Sermon: "Family Values"

The incessant march of political correctness together with the preoccupation with individual personal rights has served to undermine the value of the family on virtually every front within British society in recent years. The problems caused by the lack of family values are all around us to see in terms of crime, disorder and a general demise in community life and responsibility. The recent controversy over the government policy to insist that adoption agencies must not “discriminate” against couples who may not conform to the ideal of “family” as understood through a particular faith tradition is, I feel, yet another example of how “family” continues to be undermined. However much the politicians argue that their primary concern is for the interest of the child – it seems to me that the furore over this issue has much more to do with the rights of civil partnerships than it has to do with the best environment in which to nurture children. Following the current trend I am disturbed enough to wonder if the government will soon be legislating to re-write the Bible and the Creeds!  

As the introduction to the marriage service declares:

God calls men and women to the married state so that their love may be made holy in life-long union; that they may bring up their children to grow in grace and learn to love him; and that they may honour, help and comfort one another both in prosperity and adversity. 

The Christian tradition continues to maintain that this is the ideal for family life. Of course, we do not live in an ideal world – there are all sorts of complexities and difficulties surrounding issues of relationship and sexuality. We know it to be the case that many “unconventional” relationships can be affirming, uplifting, supportive, kind and loving and many “conventional” ones can be stifling, fearful, harsh, spiteful and cruel. Where human relationships are concerned things are rarely black and white but rather differing shades of grey.  

Bearing these complexities in mind the Church must always strive to be a “family” of inclusion and not exclusion. The Church must guard against prejudice and prayerfully be open to diversity of views and lifestyles which may be outside our personal experience. Tensions and differences of opinion occur within the best of families. We do well to recognize that the best family actually proves itself to be so by its very ability to hold together despite the difficulties. 

Good Friday reminds us how Jesus Christ was broken on the cross out of love for each one of us. As a Church family we recognize that we are a broken people travelling together, sometimes stumbling and faltering in the confusion of our lives.  

But does this mean that we can no longer hold any ideals or values?  

Easter reminds us that we are also people who travel in the hope of achieving our ultimate healing and restoration through the same Jesus Christ who rose to a new and transformed life. Being a follower of Jesus, as St. Paul says, is about striving in faith towards this goal (Phil. 3:12-21). The church, while welcoming all and recognizing its own brokenness, must surely continue to promote and work towards its ideal – the goal of new life and transformation through God’s love.  

Mothering Sunday is an excellent opportunity for affirming “family values” in terms of our own personal families and also in terms of the wider Church family. Ideally, both promote the values of care and nurture, the provision of stability and strength, all bound together and held fast within a selfless and self-giving love.   

One of the fundamental aspects of the mission of the Church must be to continue to affirm the value of the family as the ideal for the ordering and stability of society. This is because the ideal of mutual love is, we believe, the very nature of God as Trinity – Father, Son and Holy Spirit.

Written by the Rev. Huw Butler for the Llanbedr Parish Magazine, Sunday 18th March 2007.