The Domestic Church

The ideal for the family is that the household is meant to be a Domestic Church. This teaching is found throughout the documents of the Vatican Council II, as well as throughout the teaching of John Paul II. Pope Benedict XVI has also picked up on this thread and speaks about this very important understanding of the mission and vocation of Marriage and Family. For one to understand what the image of the ‘Church of the Home’ is meant to be, we need only look at the life of our Mother, the Church. The Church is a reflection of the life of the family and the family is a revelation of the Family Plan of God in the Church. We see a very basic Family Plan in what God, in Christ, has established in the Church, and this has three basic pillars, which are simply the three Theological Virtues: Faith, Hope and Love.

Faith – Evangelization and Catechesis
When we encounter the Gospel and embrace it, we grow to a vibrant faith that is an inspiration to the whole Church. By challenging each other to be heroically faithful to Christ, the response can be a powerful witness to the joy that comes from living a life of vigorous, active faith. The important aspect of this pillar is that the faith is transmitted to our children, and continually grows in the family. As the Baptismal ritual makes clear, parents are called to be “the first teachers of [their] children in the ways of faith. “Leading them to a deeper knowledge and love of the Catholic faith will assist parents to “be the best of teachers, bearing witness to the faith in all the say and do, in Christ Jesus our Lord.” This happens by continuing evangelization and catechesis in the family as well as ongoing conversion of life.

Hope – Family Prayer and Prayer of the Church
The focus is on the liturgical life of the Faith, with the Eucharist as the center. What we celebrate is our hope, the certain promise of life forever with God. We celebrate this hope through the Sacraments, which can be seen as a celebration of the life of a family: Baptism is birth; Eucharist is the family table; Reconciliation is the forgiveness lived in every family; Confirmation being that rite of passage to full adulthood in the Catholic Family with its gifts and responsibilities; Anointing of the Sick that points to the healing process in family life; Holy Orders and Marriage showing the relationship we have with God.

Charity – Works of Mercy
This is the outreach we do as a community of faith. This is where the Corporal and Spiritual Works of Mercy are accomplished. To live out the full call of holiness within the life of the family, doing works of social justice is an essential part. Families who live a dynamic home life as the Domestic Church will bring true freedom, peace and joy to their children, and at the same time transform the world by their witness. This is possible for every family because of the power of God. It is never too late to begin the Family Plan of God at home.

Some reflections on the meaning and mission of the family from the popes and the Church documents:

“Thus the little domestic Church, like the greater Church, needs to be constantly and intensely evangelized: hence its duty regarding permanent education in the faith.”
(John Paul II - Familiaris Consortio, 51)

“The Church prays for the Christian family and educates the family to live in generous accord with the priestly gift and role received from Christ the High Priest. In effect, the baptismal priesthood of the faithful, exercised in the sacrament of marriage, constitutes the basis of a priestly vocation and mission for the spouses and family by which their daily lives are transformed into “spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ”(1Pt. 2:5). This transformation is achieved not only by celebrating the Eucharist and the other sacraments and through offering themselves to the glory of God, but also through a life of prayer, through prayerful dialogue with the Father, through Jesus Christ, in the Holy Spirit. Family prayer has its own characteristic qualities. It is prayer offered in common, husband and wife together, parents and children together. Communion in prayer is both a consequence of and a requirement for the communion bestowed by the sacraments of Baptism and Matrimony. The words with which the Lord Jesus promises His presence can be applied to the members of the Christian family in a special way: “Again I say to you, if two of you agree on earth about anything they ask, it will be done for them by my Father in heaven. For where two or three are gathered in my name, there am I in the midst of them”(Mt. 18:19-20). Family prayer has for its very own object family life itself, which in all its varying circumstances is seen as a call from God and lived as a filial response to His call. Joys and sorrows, hopes and disappointments, births and birthday celebrations, wedding anniversaries of the parents, departures, separations and homecomings, important and far-reaching decisions, the death of those who are dear, etc. – all of these mark God’s loving intervention in the family’s history. They should be seen as suitable moments for thanksgiving, for petition, for trusting abandonment of the family into the hands of their common Father in heaven. The dignity and responsibility of the Christian family as the domestic Church can be achieved only with God’s unceasing aid, which will surely be granted if it is humbly and trustingly petitioned in prayer.”
(John Paul II - Familiaris Consortio, 59)

“Let us not forget that Christian marriage is a vocation to holiness in the full sense of the word, and that the example of holy parents is the first condition favorable for the flowering of priestly and religious vocations.”
(Benedict XVI - World Day of Prayer for Vocations,May 7, 2006)

For more on the role of the Christian family, see “Familiaris Consortio.”