Law

One of the things I have been thinking about recently is the importance of laws. 

Apostle Paul (Roman Bonchuk)

The early to middle part of the Twentieth Century was a truly terrible time.  It was during this time that Fascism and Nazism and Communism were in full force.  And there were terrible atrocities committed.  Six million Jewish people were murdered under the rule of Hitler in Nazi Germany, ten million Russian people were murdered under the rule of Stalin in Communist Russia.  And millions more people were killed in World War II, which followed the first World War.  In Fact, over twenty-two million people died as a result of the First World Way and then a mere twenty years later over forty million people died as a result of the Second World War.

It was truly a terrible time in the history of the world.  Such terrible suffering, death and destruction.

One of the things I have been thinking about recently is the importance of laws.  Really, the Second World War was caused (at least in part) by unjust laws that were triggered by events following the First World War.  And after this trigger, the first thing the new, non-democratic governments did was change the remaining laws regarding marriage and children.  There was a breakdown and an attack on family.  Children and spouses were encouraged to betray each other and report each other to government to allow the government to take control of the values being taught within the family…

In “The Forge”, Saint Josemaria says, at 104, “In national life there are two things which are really essential: the laws concerning marriage and the laws to do with education. In these areas God's sons have to stand firm and fight with toughness and fairness, for the sake of all mankind.”

As a family – and we are all part of some family somewhere – we are asked to share in the creative power of God and to “mould” or “create” a world where in cooperation with the Holy Spirit we are able to influence those in our families so that we can help them to develop into authentic Christians…

Saint Josemaria write in “Christ is Passing By” at 27, “Parents should find time to spend with their children, to talk with them. They are the most important thing — more important than business or work or rest. In their conversations, parents should make an effort to listen, to pay attention, to understand, to recognize the fact that their children are sometimes partly right — or even completely right — in some of their rebellious attitudes. At the same time, they should help their children to direct their efforts and to carry out their projects properly, teaching them to consider things and to reason them out. It is not a matter of imposing a line of conduct, but rather of showing the human and supernatural motives for it. In a word, parents have to respect their children’s freedom, because there is no real education without personal responsibility, and there is no responsibility without freedom.”

And it is humbling to think that is some small way inside my home, perhaps inside my very kitchen, I am talking to people in a way that might just change the laws and one day change the world.  THAT is the power of the Holy Spirit!

For with prayer, I stand on Holy Ground where everything is clear. Here. At the Foot of the Cross.