I recently wrote a reflection on how my faith with God the Father helps me become a better dad.
We are very privileged to have a faith in which God seeks us out actively and passionately rather than the other way around. To say we have a God who loves us is an understatement – We have a Father who is MADLY and lavishly in love with us, his children. As Jesus reminds us in his farewell discourse to his disciples in John 15:9, “Just as the Father has loved me, so I also have loved you…” we too as children of God the Father partake in that divine and filial love which enables us to receive the grace to be Christian witnesses in our daily lives.
To me, I see this clearly manifested in my relationship with my son. My relationship with my Father in Heaven enables me to be a better father here on earth. Throughout sacred scripture, particularly in the Old Testament, we see God the Father performing Fatherly duties and fathering his children, preparing their hearts and disciplining them along the way. What captures me most about God the Father though is His abounding mercy and willingness to forgive and embrace his children and his magnanimity with his children. I find this an exemplary showcase of true fatherhood and its something I aspire to be with my son as he begins his nascent journey in life.
But being a dad in today’s day and age is not easy. The excessive comforts that we subscribe to hinders our ability to develop and strengthen virtues that enable us to be great parents. We are tempted to outsource every part of our lives, and that includes the day-to-day mundane parental responsibilities in vain attempts to pursue “higher value” activities that society has lured us into believing would bring us happiness.
It takes a copious amount of wisdom, prayer, and fortitude to make the necessary sacrifices and effort required to be a good catholic father and to love my son the way I am loved by my Father. This definitely calls for some supernatural support and I feel very blessed that I can always lean on my super role model, my Father in heaven, who unconditionally gives me the grace I need to be a great father. In my short time as a dad, I have learned that this process is a long journey but I know God is using His grace to chisel me to make the father I was meant to be to my son and future children.
