What is family? Between 1945 and 1970 an American might well answer, “mom, dad, 2.4 children, related by blood and living under the same roof. It was a safe time. The war had ended and those who fought and won the victory for the USA were home and reentering the workforce. However, the winds of change had already brought a revolution in the day to day life in the American family. Many women had helped staff a much–depleted home work force during the war. Life would never be the same. Many women enjoyed the opportunity to earn their own income, to work outside of the home. As the 50’s and 60’s wore on, family began to be defined by a broader, less restrictive, understanding, and mom, pop, and 2.4 children began to be less common. Divorce was losing the social curse of former years and women, as well as men were seeking their “bliss,” as the noted mythologist, Joseph Campbell would say.
After the war, family broadened to include the illegitimate progeny of service men and women and possibly, the partner to whom they might or might not be married. The younger generations pushed the envelope further, as is their wont to do, and we found ourselves in the 1960s and the notion of “family” really got expanded. Of course, some have had difficulty accepting these new, changing realities. This IS a family. That IS NOT a family. All the while, the institution of “family” was vibrant and growing even through its own metamorphosis. “The family is doomed.” Yet, millions of us are a part of families and they do not seem doomed. Perhaps a way of life is doomed and perhaps it should be. After all, regardless of how loudly we protest, the 50s and 60s are over. We can spend our life mourning the demise or we can seek a common ground and thereby embrace this institution of family, which is equally strong today, in 2006.
We now have a growing number of single-parent families. Families do not stop being families due to the divorce or death of one member. Reconfigured, yes, but still a family. You may think this is pretty intuitive and wonder what I am saying. Looking at the world from a life-long “single” perspective, I feel very much part of family; those to whom I am related by blood; and the church family where I have belonged for 36 years.
There is so much diversity in family life, even within our own church. How can we learn to embrace a new value system that will allow our thinking to grow to a more-inclusive vision of our world?
The answer is having a genuine desire to listen and hear those with whom you disagree. We each have to struggle and look beyond our own prejudices and seek that innate goodness that is in most human beings. If we would look for what is good rather than what is bad, the same tally (half-full or half-empty) can produce vastly different results. It is not easy to look for the good, especially when the media seems to be an eternal presentation of the bad.
That brings us right back to family. What is family? Who is my family? Who is your family.
Who is Y-OUR family?
. . . Mark Scott, November 21, 2006, revised October 2012