Two young local workmen were asked, ‘What is Fatherhood?’. The immediate response of the first was “someone who will be there for his children”, although he did not have that experience growing up. He said a role model could serve in this way also. He, a father of a three-year-old, said fatherhood changes one’s whole world!
The second workman spoke about the father being the backbone of the family, the provider. Both sadly agreed that everybody knows when Mother’s Day is, but Father’s Day is often forgotten.
The sacrifice of flesh and the shedding of blood is what our Lord Jesus did for love of us. Jesus said that when we look at Him, we see the Father (Jn 14:7).
We are all called to love as God loves. A woman’s call to love, when reflected upon in a Theology of the Body online seminar, could be considered something tangible which has to do with her sacrifice of flesh and shedding of blood through her menstrual period for the sake of childbearing.
Do men, however, have to sacrifice their flesh and shed blood as women do for the sake of childbearing? Yes, in a way they do.
In the Old Testament, God made a covenant with Abraham promising him many children, “you will be the father of many nations” (Gen 17:4). In an online talk, well-known US presenter Christopher West recounted, that in order to have many offspring, God instructed Abraham about the sign of that covenant with God, namely circumcision (www.youtube.com/watch?v=LAYXOgHzUHA&t=717s). West purported that the “essence of masculine identity is to remember the love of God”. Circumcision was the sign given because at that time, men had forgotten about what it means to image God’s sacrificial love.
Men are called to be the image of God’s love on this Earth. We no longer circumcise in our Christian tradition; however, the call to love ‘sacrificially’ remains. West said we need to have a “circumcised heart” to remember the love of God and to give divine love.
To love responsibly, St Pope John Paul II noted that “tenderness is an important factor in love” (206, Love and Responsibility). “Tenderness is the ability to feel with and for the whole person, to feel even the most deeply hidden spiritual tremors, and always to have in mind the true good of that person” (207).
Wives expect tenderness from husbands. “Without the virtue of moderation, without chastity and self-control it is impossible so to educate and develop tenderness that it does not harm love but serves it” (206).
In other words, to expand their ability to be tender toward women, men need to practise moderation, chastity, and self-control. Men are responsible for the ways they show tenderness. Using the ‘raw materials’ of love, such as ‘feelings’, seriously endangers the true good of love.
Love should continually begin again, continually grow. By just focusing on the raw materials of love, “deriving only a fleeting pleasure from them”, love will “be forever breaking off and stopping short” (2006). How many women love St Pope John Paul II and his interpretation of the Gospel? Numerous!
We invite all husbands and husbands-to-be, to learn the Billings Ovulation Method® with their wives and fiancées.
Gentlemen, in the letter of St Paul to the Ephesians, we learn that our Lord wants husbands to “love their wives as their own bodies”, therefore as much as you love your body, you ought to love your wife.
We invite you to come and learn this method of family planning and preserving her health with your wives. As followers of Jesus Christ, we are called to LOVE as God loves. The human person is made for love and not to be used like a thing or an object. This Method is Love!
BOMA-TT Tel: 384-1659, Email: billingstt@gmail.com, Website: www.billingstt.com