We Are Family – A story By Fr Dominic Yamoah

A teacher was teaching his Sunday school kids about the importance of the family and things that money could not buy. “Money cannot buy laughter and it cannot buy love” he told them. To illustrate his point he said, “What would you do if I offered you $1,000 not to love your mother and father?” The whole class fell silent. Finally, a small voice queried, “How much would you give me not to love my big sister?” Evidently, it is easier to love vertically than to love horizontally. The love between parents and children or grandparents and grandchildren comes more easily to us than the love between siblings.

The feast of the Holy Family that we celebrate today should give us the chance to reflect on how much love and attention we give to our families in order to build them.
We can build a wonderful family by asking ourselves how much of the three A’s – Attention, Affection, and Appreciation – we are giving to every member of your family. We all need to give, as well as receive, the three A’s in order to love and feel loved. This family is not only the home family, but also the church as family – an extended family – where we give and receive love and even the special groupings that we have. We need to contribute positively to the development of these families in our lives.

Take time today to have a reflection about your family. You can have a family meeting and talk about issues affecting your families. Ask yourselves important soul-searching questions. Are Husbands and wives making it a point to spend quality times together outside the children? Are we spending time with our children as parents? Do we as a family find time to pray together? Is our church a real family where everyone feel at home? How do we look at people with few challenges/weaknesses in their lives? How do we welcome visitors and new members? What is our contribution to making our church the best place to worship?
Finding time to consider the above issues in our families opens the way for healing and a bound of unity. If we can start being more loving in the home and the church, we would be taking practical steps in living like members of the family of God that we are.

Although the just ended year with its dedication to marriage and family life has ended, the church is still encouraging us to focus on building a wonderful family life as it continues its work on the synod of family life. We need to become partners in promoting this synod by building our own families in the pattern that Christ has instituted for us in the example of the Holy family of Nazareth. May God touch our Families with His blessings. Amen

Fr. Dominic Yamoah is a Priest from the Catholic Diocese of Konongo-Mampong. He hails from a family size of eight. The above reflection is a gift from my ministry in the St. Clare’s Parish in Clarinda and its sister stations in IOWA, USA. ‘I am blessed to have originated from a family that prays together’ (Fr. Dominic Yamoah).
Keep Fr. Dominic Yamoah in your daily prayers. May God bless you and your family.