Beyond The Church Door

I know a young girl who was happy and had lots of friends.  She had a Mum and a Dad and had friends in her neighbourhood she played with.  Then Dad walked out to live with another woman and her life was cruelly changed.  OK she is luckier than most that her Father takes her at weekends but the downside of this is that she does not see her friends anymore.  She is devastated by he separation of her parents.  That love which she has a right to has been denied her and she no longer is the child she once was.    Then there is the case of the child of 12 who did not believe in God for if there was a God surely her family life would have been better, she never sees her Dad and she is now fostered from her Mother.   These are a couple of stories I know but many schoolteachers will tell you that they sometimes have to pick up the pieces of a child at school who has gone from a happy bright little thing to a lonely an unachieving one.   And every year the number of these children is increasing and indeed in many schools the number of children still living with their natural parents is in the minority.      Little wonder with their experience marriage is for the minority of couples and when things go wrong a quick exit from just a relationship is so much easier.  Who knows what they could have achieved if that part of them which needed love to mature had been fulfilled.
Let me on the other hand tell you about my grandchildren.   They are young, they are bright, and their   achievements and their potential are inspiring.   They have two parents who are faithful to each other, they have two sets of grandparents who dote on them; they have all the love in the world.
All this happens beyond the church door, all this suffering of children and heartache of broken families.  Does the Church care?   On the absence of any evidence to the contrary the answer must be No.   And certainly that is the opinion of those who have suffered.   "But when they come t us we do care.  We show them love and understanding.  We help them to their feet.  How dare you insult us!".  But the majority do not come to Church and certainly the Church does not come to them, yet the Church will dare to speak of Evangelisation in such a way that it seems a great idea until you ask what it is talking about.  It is just an 'in' word.   Then of course we have priests telling us that marriage is just an ideal.  What an inspiration they are!
Yet the family remains the school of love.  What Christ Himself taught.   Children maturing in love through the love of a husband and wife.  Growing up themselves to feel save and be mature in love.  Society has broken down because love has broken down in the family.
But there is a Synod of the Family taking place in October where we hope we can start as Catholics repairing the damage.  The Bishop is trying hard at a Diocesan level to stir up interest but what is your parish doing.  Perhaps those in charge just do no want to do anything Catholic?