As yet another Father’s Day is upon us, one could wish for no greater gift of remembrance than the profound revelation of what it truly means to be a father. The world itself pleads that each man blessed by the miracle of a child will spend a few precious moments in the sincere contemplation of his glorious state in life.
No Greater Joy
Fatherhood, in many ways, is in dire need of this realization, not only by fathers themselves, but also by society as a whole.
The virtues necessary to succeed in the fatherly role are in direct confrontation with the qualities of life espoused by a materialistic world. For too many men, children pose a threat to their ambitions, to their leisure, and to their ultimate goals of worldly gain. Furthermore, many of those fathers who do reflect a serious interest in the lives of their children, do so all too often with misplaced priorities.
If fathers would invest as much time and effort in their children’s spiritual welfare as in their physical, material and intellectual development, they would then unlock the real treasures of fatherhood. There is no greater earthly joy for a father than witnessing his child’s discovery of God’s love; than joining with his child in experiencing the only lifestyle that leads to true peace and happiness; than knowing deep in his heart that he has done everything in his power to protect his child’s soul from the ways of the world and prepare his child’s soul for the endless promises of heaven. If there was only one possible success in life afforded to each father, it is exactly this which his whole being should strive for.
Pervasive Moral Decay
While the world has relegated such paternal aspirations to nearly imperceptible levels, the family, in turn, has suffered a truly pathetic disintegration. The United States divorce rate has more than doubled since 1965 and is now the highest in the world. Our country, with six percent of the world’s Catholic population, has more than three times the number of annulments than the rest of the Catholic world put together.
This generation, especially in the United States, has lived through the collapse of the Catholic family. There has been nothing like this decay of Catholic marriage in the 2,000-year history of Catholicism. A dissoluble family, as witnessed especially in this country, is the precursor of a pervasive moral decay that directly leads to many of the ills which we face as a society.
The correlation between a weakening, spiritually passive fatherhood and the functional obsolescence of the family is far from superficial. When trust is eroded by absenteeism, wisdom by worldliness, and sacrifice by selfishness, the very roots of the family become exposed and are soon washed away. The shifting foundation of the family is in desperate need of spiritual reinforcement. Fatherhood is the footing on which to build; faith, the cornerstone; and God, Himself, the builder.
Devotion and Commitment
We have been blessed with many great examples of inspirational fatherhood throughout history. No father, however, is a better role model than St. Joseph, the foster father of our Savior. St. Joseph teaches us the art of devotion and the perception of commitment as no other father could. His total submission to the will of God nurtured within him the indispensable virtues of faith, wisdom and self-sacrifice. He embraced simplicity and poverty so as to renounce worldliness. In material terms, he was a man of very little means, yet in spiritual terms he was, and is, a veritable wellspring of guidance for every father who has followed in his footsteps.
St. Joseph’s mission, more than raising his foster Son (who in His perfection already possessed every good virtue), was to be the personification of the covenant of fatherhood, a covenant of two parts. The first covenant is between God and every father: that each man who is granted the purity of a child’s soul will discover perfect fulfillment upon the promise that, first and foremost, he will dedicate his life to the spiritual well-being of that soul entrusted unto him. The second covenant is between a father and his child: a relationship tempered with patience and forgiveness whose sole purpose is mutual salvation, for inasmuch as a father holds the salvation of his children as his most sincere desire in life, so he ensures his own. This is the legacy of St. Joseph, a poignant and timeless declaration of God’s love between father and child.
May this Father’s Day, then, evoke a true celebration of fatherhood, not within the confines of a secular holiday but for the miraculous vocation that it is. When you look at your children, look beyond the mere responsibilities of feeding, clothing, and educating. Whether in the finest or most impoverished circumstances, these are but fleeting — it is their souls which live forever.
© Copyright 2005 Catholic Exchange
Vincent Wheeler is the father of seven children and resides in Plainwell, MI.
