In Year of Family, be grateful for all who build Church

To mark the fifth year anniversary of his apostolic exhortation, Amoris Laetitia, the Joy of Love, Pope Francis has designated March 19, 2021 through June 26, 2022 as the Year of the Family. This year, which will end on the occasion of the X World Meeting of Families in Rome, will be a time to reflect on and bear witness to family love.

Calling it one of the “first fruits of Amoris Laetitia Family Year,” Pope Francis announced the institution of a Church-wide celebration of World Day for Grandparents and the Elderly to pay tribute to them for the wisdom that they offer to society. The inaugural celebration will be held this year on the fourth Sunday of July, close to the liturgical memorial of Saints Joachim and Anne, who were the grandparents to Jesus and the parents of the Blessed Mother.

At 5 p.m. on March 25, 2021, the Feast of the Annunciation, Bishop Checchio was scheduled to celebrate a special Mass to honor our seniors for their faithfulness especially during this past year of the pandemic at the Cathedral of St. Francis of Assisi, Metuchen, (with limited seating and also live-streamed). The Annunciation is a time to reflect on Our Lady’s generous response to God’s invitation. It can also be an opportunity to be reminded that our elderly brothers and sisters have lived a life of “fiat” and in their golden years are profound witnesses of saying “yes” to God over and over again.

Over this past year, the pandemic experience has truly highlighted the central role of the family as the domestic church. In many cases, we can recognize and appreciate the role of grandparents and older family members now more than ever. While families with young children struggle to manage remote learning and full-time jobs, older family members have been able to help by assisting with school work, offering financial support and providing wisdom, advice and love. They also offer silent prayers and often help to pass on the faith by their daily witness to the Gospel. As Pope Francis states, “they can be actors in an evangelizing pastoral care, privileged witnesses of God’s faithful love.”

Sadly, the pandemic has brought many challenges for older adults as well. Some of those who are forced to stay home to protect their health are experiencing isolation and loneliness. The pandemic has also put a damper on meeting new grandbabies, guiding adult children in parenting and the social benefits of being with grandchildren. However, while older adults are especially vulnerable physically during the coronavirus pandemic, they are also notably resilient psychologically, calling upon a lifetime of experience, perspective and faith to help them through these difficult times.

From his own experience of growing old, Pope St. John Paul II shared a moving “Letter to the Elderly” (1999), just five and half years before his death. In it, he expresses his spiritual closeness to older adults as he shares and cherishes the experiences, beauty, agony and dignity of growing old and drawing closer to God. The letter also describes the many splendid images of elderly people found throughout the Bible, citing examples in Scripture “to remind us that at every stage in life the Lord asks each of us to contribute what talents we have.”

While many of our seniors are still active and able to contribute their talents in the faith community, others, due to diminished health, are unable to participate in their customary ways. One of the greatest gifts Pope St. John Paul II gave us in his final years was the courage he showed in letting us see his infirmity. He served as a living testimony to the dignity of the human person in sickness and in health as well as in aging.

I have personally witnessed the deep faith of those older adults in our communities that are frail and/or sick. A few months before the pandemic began, I started attending a Communion Service at my father’s assisted living residence. Dad, who suffered from Parkinson’s disease as well as dementia, would join about 50 other residents in the common area each Sunday to hear the Gospel. While most members of the community were physically or mentally diminished, it became clear to me that they still treasured their faith. Each Sunday, the facility was filled with prayers and hymns — like a choir of angels. At one point, I was asked to help distribute Communion each week. What an honor it was to place the sacred host into their frail hands and say those sacred words, “The Body of Christ.”

In “Amoris Laetitia”` (191), Pope Francis urges, “We must reawaken the collective sense of gratitude, of appreciation, of hospitality, which makes the elderly feel like a living part of the community.” As we begin this Year of the Family let us express our profound gratitude for the many ways in which faithful and generous older Catholics have built — and continue to build — the Church. Let us find ways to affirm and challenge older people, acknowledging both the blessings and the losses of later life and recognizing that interdependence, not independence, is the true Gospel value.

Ruggiero is secretary, diocesan Secretariat for Family and Pastoral Life