← The Catechism in a Year (with Fr. Mike Schmitz)
The Catechism in a Year (with Fr. Mike Schmitz)
Day 289: Family, Society, and the Kingdom (2025)
00:16:42
While family is important, the Catechism states, “The first vocation of the Christian is to follow Jesus.” This means that parents should support Christ's call for their children. Fr. Mike explains that when we deny Jesus or his teachings for the sake of our families, we are making an idol of the family. We also learn the duties of civil authorities. Today’s readings are Catechism paragraphs 2232-2237.
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Hi, my name is Fr. Mike Schmitz, and you're listening to the Catechism in a Year podcast where we encounter God's plan of sheer goodness for us revealed in Scripture and passed down through the tradition of the Catholic faith. The Catechism in Years brought to you by ascension. In 365 days, we'll read through the Catechism of the Catholic Church, discovering our identity in God's family as we journey together toward our heavenly home. This is day 289. We're reading paragraphs 2232 to 2237. As always, I'm using the Ascension Ascension edition of the Catechism, which includes the Foundations of Faith approach, but you can follow along with any recent version of the Catechism of the Catholic Church. You can also download your own catechism and year reading plan by visiting ascensionpress.com ciy and you can click Follow or subscribe in your podcast app for daily updates and daily notifications. It's day 289. We're almost at day 290. We're only one day away. I don't know if you can count like that. I just learned. Anyways, I don't know what that means. We're continuing to talk about the Fourth Commandment and talking about the family. Yesterday, if you remember, we talked about how, yes, the family is the place of. We talked about a lot of things yesterday. I understand that yesterday was a long, long day. And at the same time, it's so important. We talked about how the family's place of evangelization, it's a place of holiness, place of growth and holiness. It's also we note that in paragraph 22:30 that when they become adults, children have the right and duty to choose their profession and state in life. So parents should, yeah, weigh in and give their advice, good advice. But the children, grown children, have the right and the duty to be able to make their own decisions. Now, this is going to be important because paragraph 2232 today here has one of the. Well, I don't want to say one of the most important lines. It has a very important line. And we're talking about the goodness of the family. The family is good, Very, very good. Paragraph 2232 highlights this truth. It says, family ties are important, but not absolute. This is very important for us to understand. Family ties are important, but not absolute. And so there are times we recognize where Jesus even said this. He said, I've not come to establish peace, but the sword. He said, from now on, families will Be divided three against two, two against three. Father be divided against son, son against father, mother in law against daughter in law, daughter in law against mother in law. This is what's gonna happen. The our primary allegiance, the absolute allegiance we owe is to the Lord himself. So family ties, important but not absolute, to be a disciple of Jesus. Paragraph 2233 says, Becoming a disciple of Jesus means accepting the invitation to belong to God's family and to live in conformity with his way of life. We'll talk about that today as well as we're talking about the fact of authorities in civil society. So God's fourth commandment also enjoins us to honor all for who are good, have received authority in society from God. We'll talk about that as well. So in order to prepare our hearts for this challenging, it's always God's message is always challenging, it's always convicting, it's often consoling. But here we are. We're asking the Lord to hear our prayer, to be with us in this moment as we pray. Father in heaven, in the name of your son, Jesus Christ, I ask you to please be with every one of us. As we're listening to these words today, as we're reading these words today, please be with us. Lord God, help us to understand the true value of your good gifts, the true value of discipleship, the true value of family, the true value of the society in which that you've given us, in which you've placed us. Lord God, help us to acknowledge the goodness we've received and to acknowledge the limits of every good thing. Except for you. Because you are the source of good itself. You are the ultimate good, because you are the foundation of all being and you are love. Lord God, help us to let you, you alone be the number one. Be the center of our gravity. Be the one God in our lives. In Jesus name we pray. Amen. In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen. It is day 289. We're reading paragraphs 2232 to 2237. The family and the Kingdom Family ties are important, but not absolute. Just as the child grows to maturity and human in spiritual autonomy, so his unique vocation, which comes from God, asserts more clearly and forcefully. Parents should respect this call and encourage their children to follow it. They must be convinced that the first vocation of the Christian is to follow Jesus. As Christ himself said, he who loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me. And he who loves son or Daughter more than me is not worthy of me. Becoming a disciple of Jesus means accepting the invitation to belong to God's family, to live in conformity with his way of life. Christ further said, for whoever does the will of my Father in heaven is my brother and sister and mother. Parents should welcome and respect with joy and thanksgiving the Lord's call to one of their children to follow him in virginity for the sake of the kingdom, in the consecrated life, or in priestly ministry. The authorities in Civil society God's fourth commandment also enjoins us to honor all who for our good have received authority in society from God. It clarifies the duties of those who exercise authority as well as those who benefit from it. Duties of Civil authorities those who exercise