FRUITFUL LOVE
"Love always gives life. For this reason, conjugal love does not end within the couple. Spouses, while giving themselves to each other, give the reality of the child beyond themselves, a living reflection of their love, a permanent sign of conjugal unity and a living and indissociable synthesis of their being father and mother “(AL 165).
Thus opens chap. 5 of Amoris Laetitia. Love, as such, is always open to welcoming a new life and always gives life: the family is the place where life is generated, where life is welcomed and developed. Each new life comes as a gift from God, as a sign of his gratuitous love for him.
“Each new life allows us to discover the most gratuitous dimension of love, which never ceases to amaze us. It is the beauty of being loved first: children are loved before they arrive. This reflects the primacy of the love of God who always takes the initiative, because the children are loved before they have done anything to deserve it” (AL 166)
It is not for nothing that the most beautiful moments in a couple's life are generated by the birth of children, their growth ... When love opens up to life, to relationships, then joy and happiness are experienced. A closed love does not lead to a full love..
Living the marriage vocation means being open to life, not only a generative one in a biological sense, but generative also in terms of relationships with others, service, the apostolate.
FECUNDITY AND THE SACRAMENT OF MARRIAGE
Fertility is inherent in the choice of the sacrament of marriage. Marriage implies that the fate of the spouses' love is not a private matter but has a public destiny. It is not just for me but it is for the others, for society, for the Church. In the Eucharist it emerges clearly that Jesus does not give himself only for the devotees but as he says: "This is the chalice of my blood for the new and eternal covenant, poured out for you and for all". Marrying in the Lord therefore means affirming that love is not just a question of two, but is intrinsically open to the third: to the other, to the child ... to God. And this love, precisely because it is both fully human and 'divine' is always generative and fruitful. It produces life! The destiny of love is therefore generation, i.e., the fruitfulness of love. It means that the intimacy of the spouses is either generative or sterile. Because when love is true it generates life. Always.
Life in the relationship between spouses: dialogue, listening, tenderness, search for communion.
Life in relationship with others: welcoming, hospitality, openness, generosity.
Life especially in the generation of children: becoming fathers and mothers.
In Christianity, speaking of generation is what is most divine. In fatherhood and motherhood there is the beauty of the affections and also their destiny and not what sooner or later one must resign oneself to. It is the greatest joy and at the same time the deepest one, to perceive that love is fruitful and generative.
The greatest risk is that, in our culture, the good 'desire of the child' will turn into the 'child of desire'. In this way the other - and the child is always other, even if there is no one who resembles us like him / her - is brought back to himself, annulled in the self, reduced to an object of desire, a thing, our possession. or a 'need'. Hence the claim to fill one's 'needs', disappointments, claims, failures with the child. On the contrary, the child is an other self and as such he is received as a gift. Therefore it asks to be accepted with responsibility: it is a gift that solicits the response of those who generated it. The answer is called paternity and maternity.
THE RESPONSIBILITY OF PARENTING
The starting point is that parental responsibility, like any responsibility, is not a burden but a beautiful path. It has exactly to do with a path of fullness, of self-realisation. Responsibility does not begin with a skill - no one has ever been a parent before they have become one - but with ignorance. So don't be scared if you don't know how to answer, what to do, what to say. We are on the right path. The way is to become responsible, able to answer a certain question, then another one will come in which you will find yourself completely disabled and you will have to start over. You are a responsible person because you care, and you are responsible because you are answering a care question.
The difference between a biological dad and mom and a parent dad and mom is that the parent dad and mom are aware that they have a child. And this is not automatic. Responsibility is the attitude of answering a question that you do not ask, but that the other asks you. It is exactly the conscious listening to the other. Without this step, responsibility, as well as speaking of fertility, is pure rhetoric.
Parenting is an answer: this is why we often feel incapable. It happens to everyone. It is precisely because it feels like this that we seek responsibility. If we all had a series of preconceived answers, it would not be called responsibility, i.e. answering. The questions are different and therefore the answers are always different. We are always caught off guard. This is why we need to share this fragility with others. When you are in the family and it comes to managing and educating your children, perhaps the most complex, but also the most important thing, is to maintain a strong alliance with your husband and wife.
BEEING FATHER AND MOTHER
Pope Francis specifies as follows:
"It is not just a question of the love of the father and mother taken
“When you are in the family and it comes to managing and educating your children, perhaps the most complex, but also the most important thing, is to maintain a strong alliance with your husband and wife.
Separately, but also of the love between them, perceived as the source of one's existence, as a nest that welcomes and as the foundation of the family. Otherwise, the son seems to be reduced to a capricious possession. Both, man and woman, father and mother, are cooperators in the love of God the Creator and almost interpret-ers of him. They show their children the maternal face and the paternal face of the Lord. Furthermore, together they teach the value of reciprocity, of the encounter between different people, where each brings their own identity and also knows how to receive from the other. If for some unavoidable reason one of the two is missing, it is important to look for some way to compensate for it, to favour the adequate maturation of the child (AL 172).
