Friends
Peace be with you.
I’m guessing some of you are, once again, surprised, maybe even a little disappointed, that I didn’t use the short version of the second reading. And, let me allay the fears of the women and, possibly the hopes of some of the men, that I’m not going to use St. Paul’s Letter to the Collosians to outline a misogynistic view of the world where women, as the philosopher Simone de Bouvier said, are considered the second sex. I’m sure most other priests did have the lector read the shorter form and/or are probably avoiding talking about the reading. But I think, if we do that, we not only contribute to any misunderstandings or abuse surrounding this passage but we miss out on what is really meant to be more of a challenge to the mindset of men, possibly even more so in today’s world than at the time of St. Paul. So, at the risk of neglecting the gospel and first reading, let’s look at that second reading for today’s Mass and let it teach us what a holy family should look like.
First and foremost, St. Paul paints a general picture of what the life of virtue should look like for all who call themselves Christian. It’s worth taking a day to reflect on the whole paragraph but especially “heartfelt compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness, and patience, bearing with one another and forgiving one another”. We may want to ask ourselves what role each of these virtues play in our lives. He starts by being inclusive of everyone and then moves into some specific advice to families.
It’s at this point that things get…controversial. Some people look at this second paragraph and say that it’s representative of an outmoded view of life, of a time when the man was in charge of the family and the woman was seen as little better than property. They say that it reminds them of when we used to use terms like “women’s work”. They point to the word submission and shake their heads picturing a woman barefoot and pregnant doing all the housework like cooking and cleaning and raising the children while the husband goes to work and mows the lawn and changes the light bulbs. I’d like to suggest we take another look at this reading starting with a better viewpoint, with the help of a theologian named Dr. Peter Kreeft. By the way, you can get the book that I’m basing this homily on in our bookstore and it’s called “Food for the Soul” by Dr. Peter Kreeft.
First, even though St. Paul only says wives should be submissive to husbands in this passage, in Ephesians, he starts by saying that everyone should be submissive to everyone out of reverence for Christ. So, it’s meant to grow out of an overall sense of mutual submission to one another that marks the Christian community. Dr. Kreeft goes on to point out that a husband is meant to love his wife and avoid any bitterness toward her. Again, he points to the passage in Ephesians where it says that a husband must love his wife like Christ loved the Church. I’d like to suggest that this is actually more of a radical submission than the wife is called to do. Christ loved the Church by dying for her, by giving up his life, by submitting his will to her will. After all, as Dr. Kreeft points out, submission means being “under the mission of” so this submission isn’t a kind of fear of violence or a kind of blind obedience. Soldiers are submissive to their superiors when they charge into battle. Being submissive means having a mission in mind and following it. Dr. Kreeft had this great quote, “There are two possible motives for getting married: to get happiness or to give it. If the motive of either or both is to get it rather than to give it, the odds are that the marriage will fail. If the motive of both is to give it, it will almost certainly succeed”.
You see, I think in both Ephesians and in today’s reading from Colossians, St. Paul wasn’t advocating husbands dominating their wives. Far from it! I think he was saying that a family has a mission and it’s important that both husbands and wives have that mission in mind. The mission can be easily stated as to get the other person and all their children to heaven. That is our ultimate happiness, after all, to be with God in heaven.
Do we live our life as though the only thing that matters is getting myself into heaven or do we see our mission to get our holy family in heaven?
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