"A well-meaning speaker had been waxing rhapsodic on the way in which people might become true disciples of Jesus in their roles as parents. My acquaintance was taken aback when the speaker claimed that whenever parents diapered and dressed their baby, they were performing one of the traditional Christian works of mercy - clothing the naked. My friend was right to be jarred- not because tending one's own child cannot be a spiritual practice but because the traditional Christian works of mercy...generally refer to acts of mercy performed on behalf of the poor and marginalized, not for the benefit of one's relatives. These are acts of love - almsgiving in fact - that go well beyond what would be normally assumed as family responsibility. This caveat is well taken. Genuine spirituality is not sentimentality."A close reading of this passage brings up several questions, two of them I think I can attempt tonight.
a) Is it possible for people to become true disciples of Jesus through their roles as parents?
b) When parents perform acts of parenting are they performing acts of mercy?
A) Is it possible for people to become true disciples of Jesus through their roles as parents?
- The initial answer to this is 'No', because of course the way to become a true disciple of Jesus is not to be a good parent. But in all of my talks with people, Christian or not, one question gets asked over and over again - what about works? As in, things you do or are expected to do, as a Christian. Of course, you're expected to do one thing as a Christian - confess that Jesus is Lord, that He died for your sins, and accept Him into your life, and if you've got 30 second to live and you do this with an honest heart God will hear and accept you. BUT, if you do this at, say, the ripe old age of 13 and live another eighty years, well you'll notice something starts to happen. You start to live differently because you are being changed from the inside by the Holy Spirit. When someone says to me "If I become a Christian do I have to stop swearing?" I usually say, "Well, if you swear that doesn't negate your salvation, if that's what you're asking, but you'll notice, if you let God into your life, that eventually swearing isn't enjoyable anymore, that it starts to bother you, and eventually it will phase itself out because He will begin to remake you." What does this have to do with parenting, you ask. Good question. As you are living the life of a parent you will notice that God will begin to work though you, as He works through us all, smoothing out our wrinkles and easing the knots in our souls. If you let Him work He will show you the cracks in your heart, your tendency to lash out, perhaps, or your snide remarks, and slowly, slowly, you'll move away from those things that have darkened you and into His light. So, can you come to be a true disciple of Jesus through parenting? If you mean does having a baby make you a disciple, then no, but if you mean through the journey of parenting can God draw you closer to Him and closer to His ideal for you, then absolutely.
B) When parents perform acts of parenting are they performing acts of mercy?
Acts of Mercy is the name given to the works that many Churches feel embody the responsibilities of the Christian. The corporal works (there is also a list of spiritual works) are to feed the hungry, give drink to the thirsty, clothe the naked, to visit and ransom the captive, to shelter the homeless, to visit the sick, and to bury the dead. As these acts tend to be focused on more in churches with a Catholic or Eastern Orthodox history or ties to one of those denominations, some of them will be a bit foreign to Protestants. Bury the dead, for example. However, several of these are acts that parents perform daily for their children, so what's the difference? I did my best to research this one, because I'm a little lost in the midst of Catholic theology, and came across the Catholic Encyclopedia if you feel like reading what I slogged through, but it seemed to me to boil down to this: Christ asks us to be like Him. And what did He do? He was a friend, He was a leader and a follower, He was a mighty fortress against evil, and a kind and gentle shepherd. He was all things and we, as His followers, are not asked to stand up in His place now that He is gone, but to be windows through which He, the light of the world, can shine. When you meet an especially wonderful Christian, like Mother Theresa wonderful, you are actually meeting someone who is the least like themselves. So, in my simple and hole-filled theology the Acts of Mercy are those things which we do to be more Christ-like. You can do those things anywhere, and I personally think it is unlikely that Christ would differentiate between responding to the hungry cries of your infant and the hungry cries of a homeless man.
Of course, seeing as this space is devoted to my journey and understanding of my own call to a domestic vocation, I would think this way. I can't imagine that God would give me a calling and then cheapen or lessen it in any way. As we all follow His purpose for our lives we grow in our understanding of Him and ourselves, and maybe I'll agree with Wright one day, that parenting, while a spiritual practice, cannot compare to a true act of mercy and compassion. But as it stands right now, diapering my son humbles me, feeding him humbles me, loving him humbles me, and a humbled me draws closer to my Lord.
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