The feeling of being orphans that many children and young people experience is deeper than we think. We really need mothers and fathers who are with their children and educate them with the typical richness of motherhood and fatherhood that becomes a true and daily alliance.
"In fact, mothers are the strongest antidote to the spread of selfish individualism. They are the ones that testify to the beauty of life. Without a doubt, a society without mothers would be an inhumane society, because mothers always know how to testify, even in the worst moments, tenderness, dedication, moral strength. Mothers also often convey the deepest sense of religious practice: in the first prayers, in the first gestures of devotion that a child learns. Without mothers, not only would there be no new faithful, but faith would lose much of its simple and profound warmth. The mother, who protects the child with her tenderness and compassion, helps him to bring out trust, to experience that the world is a good place that welcomes him, and this allows him to develop a self-es-teem that favours the ability to intimacy and empathy. "In fact, mothers are the strongest anti-dote to the spread of selfish individualism. They are the ones that testify to the beauty of life. Without a doubt, a society without mothers would be an inhumane society, because mothers always know how to testify, even in the worst moments, tenderness, dedication, moral strength. Mothers also often convey the deepest sense of religious practice: in the first prayers, in the first gestures of devotion that a child learns. Without mothers, not only would there be no new faithful, but faith would lose much of its simple and profound warmth. The mother, who protects the child with her tenderness and compassion, helps him to bring out trust, to experience that the world is a good place that welcomes him, and this allows him to develop a self-es-teem that favours the ability to intimacy and empathy. concrete circumstances of each family, but the clear and well-defined presence of the two figures, female and male, creates the most suitable environment for the child to mature” (AL 174-175)
OPEN AND WELCOMING FAMILIES
The pope also reminds us that no family must conceive itself as too "different or separate". Christian families are not "strange" families but families open to all, both towards those who share the same values and towards those who do not fully share them while seeking support and help from them. Open above all to the poor and to those in need. Families who are capable of weaving friendships.
“With the witness of their lives, and also with words, families speak of Jesus to others, transmit the faith, awaken the desire for God, and show the beauty of the Gospel and of the lifestyle that he proposes to us. Thus Christian spouses paint the grey of the public space, filling it with the colours of fraternity, of social sensitivity, of the defence of fragile people, of luminous faith, of active hope. Their fruitfulness expands and is translated into a thousand ways of making God's love present in society "(AL 185).
THE SOURCE OF FECUNDITY
Where to find the strength to experience the fruitfulness of love?
First of all, in the Eucharist. Families who feed on the Eucharist with the right disposition strengthen their desire for fraternity, their social sense and their commitment to the needy. They know they find the source of their self-giving in the Body and Blood given by the Lord.
So in extended, open families that meet and collaborate with each other. More than ever, there is a need to establish networks of families, overcoming the "Temptation to individualism that leads to withdrawing into a small nest. However, this isolation no longer offers peace and happiness, but closes the heart of the family and deprives it of the broad horizon of existence "(AL 187).
Finally, if we are able to reconcile ourselves with time, we will understand the fruitfulness of waiting. Against the culture of immediate enjoyment that wants everything immediately, man knows that authentic desire is strengthened and purified over time, that love grows with time, that affections take shape and strength only if we give them time, that bonds can be faithful and happy only if they are the result of a prolonged time of knowledge, respect, attention.
FRUITS OF JOY
A family that generates love, and makes its home a hearth for all, is a home of joy for all, is a cradle of love for children, for friends. Thus the family becomes a school of life, of love and of joy.
In the identity card of the Salesian Family (art. 33) we are shown three attitudes which foster joy and communicate it to others.
Confidence in the victory of good. In us and around us. There is always an ac-cessible point to the good on which to leverage.
The appreciation of human values. Don Bosco's disciple grasps the values of the world and refuses groaning about his time: he retains all that is good. No more complaints and prophecies of doom. Let's train ourselves to say only words of blessing.
Education to daily joy. We ask for the grace of a patient effort to learn and learn again, to taste with simplicity, the many human joys that the Creator puts on our path every day: meals, evenings, going out, playing together, daily dialogue ... "Rejoice in the Lord always, I repeat: rejoice" (Phil 4: 4)
FOR PERSONAL AND GROUP REFLECTION
What are the most beautiful signs of fruitfulness and openness that you see in yourself and in your family? Which, on the other hand, are those of closure and selfishness?
Are you building a network of families where friendship and sharing are at home? What steps should you still take in this direction?
What is the attention paid to the poorest people and/or families in need of help and closeness?
How are you living your parenting in the time you invest to be with your children, to talk and play with them? Do you pray for them while offering your small and big sacrifices? Are you aware that the more you grow in concrete love for your spouse, the more you nourish your motherhood and fatherhood?
