How Can a Catholic Mom Find Good Friends?
Ask a Priest vol. 1
Posted by AGroup
in Faith
on Wednesday, January 06, 2010 10:00 AM
Q: How do you recommend we interact with fellow Catholics who blatantly disregard the churches teachings on contraception or other major teaching of the Church? I feel lately like I would rather associate with non-Catholic moms than ones who call themselves Catholic but then don’t go to Mass or make me feel uncomfortable for being pregnant with my 5th in 6 years. I am just new to my community and trying to find like-minded friends.
A: You have answered your own question! You mentioned that you are “trying to find like-minded friends.” That’s the key. We all need to have a core group of friends who share our faith and priorities and will help us stay accountable to and keep on growing in our friendship with Christ. Ideally, this core group will consist of a handful or even eight or nine people, but sometimes we only find one or two:
“A loyal friend is a powerful defense: whoever finds one has indeed found a treasure” (Sirach 6:12). Keep on looking, and God will provide: “The one who searches always finds” (Matthew 7:8).
Having a core group of Christ-connected friends will help solve the other issues you raise. You will be able to interact with secular Catholics without feeling so threatenend; you will better be able to accept and deal gracefully with the scorn and criticism (silent or otherwise) of secular women, as Christ did with the scorn of his critics; and you will be able to treat secularized folks with more of the the patience, charity, and goodness that the Gospels command of us, because your own spiritual foundation will be more secure. When trying to deal with these challenges on our own, without the support of a core group of fellow Christ-seeking friends, we are more easily overwhelmed and discouraged, or corrupted.
This core group should be built not only around supporting each other in raising your children, but also praying together, studying Church teaching together, and, in short, bolstering each other in the quest for holiness and true, God-centered happiness.
Catholic moms who aren’t living their faith, or who don’t accept Church teaching on moral issues, are not good candidates for this core group. If you can only find non-Catholic Christians who will support your journey of faith, that’s okay. But in that case, you need to make sure that you are also feeding your Catholic faith. I am sure that you can find, if not in your home parish, then at least in a nearby parish, some faith-building group that will challenge and feed your Catholic mind and heart. It may be a lecture series on the Catechism now, a Bible study later, and a Catholic book study group after that. It may simply be a trustworthy priest at a nearby retreat center, to whom you go for confession on a regular basis. God will provide. (Of course, the Lord may be asking you to start one, if there really is nothing else happening …)
By the way, all of this doesn’t mean you won’t or shouldn’t have secular friends. As long as you have a core group of Christ-seeking friends, you will be able to build healthy relationships with people outside that circle—other moms you meet through school activities, other wives you meet through your husband’s work contacts, fellow aerobics class-goers ... These relationships can be meaningful, fulfilling, and mutually beneficial, when we keeping ourselves grounded in the faith. They are also satisfying ways to “let our light shine,” instead of hiding it under a bushel basket (see Matthew 5:15-16).
Finally, a word about judging. Our Lord was clear in his remark about not trying to take the speck out of someone else’s eye while we have a board blocking our own vision:
“Do not judge, and you will not be judged” (Matthew 7:1).
In your current situation, the frustration you are experiencing as you look for Christ-seeking friends may spill over into resentment and anger towards the non-Christ seeking women you keep running across. Watch out. Objectively, these acquaintances may be in the wrong (rejecting clear Church teaching—things explicitly included in the Catechism), but subjectively only God can evaluate their level of culpability.
We always need to remember how patient and merciful God has been with us, so that we can learn to be that way with others. This doesn’t mean you have to ignore or condone their views and behavior. It doesn’t mean you have to be best friends with them. But it does mean that you should avoid speaking badly about them to others and criticizing them in your heart (pray for them instead), while at the same time keeping the door of firendship open to them, in case God wants to use you to help guide them closer to himself.
May the Lord send an AVALANCHE of blessings on you and your family in this new year!
(Do you have a question for Fr. John? Leave it in the comments here or .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)!)
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