authority should do so as a service. As Christ said, whoever would be great among you must be your servant. The exercise of authority is measured morally in terms of its divine origin, its reasonable nature, and its specific object. No one can command or establish what is contrary to the dignity of persons and the natural law. The exercise of authority is meant to give outward expression to a just hierarchy of values. In order to facilitate the exercise of freedom and responsibility by all, those in authority should practice distributive justice wisely, taking account of the needs and contribution of each with a view to harmony and peace. They should take care that the regulations and measures they adopt are not a source of temptation. By setting personal interests against that of the community. Political authorities are obliged to respect the fundamental rights of the human person. They will dispense justice humanely by respecting the rights of everyone, especially of families and the disadvantaged. The political rights attached to citizenship can and should be granted according to the requirements of the common good. They cannot be suspended by public authorities without legitimate and proportionate reasons. Political rights are meant to be exercised for the common good of the nation and the human community. All right, there we have it. Paragraphs 2232 to 2237. A bit shorter than yesterday, at least when it comes to the. To the paragraphs themselves. But let's go back to the very beginning. The family and the Kingdom, before we get to authorities in civil society. So the family and the Kingdom. I highlighted this before we even started, or as we even started. Family ties are important, but not absolute. So important, so valuable to us because we recognize this fourth commandment is highlighting the right, the highlighting the goodness of the family. And so the more we highlight the goodness of the family, the more likely we're tempted to maybe make a good thing an ultimate thing. Right to make the good thing, an idol. How many times will you have movies about like say, you know, a family that has a lot of loyalty to each other, whether that's like a criminal family or something like this. And it's because of that loyalty they have to each other. They will lie because of the loyalty they have to each other. They will enter into corruption because they're willing, unwilling to tell the truth or unwilling to disappoint or be disloyal to their family. For the sake of the good. Right? For the sake of the common good. Now we're called to allow our family to have a subservient role to the kingdom of God. What that means is that Jesus has the first claim on our lives. That's it. Jesus has first claim on our lives. If he's calling us to do something or if the church is asking us to do something, then and our family says to not do that, we can take into account the request of our family and then do what Jesus asks. I mean that's ultimately that's the case. Now this is in big things. For example, I mentioned yesterday, here is a young man who wants to go to seminary or young woman who wants to enter religious life. And their parents say, I don't want you to do that. So they don't do it. And just like that's again, backwards, completely backwards. And yet that happens a lot. But let's even say small things. So here's, here's, I, here's an example. Say I might have mentioned this example before when we talked about the Sunday obligation. But imagine there was, here's a bunch of grown up sisters and their grown up mom. So they have, and they have a sister's girls weekend, say out of town in the big city. We'll say in the big city. And it's like, is it the girls shopping weekend, you know, leading up to Thanksgiving, Christmas, whatever the thing is. So the girls shopping weekend in the big city and the one, one of the daughters is like, okay, I'm convicted, I need to go to Sunday mass. But their sister, her sisters or her mom are like, ah, no, you don't need to go to. That's inter. That's going to interrupt our plans for the weekend. That's going to interrupt our plans to, to have that. We have a schedule when it comes to shopping. We have a schedule when it comes to this weekend. And so they can even invoke family as the reason to like, hey, just go along with us. Now that daughter slash that sister, her obligation. Yes, she has an Obligation to her sisters, she has an obligation to her mom, but she has a greater obligation to the Lord. And the Lord has said, do this. And so, yes, this is going to maybe upset the apple cart, and yes, it might upset my sisters, or one's sisters might upset their mom. Yet your obligation, our first duty is to the Lord before anyone else. So in big ways, right, vocation, but also in small ways, saying, I know we're all on vacation right now, but I have to go to Mass because I know that this is the requirement that the Lord asks of me. Does that make sense? So just again, we can sometimes. I sometimes can go to the big things, like martyrdom, as opposed to the small things, the everyday things like, oh, that's right, I'm going to disappoint my family in this small way, in this immediate way. But I have to, because I belong to Jesus more than I belong to my family, as Christ himself said. And this isn't just me making this up. This isn't the church making this up. Jesus himself said, he who loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me. He who loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. You know, in a couple weeks, essentially, we'll get to the sixth commandment, a sixth and ninth commandment. When we get there, we're going to talk about sexual morality. And there are so many family people in their families who have said, okay, someone in my family is in. We might call in a euphemistic way, an irregular relationship. Now, that could be a homosexual relationship. That could be a relationship where they're divorced and remarried. But it's an irregular relationship, right? Living in a sinful state in that kind of case. And I've seen this happen where parents and siblings are saying, well, for the sake of my brother, for the sake of my sister, who is in this irregular relationship, I'm