How to Love Your Difficult Parents

when i have a just a parent who is dishonorable when i have uh when i'm emancipated from my parents how do i interact with them and when they get old what am i called to do for them hi my name is father mike schmitz and this is ascension presents i've been asked a lot recently what do i do as a grown child an adult child of my parents because i get it when i was a kid fourth commandment really big deal and you honor thy father and mother got it um no problem but now that i'm an adult i find myself in two categories one is what if my parents are says honor my father and mother under thy father and mother what if my parents are actually acting in a dishonorable way question number one and secondly okay now as as an adult do i have different obligations do i have a different way that i interact with my parents when it comes to that commandment the fourth commandment honor that father and mother and i think wow those are really that's a really great question i remember as a kid hearing that commandment you know the fourth commandment honor that father and mother my teachers would say that means you obey your parents and of course being the smart alec in class i would say things like what if my parents asked me to like rob a bank or something like this and they would say okay important caveat we only obey our parents when they're asking us to do good things we don't have to obey our parents when they're asking us to do something evil okay back to our story what happens a if my parents are dishonorable b as an adult child do my responsibilities change so great great question first what if my parents are uh not acting in an honorable way what if my parents are actually um they were poor parents they were bad parents and they couldn't they continue to be bad parents they treat me poorly they treat my siblings poorly maybe they treat your spouse poorly or your grant or their grandchildren your children poorly or just even people in general poorly maybe their life they have not been the kind of parent that they should have been what do i do then how do i honor them i i think it's important to note we've made a video about this a while back about when it comes to um the kind of respect that is owed and kind of in the end the kind of respect that is earned if you think about it like this in three categories there's the first kind of respect and that is given to everybody and that is the respect that is based off of the dignity of the human person the the fact that they're made in god's image and likeness it's just theirs that's the respect that they're given automatically secondly is the respect that's connected to the person's role in my life and they might not be an honorable person a respectable person but the role they have i respect the role here so i respect the role of my teachers i respect the role of our elected officials i respected the role of my priest or i expect all of our parents like again the individual themselves might not be honorable but i will do what i need to do in order to respect the role that they occupy and the third part is the individual like the respect owed to the individual now there is no respect owed to the individual there's only the respect that the individual earns on that level right okay how do we navigate this well we have the sense that here's my parent and they're not an honorable person they're not a respectable person when it comes to that third category as an individual they don't have they did not have virtue they did not have a good character um they maybe have abandoned or maybe they betrayed maybe um all i mean it goes it's pretty bad and i in the most intimate relationship in so many ways between parents and children this this that should be good it should be healthy when it's not it is devastating it's absolutely horrible and horribly devastating if they haven't acted in an honorable way i can still respect them that's the respect owed to them as a human being maybe god's image and likeness okay fine um and i can respect the role that they didn't live up to and i can give honor what kind of honor well actually at the baseline it might look like this it would look like avoiding dishonor it would mean avoiding uh treating them the way they treated me it would mean avoiding uh gossip it would mean avoiding detraction it might mean avoiding um all those behaviors that would tear them down you know it doesn't mean i necessarily need to build them up and that might be a call that we have as a christian is to love our enemies and it could very well be that your your parents um have actually made themselves your enemy because of the way that they treated you over the course of your life that is very possible and even then right we're called to love our enemies just the very fact that there are parents adds a complexity to it and neither disqualifies them nor does it give them any more claim to our honor especially if they in and as a person have acted in a dishonorable or even uh devastating destructive way but we can we can honor the fact that yep they've given me the gift of life um even if nothing else the first part would be it means avoiding elements of acting in ways of dishonor but also would look like this what happens a lot of times is here become is an abusive relationship here is someone who finds themselves as a as an as an adult child looking at the parent thinking um my parents my parents or my parents they live in such a way that it's destructive to themselves it's abusive to the people around them and in that case what would what would