Source: Orthodox Online Network
October 17, 2024
In Christianity in particular, the family structure does not constitute a system of life, but its purpose and way of living. Life in Christianity is not the life of an individual. Because, from our anthropological point of view, human life cannot exist alone. “It is not good for man to be alone. Let us make for him a helper for him.” These are the first words of the Holy Bible. Christianity is a religion of individualism. Do not look at man as an animal entity seeking his daily livelihood within the framework of birth, growth, and death alone. Life for Christianity is the personal relationship, without which what the book says applies to life: “What does it benefit a person if he gains the whole world and loses his own soul?” And “his soul” here does not mean his livelihood, but “his life with others,” that is, his personality. By a word that is very specific and comprehensive in Christianity, by “himself” we mean here his spiritual life as a person with God and neighbor. This is what it means
Some of our theological statements, which sometimes seem to some to be like rigid statements, are, on the contrary, a common and living human experience for all people, such as, for example, “Salvation is not individual.”
We do not treat the “family issue” Christianly as we merely study a social structure. Because the “family”, in its deep and comprehensive Christian concept, is the goal of the divine creation of man and is the final form to which all humanity must reach in the end. It is not merely a form of human ties, which we can change with circumstances to reach another human goal. The ultimate human goal is to build a family, a family between husband, wife and children, and a comprehensive human family. In both families, God is the true father. This theory does not seem ideal to us! On the contrary, the disintegration of some family aspects, in our opinion, is due to the fact that this natural family bond does not develop towards this spiritual family. Perhaps all the disintegration and problems that we observe today are merely a gestation that rejects ideas in the current family structures and constitutes the beginning of the birth of the true family that God the Father takes care of. We hope that this will be the case, or at least let us strive to build the family spiritually.
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