“My whole life could be wrapped up in those few words,” he
said. A friend of mine was introducing me to the idea of a “Six Word
Autobiography” and this was his – Distant
dad. I will be different. When he really thought about the story of his
life, when he really reflected on his hopes and dreams, his anxieties and
motivations, it all came down to this definitive experience - a distant father
and his life-long resolve to be different.
This year, in a peculiar coincidence, most of the world
honored their fathers on the same day that the Church celebrated her most
fundamental doctrine of God in the Solemnity of the Most Holy Trinity. This week,
the universal Church ponders the deepest mystery of God as a Trinity of
Persons, one God expressed in a triune community of Being. For Christians, this represents the most
essential truth of our faith and the “source of all the other mysteries.”[1]
“So what does Father’s Day have to do with Trinity Sunday?”
you may be asking. As I thought about that question, my friend’s six-word
autobiography came to mind.
“Distant dad. I will be different.”
This isn’t just the bracing testimony of one person. It is
the spiritual autobiography of an entire generation. When only 60% of Catholics
believe in a personal God, the idea of a “distant dad” is all too real.[2]
When less than half of Catholics are confident that they could even have a
personal relationship with God, “distant dads” are more the norm than the
exception.[3]
Our image of God the Father is distant, non-present, dispassionate, and the
contemporary lacuna of Catholic spirit and practice is a fateful result.
“Distant dad. I will be different.”
Those six words were powerful for me, not simply because of
my own struggles with a distant dad, but because they tell the story of the
Church’s failure to convey the most crucial reality of Christian faith – God is relationship. Our God is a personal God. Our God is a
relational God. Our God does not simply use
relationships to communicate the Gospel, our Trinitarian God is relationship and the Good News has everything to do with the
deeply personal relationship with the Father that is
available to us in Jesus Christ through the Holy Spirit.
The doctrine of the Trinity is not some impractically
ethereal concept of God that never touches the daily reality of our lives. It
is the very essence of God’s life breaking into our fallen world when we engage
in personal, intentional relationships with those we love and serve.
“Distant dad. I will be different.”
Reflecting on the importance of loving fathers, I pray that
this generation will truly be different. It is time to reclaim the truth of a
heavenly Father who “comes lovingly to speak to his children,”[4]
a God-in-relationship who invites us to share in the divine life through a
deeply personal relationship with Him.
God is personal.
God is relationship. This changes
everything.
I love this entry! My siblings and I had different experiences with our dad. My older sister saw him as a distant dad, while I and my younger sister saw him as a loving dad. Some of that was due to how different WE were. My sister's distant dad appeared to be a judgmental taskmaster, while my other sister and I had a more fun, smiling dad. Funny how that carries through to the way we see God. My older sister is full of fear about God, while my younger sister and I have tons of faith and trust, and it appears that our attitude is not going to catch on with her! Sad!
ReplyDeleteIt is also a generational thing. Not infrequently do I hear Catholics (and many other Christians) from older generations talk about God as an angry and implacable taskmaster. So much so that comedian (and committed Catholic) Stephen Colbert quipped, "A father has to be a provider, a teacher, a role model, but most importantly, a distant authority figure who can never be pleased. Otherwise, how will children ever understand the concept of God?" Of course Colbert was speaking sarcastically, but his comment highlights the universality of the problem. The PEW study digs deeper to discover that nearly half of all Catholics in the U.S. are, functionally speaking, deists. The God that they believe in isn't even personal. He created the world, "wound the clock" so to speak, and left it to its own devises. We are left alone to figure things out for ourselves. This kind of impersonal religiosity fosters the kind of check-the-box obligation that asks, "What minimum do I have to do in order to 'be in good standing' with the Church"? It is lifeless and lacking fruit. A religion without a personal God is a body without breath.
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