Loving Our Universal Family

What does it mean to truly treat one another as “sisters and brothers” in Christ? This is a question that I have reflected on deeply over the last year and a half during the COVID-19 pandemic. To call someone a sister or brother, is a very intentional title and should not be used lightly. Likewise, there is a special relationship between family members, a responsibility to be present and care for one another, when it is easy and even more so when it is difficult. I am very thankful to say that I have been blessed with a family of people in addition to my immediate bloodline who have treated me with this form of care and undeserving love. And although I had heard it hundreds of times before, it was not until a random night during the height of quarantine when God opened my eyes to see how every single person around the world is called to be treated with this same type of familial love. A radical love that has mothers lifting cars off of babies and fathers running out to prodigal sons (Lk. 15:20). While God could have easily created humans as individual beings, He instead made us live in community and be utterly reliant on one another, just as a family is. 

Unfortunately, after taking a step back to reflect, I found that I was not living out this call to treat everyone as family. Actually, I felt that I and many others were completely failing at it. If each person is to be treated as “sister and brother” then how could I be sitting back in my privileged life not doing anything to help all those who were experiencing extreme poverty, homelessness, malnutrition, dehydration, forced migration, and a multitude of other life threatening conditions? I recognized that if one of my four siblings were in any one of those positions that I would do anything and everything to help them out of it, so then why wasn’t I and the Church doing that for the rest of our universal family? 

Of course I knew that there were plenty of charities and organizations out there trying to accomplish these goals, but I was overwhelmed by how little I felt the Church was doing to protect and care for the Body of Christ. After many helpful conversations, the research of a few encyclical letters, and the review of terms I had learned in my Engaging Catholicism course, I landed on the concept of Catholic Social Teaching (CST). The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops describes this well, stating that CST is “a rich treasure of wisdom about building a just society and living lives of holiness amidst the challenges of modern society.” CST is founded in seven themes including: dignity of the human person, family and community participation, rights and responsibilities, preferential option for the poor and vulnerable, dignity of the worker and workers rights, solidarity, and care for God’s creation. Now while skimming these quickly they all seem to be good and dandy goals, but when they are truly analyzed and recognized as the heart of the gospel and what each Christian is called to live out, they have the ability to stop everything in their tracks and break down each of the norms we hold in our lives.

 I have been happily surprised to find that there are a multitude of encyclical letters that focus on how to realistically live out these principles, even though they may be incredibly countercultural, controversial, bipartisan, and overall uncomfortable to face. However, Jesus did not call us to comfort and I am honestly so thankful for this challenge that God has given us as a Christian family to radically love even when it may seem against the norm or go against our best interests. 

To conclude, I want to say thank you to all the friends who have journeyed with me as I have struggled to find the “right” way of living out these principles in my own life, and for showing me that there is not one, but many ways to fulfill this call. So I encourage each of you to sit with these teachings and see how they align with your life. They may seem intimidating at first, but trust me, if a girl whose favorite food is steak can start incorporating tofu into her diet as the smallest way to care for our common home, then there are no limits to what you can do too.