point is made clear that the relationship and debt owed to family is transcended by a relationship of committed faith. Christ’s words may seem to diminish the relationship one has with one’s family. But such reading ignores other texts in the scripture that place an emphasis on the duties and correct relationships between parents and children. The idea that Jesus was given a family and by means this family identifies the importance of this structure which finds its roots in the divine order. Good families are the ground by which the fruit is born. A good family enables its members to break away and develop mature relationships that have their primacy in a relationship with God. Hence Jesus’ words simply refer to the primary relationship between God and the family which good families nourish and support.