love look like and the answer in so many ways is love would not enable them to do this and so it doesn't always mean saying yes it doesn't it doesn't mean obeying in fact the catechism goes on to say that um while when the adult child is the kind of the second half of the question when the adult child becomes emancipated essentially when you're independent of your parents then you no longer need to obey your parents when you become emancipated from your parents essentially you no longer need to obey your parents but you must always respect them again respecting them human dignity respecting their role and if they're honorable respecting their character but you no longer need to obey them so you can actually say no you can actually even say no to things that they're asking for that uh are very important but aren't good for them for example any kind of enabling behavior could be important but it would not be good for them for example there are maybe more specific example um i know of cases where there have been people who have said uh hey my my dad is calling because he uh needs money for rent or he's gonna get kicked out of his apartment um but i know that he spends all his all of his money on alcohol and drugs and i have constantly tried to get him into rehab or get him into some kind of place where he could get back on his feet and he refuses what do i do if i don't give him this money he might be out on the streets that could be it now i'm not saying this is the automatic answer but it could that could be a situation where you actually let him hit rock bottom you let him not have enough money for his rent that would could be could be an act of love that could be actually honoring the the fourth commandment which is to honor thy father and mother why because enabling isn't honoring to enable someone in their bad behavior is not honoring and you do not have to do that that is so so critically important i can love someone i can respect them i can honor them their role their human dignity and still not give them what they want even if that person is my mom or dad even if that person says but i gave you everything yes but hopefully as a good parent they didn't enable your bad behavior and so you as a good child would also not enable their bad behavior so any kind of enabling uh relationship would be something that we would need to absolutely avoid the case also not just of like any enabling behavior but your parent uh doesn't get to choose your vocation for you this is a kind of a critical thing your parent does not get to tell you um what your vocation is we as adults hopefully if there's a good relationship where you trust the wisdom of your mom or dad or mom and dad that you would ask them for their advice that you might ask them for their input or their counsel but they don't get to say you can't be a priest you can't be a nun you can't get married they don't get to say that in fact i it it's crazy to me it like boggles my mind how many young people i know who uh their vocational path has been thwarted by their parents who didn't want their son to go to the seminary they didn't want their daughter to go to the convent is this fear of of losing their child it's a fear of maybe even a difficult life then again i say i say okay yes uh it can be difficult to be a priest for your life it can be difficult to be a religious brother or religious sister in your life but also have you seen what marriage looks like marriage is also a pretty difficult vocation all of the vocations every vocation every christian vocation has its difficulties but every vocation is a call to come follow jesus and die in those cases you would still owe them honor still owe them the respect that's due to them but you don't need to do what they say last note here's the thing the scriptures and the catechism also say but in their old age you must also do what you can to care for them that's the thing is like we're like oh i don't have to do all these things yeah but when you become an adult and become independent and become stable if that's your place in life then the roles get reversed and our call is as christians is to care for our elderly parents is to care for them like they cared for us when we were children and unable to take care of ourselves the catechism hammers this away and because the scripture does too makes it very very clear that to the degree that an adult child is able they are obligated they're called by god they're actually even placed in this in this position by god to take care of their parents as they're able now sometimes you don't we don't we're not able sometimes someone needs 24-hour care sometimes it's just it's beyond our capacity but we have to do what we can to care for those parents that it's not just the call of uh i could do whatever i want now because i don't have to obey you but it's the call of love we have a high call in the christian life and we do what we can we don't do we can anyways that's all i got here for today promise here at ascension presents my name is father mikey god bless

Channel: Ascension Presents

Views: 109,081

Keywords: Fr. Mike, Fr. Mike Schmitz, Ascension Presents, Ascension, Ascension Youtube, Ascension Press, Father Mike Schmitz, Fr. Mike advice, Father Mike advice, fr. mike schmidt, parenting, parents, honor your parents, honor thy mother and father, family relationships, aging parents, adult children, toxic relationships, toxic parents, toxic mother, toxic father, emotional abuse from parents, toxic family

Id: gVai_DcgZTM

Length: 10min 15sec (615 seconds)

Published: Wed May 05 2021