Recently, Daniel P Horan, a columnist with the National Catholic Reporter, wrote about his experience of leaving the Franciscan Order and “retiring” from the priesthood.
He was treated decently by the leadership within the Order as he went through the process of separation.
He acknowledges the blessing this was and how his experience has not been that of most of those who left religious life, whose treatment was anything but Christian.
Given that religious life is one form of family, it set me thinking about the term “family values”.
Unpacking a loaded phrase
“Family values” is a slogan often deployed as a bulwark against social change in a way that presupposes its meaning is obvious and it is good for one and all. It very often has the whiff of religion about it, with more than a little smug self-righteousness.
But it has many unspoken assumptions that require excavation. What are the values being claimed?
Are they those that offer roots to anchor us in a solid grounding but also wings to fly, to find our own path? Are they the values that cede control as we grow into maturity or do they cling to power and infantilise adults?
Tribal or inclusive?
Are they tribal and exclusive like the religious congregations who made those who left feel deep and abiding shame for their honest discernment?
Are they the values that cherish all the children equally, or those that exclude on the basis of gender orientation, often leading to poor mental health, homelessness and heightened risk of suicide?
Are they the values that often see a single parent end up in poverty, but enable people to feel heroic when fighting for children’s rights and welfare for the nine months in utero?
The kingdom of God is like a mustard seed, which is the smallest of all seeds on earth.
Mark 4:31-32
Yet when planted, it grows
and becomes the largest of all garden plants,
with such big branches
that the birds can perch in its shade.
A gospel measure of family
I feel more disposed to the family values that reflect Jesus’ attitude in the gospels. If family values espoused the inclusiveness of the mustard tree that has room for all the birds of the air, then they would be worth appropriating.
If they had the expansiveness of Jesus as to whom he regarded as his mother, his brothers and his sisters, then I could sign up to them.
Naming what we mean
Rather than the indiscriminate use of the phrase “family values” with an expectation that it has a clear meaning, perhaps its advocates, religious and political, would clearly articulate what they understand by it.
Is it being tribal and insular, huddling behind ideological fences or is it the mustard tree with a place for all-comers, in all their wonderful diverse humanity?
The distinction is critically important.
- Angela Hanley studied theology as a mature student, graduating in 2010. In 2015 she completed a research MA on Catholic same-sex relationships. She is currently undertaking PhD studies. She has published many articles and two books, Whose a la Carte Menu?: Exploring Catholic Themes in Context and What happened to Fr Sean Fagan?