The most important and primal social unit is the family. The human condition is intrinsically familial; hence the greatest variety and degree of human emotions are experienced in and through the family. It is for this reason that the breakdown of society is always coterminous with the breakdown of the nuclear family.
In once sense it is odd, given the importance of the family, that it would be so denigrated by the secular world. But on a closer look, the roots of this hatred begin to surface. The family is deeply and uniquely Trinitarian; with its three constituents: father, mother, and child. The Trinity is the foundation for not only the family, but love—it is the cornerstone of all romance. It is the first and only real love story.
The world hates the Trinity, and as a byproduct begins to hate the family. Yet they are smitten with the idea of love and romance, all the while failing to understand that the only true love and true romance is found within the family. “Falling in love has often been regarded as the supreme adventure, the supreme romantic accident.” Adventure however is something that happens to us, it finds us. The man that goes out looking for an adventure is acting against the very spirit of adventure. It is neither spontaneous nor adventurous to back up one’s belongings and head to Africa in search of a great adventure. It is more adventurous to stay at home and deal with the things that happen to you.
On the same token, falling in love has something to do with us. As much as we may “fall in love”, do we not also jump? “In so far as to some extent we choose…falling in love is not truly romantic…The supreme adventure is not falling in love, it is being born.” This greatest of all adventures, breeds true love and true romance. We do not have the slightest choice in picking our families, just as we have no choice in picking our neighbors. Yet Christ commanded us to love our neighbors. That is because there is a deeper love, a deeper romance formed when our choice is taken out of the equation.
One does not get to choose their R&B singing sister. One does not choose to have a sister with a strange obsession with Asian children. One does not choose a sister who has a deep-rooted psychological obsession with Glen Beck that manifests itself by framing her husband with having a strong hankering for Nancy Grace. One does not choose a sister who fails to see the intrinsic likeability of Taylor Swift or a brother who eats 40 hotdogs in a sitting. Yet with this lack of choice comes Christ-like Trinitarian love.
In heaven there will be no husbands and wives but there will be a family of believers. Maybe this is because there is nothing greater, nothing more romantic, nothing more fundamental than the love of family.
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