going to discount and discard the Lord's teachings. I'm going to discount and discard the Church's teachings. And this is. This happens again and again and again. For the sake of my child who is in this relationship, for the sake of my sibling who's in this relationship, I will no longer attend to God's commands when it comes to this particular area. Again, this. But what does Jesus say? Jesus said very, very clearly that for me, families will be divided. Because of me, families will be divided two against three, three against two, mother against daughter, father against son. That whole. To recognize that, yes, family ties are good, they are important, but they're not absolute. And just because I have someone in my family who may experience whatever they're experiencing, that doesn't mean that the Lord's command has changed. And it doesn't mean that now I have to choose family over the Lord. In fact, it is the exact Now I see it too often with people who are like, oh yeah, I embrace everything the Lord's teaching. I accept everything the church is teaching, except when it comes to somewhere it's connected to my family. And now I'm like, no, I'm going to choose family over Jesus. I'm going to choose family over the church. In those moments, we recognize that. What I'm choosing is I'm choosing to allow my family ties in this relationship to become an idol. It is a rival in my life to God's position in my life. Does that. I hope that makes sense. Again, I don't, as I said, I don't mean to come on too strong on this and be too pointed in my example. At the same time, I will repeat myself and say I see it too often. I see it happen happening too often to just pretend that it's not happening right now. Becoming a disciple of Jesus, as it says in paragraph 2233, becoming a disciple of Jesus means accepting the invitation to belong to God's family, to live in conformity with his way of life. For whoever does the will of my Father in heaven is my brother and sister and mother. And so that's our call right now. Paragraph 2234 moves on to talk about how this fourth commandment also extends to just authority. Right? So paragraph 2234 states, God's fourth commandment also enjoins us to honor all who for our good have received authority in society from God, clarifies the duties of those who exercise authority as well as those who benefit from it. So right away, in paragraph 2235 through 2237, there's the duties of civil authorities. So number right off the bat it says, those who exercise authority should do it as a service. And that's, that's, that's, that's clear. And let's go to this. If you desire or you are as a civil servant, if you're a public servant, you have any kind of leadership role. Those who exercise authority should do it as a service. Remember what Jesus said. Whoever would be great among you must be your servant. Jesus himself said, I did not come to be served. I came to serve and to give my life as a ransom for many. He's the model when it comes to leadership. He's the model when it comes to authority. It's an. It's the authority to serve. In fact, I'm sure every one of us has heard the phrase servant leadership. Of course that comes from. It might be, you know, kind of cliche right now, but it's still true. The authority that comes from the Lord is the authority to serve. Therefore, the exercise of authority is measured morally in terms of its divine origin. That comes from the Lord here. Secondly, its reasonable nature, and third, its specific object. No one can command or establish what is contrary to the dignity of persons and the natural law. So yes, while someone may exercise authority if what they're commanding is or they're establishing is contrary to the dignity of persons or to natural law, that is a lot that does not need to be followed, if that makes any sense. Hopefully it does. Now 2237 highlights. Political authorities are obliged to respect the fundamental rights of the human person. They will dispense justice humanely by respecting the rights of everyone, especially of families and the disadvantaged. And so keep this in mind. Political authorities, we have to observe and they have to respect the fundamental rights of the human person. The human person, the individual is greater in many ways, greater than any society at large. I've mentioned this before. Peter Craven highlighted this. Maybe this comes from CS Lewis as well. But other people have also pointed this out and that what they pointed out is that civilizations will come to an end, that countries will cease to exist. Every nation that is right now will at some point not be, but every human being will always exist forever, all the way into eternity. Every human being will exist forever, either in glory with the Lord or in. In horror in separated from the Lord because of that one individual human being in so many ways is, you can say it like this is of greater value, is of greater worth than any one nation, any one single society. Now, at the same time, all of us are part of society, right? We're all part of a nation at, at some. Some level, a community at some level. Therefore, we do ask questions about the common good. But keep this in mind, we have this intention, is that none of the commands of the common good can be a command that violates the dignity of any human person. Hopefully that makes sense. And hopefully, hopefully it makes sense. You know, today, as I said, every one of these days we're going to be challenged in some way or another. And maybe you're challenged today. I know I'm challenged today in many, many ways. Tomorrow we're going to continue to be challenged because we're not only talking about the duties of civil authorities. Tomorrow we're going to talk about the duties of citizens. Like what? What is it that you and I actually owe to our country? Our country of origin or wherever we're living right now? That is a big question, and it also could be a great challenge for many of us. But I know you're up to the challenge, and I know you're willing to ask the question and find out the answer. More on that tomorrow. Until then, I'm praying for you. Please pray for me. My name is Father Mike. I cannot wait to see you tomorrow. God bless.