Strengthening the

Family through
the Word and the
Eucharist
+Ambo David

It takes a
community to
build a family.

From the African

saying

It takes a
village to raise
a child.

Start

with a man
and you have one;
add on a woman and
then you have two.
Add on a child and
what have you got?

Youve

got more
than three;
you have what
they call a family!

not as simple as
that
in our so-called

modern or even
post-modern
societies!

If

it takes a wholesome family

to raise a healthy child;
it also takes a wholesome
community to raise a
healthy family
that

will raise a healthy

child.

Then and Now:

The Family in
the Context of
Modernity

underlying principles that govern

human behaviour in modernity

No one has the right to

tell me
who

I want to be family

with;
whom I choose as sexual
partner

whom

I choose to

be

affectionate to and
be family with
my

FB friends, my pet
dog or cat, my
computer, myself.

Family

is who I
feel like being
and living with.

Responsibility

is a
matter of choice;
only

I can determine
who and what I want
to be responsible for.

No

one has the right

to question my
individual pleasures
as long as I dont hurt
anybody.

new rights
To

a worry-free and
pleasurable sex
To get in and out of marriage
at will
To ones own body; e.g.,
right

to terminate a
pregnancy

compassion
redefined:
to terminate a human life
than

allow it to be born
abnormal,
to grow up in poverty,
to suffer from a disability,
terminal illness and old age,
and misery

Biblical Analogies
for the Family in Crisis
Cains

murder of his brother (Gen

4),
the human hubris that leads to the
nemesis of the Great Flood (Gen
6-9), and
the symbolic tower of human
arrogance and impulse to play
God (Gen 11)

Israel

began as a
family with the
patriarchs Abraham,
Isaac, Jacob and his
children.

how

this family was

threatened by many factors,
External
like

famine, war, natural

calamities

Internal
like

al.

conflicts, sibling rivalry, et

how

it survives all
odds and grows
into a nation, by
Yahweh's blessing

common motifs
in the Patriarchal stories
get

married to infertile women

sibling rivalry among their
sons
younger sons are favored
go down to Egypt due to
circumstances

Same blessing to all 3

Patriarchs
Blessing

of land and

posterity
Yahweh says to them:
I

will bless those who bless

you...by you all the nations
on earth shall be blessed.

blessed

so that
(through them)
all

the nations on
earth shall be
blessed

To

be family with
God:
this

is the visionmission of Israel:

to

be a covenant-people

symbolically

ritualized by the
blood of animals
a blood compact

family,

not just
with each other
but with God

ancient

version of
the FRC slogan
"The

family that
prays together stays
together."

covenant

bond between
Yahweh and Israel symbolized
by the Ark of the Covenant
which

contained the stone

tablets of the ten
commandments (Gods Word!)

Ten Commandments
Israels
one

keys to a strong family:

God, observance of Sabbath

respect for parents
no murder, no adultery, no
stealing,
no lying, no coveting of spouse
or property

Jesus
Love of God, above
summary:
all, &
Love of Neighbour
as Oneself

lawyers

rejoinder,
Who is my neighbour?
occasion for Jesus
Parable of the Good
Samaritan (in Luke 10)

The Parable as
a

critique of the narrowminded and exclusivist

definition of neighbour,
which

(for Jesus) goes

against the very grain of
the Torah

Lev 19:10
You

shall not strip your

vineyard bare, or gather the
fallen grapes of your
vineyard; you shall leave
them for the poor and the
alien: I am the LORD your
God.

Lev 19:33-34
When

an alien resides with

you in your land, you shall
not oppress the alienyou
shall love the alien as
yourself, for you were aliens
in the land of Egypt: I am
the LORD your God.

Deuteronomy 7:7-8
It

was not because you

were greater than any
other people that the LORD
set his heart on you and
chose you-- for you were
the least of all peoples.

It

was because the

LORD loved you and
kept the oath that he
swore to your
ancestors

the Deuteronomic
version

of

Pope Francis
motto:
miserando

eligendo

atque

Deuteronomys
inclusive sense of
neighbour
a result
of the

experience of
exile for Israel

In a state of
DIASPORA
Israel learned to live
with strangers
and

to start seeing
them as part of the
equation of salvation.

In a state of
dispersion

the

Jews rebuilt
their lives
by

congregating
around the written
Word of God

Their

desert experience
in exile made them discover
the most important key to
being family:

God's

Word!

Deuteronomy 8:3
He

humbled you by
letting you hunger, then
by feeding you with
manna, with which
neither you nor your
ancestors were
acquainted

in

order to make you

understand that one
does not live by bread
alone, but by every
word that comes from
the mouth of the LORD.

the

Scripture was not

enough to keep them
united with God and
with one another in a
covenant bond

They

needed the
yearly ritual sacrifice
of the paschal lamb:
to

recall their kinship

with Yahweh.

NT SHIFT
It

is not the blood of

animals that will seal
the covenant
But

the blood of the

God-Man Jesus

not

the blood of animals

but his (Jesus) own blood
in the paschal mystery
which

we celebrate and
re-enact constantly in the
Eucharist

Jesus

himself becomes
our covenant,
already

in his incarnation
but more so in his
passion & death

Colossians 1:20
and

through him God

was pleased to reconcile
to himself all things,
whether on earth or in
heaven, by making peace
through the blood of his
cross.

Jesus

self-giving act of
unconditional love
is

what truly strengthens

and unites us, and
makes us grow from human
families to holy families,
God's family.

The Eucharist
As
a

a sign and an instrument,

sacrament that actualizes

Christs life-giving death on
the cross,
and which in turn becomes
our new and eternal covenant
bond with God

John 6
to

seek the more

essential kind of
food:
the

Bread of Life

John 6:53-55
unless

you eat
the flesh of the Son
of Man and drink his
blood, you have no
life in you.

Those

who eat my flesh

and drink my blood have
eternal life, and I will raise
them up on the last day;
for my flesh is true food
and my blood is true drink.

In the Eucharist,
the

Word that
we receive
becomes
complete

It

takes flesh in the Lord

whom we receive, and
who

in turn takes flesh in

us who receive him,
keeping us in communion
not just with one another
but with God.

It is through the
Eucharist

that

we truly
become a community
that builds our
human families into
Gods family.

In the Eucharist
Gods

promise to Abraham
finds its fulfilment:
we

are blessed to be part of

Gods family, and
in thanksgiving (Eucharistia)
we become a blessing to
others