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April
2004
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Parents
take own vows of
‘poverty, chastity, obedience’ |
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James
Pankratz
Special to Parenting |
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Last month a member of a religious order spoke to our
congregation. The bishops had set aside that particular
Sunday to focus on the “consecrated life.”
The speaker’s main point was that one factor sets
aside the lives of priests, sisters and brothers from
that of the laity: the vows of poverty, chastity and obedience.
The brother spoke of the vow of poverty both as sacrifice
and as freedom — a letting go of the distraction
of gaining and maintaining earthly possessions in order
to devote oneself to the service of others.
The congregation, mostly lay people, listened intently.
I think we felt genuine respect for this brother, who
gave up a career in business to join an order dedicated
to care for the sick.
But while taking nothing away from those who make formal
vows, I thought of another group whose everyday life reflects
the spirit of the vows of poverty, chastity and obedience
— parents.
Poverty
A recent survey reported that Americans are more religious
than Europeans, as measured by the percentage of people
who say they believe in God and attend church. A news
commentator offered an intriguing explanation for this
contrast. Because Americans lack a system of universal
health care, parents know it would take only one catastrophic
illness to wipe out a family’s meager savings and
place them in debt for the rest of their lives. A large
percentage of bankruptcies filed in this country follow
such an illness.
A Department of Agriculture report, quoted in the Feb.
14 Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, pointed out that today
parents pay from $116,000 to $250,000 for the basic needs
of a child. That’s food, clothing, shelter, health
care and education for one child through age 17. That
total does not include college. And does anyone think
a child stops needing help after age 17?
Millions of unemployed Americans have watched their jobs
go overseas. All they want is a chance to work to provide
for their families.
Many Americans are very worried about how they will manage.
When a barrage of applications and resumes fail to snag
a job with a livable wage, and with no commitment from
government or loyalty to employees from business, parents
become acutely aware of the fragility of their family’s
physical existence.
Chastity
In graduate school, I was taught by a married sociology
professor who once quipped that he had taken a vow of
celibacy, with one exception. Chastity is not the same
as abstaining from sex or marriage. Chastity is the frame
of mind not to use one’s sexual drive to dominate,
exploit, or use other people for one’s own gratification.
Many married people hold to that standard.
And then there are the parents of toddlers, parents who
work split shifts, marriages in which one spouse travels
extensively, and marriages in which one spouse has a chronic
illness. Being healthy and relaxed are prerequisites for
sexual intimacy. Sometimes couples are just too tired,
too stressed, or too sick.
Obedience
This is the most important comparison. An author once
pointed out that monks are awakened by the monastery bells
in the middle of the night to chant the hours of the office.
The bell is symbolic of the will of God. He observed that
parents are routinely awakened by the crying of an infant
to do the will of God — to tend to the needs of
the helpless.
And that’s just the beginning. Visits to the clinic
for ear infections, the last minute trips to Walgreens
for supplies for school projects due tomorrow, building
a science project together, and patiently helping an autistic
child with her homework can make up the rest of the journey.
Good parents routinely put aside their desires for rest,
pleasure, and self-indulgence to answer the call of another,
through whom the voice of God can be heard.
What do compassionate individuals of whatever vocation
have in common for their selfless dedication? Hardship
and suffering? Yes, but much more. Most parents would
not want it any other way. Like their brothers and sisters
in religious life, they’ve also felt the joy of
losing the nagging demands of the ego in the experience
of unity with Another.
(Pankratz is a marriage and family therapist at Catholic
Charities Milwaukee regional office.) |
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