Priesthood and the Grace of Ordination
Combining negative approaches to life
We look at life in a positive manner if our belief in Jesus and all he taught means anything to us. Go into a hospital and give hope to those who lie waiting for a good prognosis, and accept a blessing from other friends and family. Sometimes the results of medical care are not always positive and we still support that person’s outlook of a future promised by God.
A mother expecting her child gets news that this child will have Down Syndrome or some other childbirth anomaly. What to do with a diagnosis of accepting a child whom you want to love and care for. Compare this news to a grown child who suffers from a tragic accident or disease. You still love and care for this offspring of yours no matter what has occurred in his/her life. Is there a difference between the unborn with a devastating abnormality or a grown child who also may require most of your time giving the same love to them?
One of your parents becomes afflicted with alzheimer’s disease or any of the other illnesses under the same umbrella. A choice to put them away or care as much as possible since they gave you life.
Let’s look at the possibilities that our current society adheres to, safeguarding your individual freedom and rejecting the burden of caring for one who may never be able to care for themselves. Another possibility could be one who may receive a disturbing outlook from a prognosis of a crippling existence from a hospital diagnosis. You may be the only person to make a decision. Put them away in a nursing home where very few come to visit. Of course, there are situations where that might be the best for them, but your attempted visit will have the most adhering healing for them in their unfortunate life. What if the prognosis means they will encounter a vegetative existence while that person is brain cognitive but remains in a state of inability to remain bed-ridden until death. Euthanasia becomes too easy and puts a strain on your Christian consciousness.
Far too many persons, including Catholics, have chosen abortion to ease the future of constant care for a Down-Syndrome child whose birth changes a parents life. Look at a family with a child like that, as I have on numerous situations, and you’re viewing parents sitting in as saints; disregarding their time and efforts of accepting one of God’s angels.
How many children, after reaching their golden years, are faced with an elderly parent, or in a lot of marriages, are confronted with an alzheimer’s spouse or parent and the communications becomes almost intolerable. Do we terminate the challenge of still honoring the “until death do us part” or for parents forgetting what they did for us?
You could blend any of these scenarios into a large bowl, as making a cake, and mix them together. With a cake different ingredients make something different. With these incidents of life’s unexpected problems the result will look the same. Whether it is abortion, euthanasia, a home where no one even knows the patient, or a stone-faced existence, the blend is still the same doing away with the responsibility of care and love for one of ours.
Assuredly, we do have an obligation that goes beyond; “I gave them back to God since I had nothing to do with their maladies.” There will be more accounting to what we at least attempted to do for one of these children, no matter their age or status in life, than ensuring we say our rosaries and attend church every Sunday. Are those important? Remember the parable of the Good Samaritan. Assisting one who needed immediate care before making certain to get to the temple was the important theme of this parable. We must choose the path of love that our lives encounter.
Ralph B. Hathaway, caring for the least in our life.