| | Saints Anne & Joachim | | CELEBRATING PARENTHOOD – CELEBRATING FAMILY | | By Ladislaus L D’Souza | | | International Fathers’ Day (IFD) and International Mothers’ Day (IMD) are over and done with. And now comes “Parents’ Day” – shall we call it International Parents’ Day (IPD)? O why not! For today more than ever, the significance of this feast initiated by the Church to celebrate parenthood, with the parents of our Blessed Mother, Saints Anne and Joachim as role-models, can no more be overlooked.
Family – the basic unit of society
There’s no gainsaying the fact that the Church itself needs to give this feast more emphasis – at the parish level, at the diocesan level and at the universal level, more specifically by declaring it a “solemnity”. The focus of the observance of IFD and IMD (both American inventions) is essentially single parenthood. There is already confusion concerning parenthood in broken marriages where the children are expected to put up with the dual parenting as well as the multiple-parent phenomena. And we are not talking of the situation in the West – it’s all happening here in mera mahan Bharat mind you! Adding to the confusion is the reality of surrogacy, India itself emerging as a hot destination for foreigners and Indians alike. Infants are thus now being parented by unwed individuals of both the straight and the gay/lesbian variety.
The implication is clear: there is a new generation growing up with the love and care of only one parent. It’s one thing for a child to be faced with the prospects of being brought up by one parent on account of the death of the other; it’s quite a different matter to be parented either by an unwed man or woman who has chosen to have no specific life partner as such or by a gay/lesbian same-sex couple. Such children, needless to say, are bound to grow up with a distorted set of values in terms of marital relationships and parenthood itself, sex and procreation, God and His creative link with humankind and a lot else. Isn’t that a major threat to the very continuance of the family as a basic unit of society? The celebration of IFD and IMD, while glorifying the father and the mother as individual entities, amounts to a nullification of the very concept of marriage on the one hand and parenthood on the other. This is where the Church comes into the picture.
Church’s responsibility Being the natural, de facto custodian of God-given human and social norms, the Church must needs keep a close watch over the way marital relationships are developing in today’s world. Time was when an extra-marital affair was actually frowned upon and an individual could approach the court for redressal of grievances on the issue of marital infidelity. In recent times, the governments of certain states in India—Maharashtra being one of them – have ruled that a live-in partner—read, in effect, second wife, commonly known as souten in certain Indian languages!—will be treated on par with the actual wife. It follows then that the children issuing from such a relationship also earn legal status. |
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Does this not defeat the country’s very norm that shuns both polygamy and polyandry? What sort of justice the actual wife and her children can expect with reference to conjugal rights and to property respectively is anybody’s guess. Further, what sort of moral standards the children caught in such a situation will grow up with is definitely cause for worry. The Church needs to take cognizance of the situation and make its displeasure known to the powers-that-be, maybe not necessarily publicly but by some sort of an interaction with the Government/s through appropriate channels like the commissions of the CBCI/CCBI for the family. After all, it all boils down to the question of the stability of the twin foundations of human society, viz. marriage, and the family.
Consequences of nullity
Take the issue of nullity of marriage. Couples going their separate ways land the children begotten in the marriage in a situation they did not bargain for. Nullity implies the marriage did not exist and so the partners have the right to either marry or remain single. But how can a marriage that has had an issue, be declared null and void? And how can the parties involved in such a case be free to marry? Just who is fooling whom? Turning a Nelson’s eye to the realities involved can be disastrous for, after all, what is at stake here is the child’s outlook on life in general and on marriage, parenthood and the family in particular. Instances of entire families going through the null-and-void syndrome are not rare. A couple who’ve had their marriage dissolved have seen both, their only son and their only daughter go through a similar exercise in their respective marriages. If it is true that parents lead by personal example, no prizes for guessing the fate of the children’s and grand-children’s marriages!
Is money everything?
Time was when the father was the bread-winner of the family while the mother devoted all her time and attention to making the home an ideal dwelling-place where the entire family had its being in a very satisfying, fulfilling manner. The situation is totally different today where both husband and wife are working and the children, in most cases, are left entirely to themselves. While money might be in abundance in certain instances, what is grossly lacking is love and accountability, both on the part of the child and of the parents. How often do we not hear parents say of a wayward son or daughter: “What was less for him? We bought him all the latest in foreign stuff, be it the music system or a bike. And we gave him enough pocket money to last him a life time!” Or, “What did we ever deny her! Be it the latest fashions or cosmetics or whatever, it’s been all hers for the asking from the time she was a kid!” Oh yes! Then why oh why has this son or daughter of ours gone astray, we could collectively wonder and yet fail to see that monetary satisfaction is not everything. ...Contd. | | |
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