Honoring Fathers and Mothers
And When That is Difficult
A View -
I really didn’t give a lot of thought to honoring my Father and Mother. I think that is pretty common. I came to faith as a teenager in a broken and dysfunctional home with lots of obstacles, shall we say, to the honoring of my Father. How I should translate this faith into my relationship with my Father was not something I remember thinking much about. I certainly was familiar with the command, I just don’t remember worrying about it. I didn’t know my Mother well for reasons that have to do with my Father and which play into my issues with my Father - but that is at least another whole dispatch. Through these relational challenges, there was difficulty, pain, disappointment and distance - but there was at least the semblance or outline of a relationship.
This is part of what came to mind and heart when I saw this recent social media entry:
What a world. There is so much tragedy in these two sentences. So much pain that impacts these two people and probably a number of others. There were many sympathetic replies - here is one:
And another:
And another:
And another:
And more:
I don’t know any of these situations, of course. Some parents are abusive and sometimes the only way to no longer be in an abusive relationship is to cut off contact completely. In the past (“in my day”), it was assumed you would have some relationship with a parent, even if it was toxic - you just didn’t cut your parents off very often. Despite everything, there was some sense of duty or family obligation or family identity. It was probably true then that people needed boundaries they weren’t willing to set (or never considered setting) for these parental relationships. But more and more, adult children are ready to set these boundaries - and enforce them.
Family estrangement has been growing in our culture (see the long list of links below). Cornell sociologist Karl Pillemer has been studying this trend for a number of years. The Cornell Family Reconciliation Project, which he leads, found that
more than a quarter of Americans (27%) are currently estranged from a close relative, which translates to approximately 68 million Americans. Cornell Family Reconciliation Project
It is hard to overemphasize the potential impact.
Many experience it as a considerable loss, causing feelings of grief or remorse, and it can lead to chronic stress from repeated reminders, rejections, or from efforts to conceal it due to its stigma. Those affected may experience social isolation, depression and anxiety, insomnia, and low self-esteem. It not only impacts those who are directly involved but also other family members who are forced to take sides. The collateral damage of family estrangement means less overall social support and social capital in families torn apart by this issue.” Cornell Family Reconciliation Project
Dr. Pillemer, who authored “Fault Lines: Fractured Families and How to Mend Them,” writes that the adult children in these cases have many reasons - harshness, favoritism, the betrayal of divorce - that can culminate in a decisive break. Or, sometimes, there is no blow up, just a slow closing of the door. David Brooks of the New York Times quotes one of these adult children,
“I have someone out to get me, and it’s my mother. My part of being a good mom has been getting my son away from mine.” (NYT)
On the other side of the relationship there can be total bewilderment. What family used to imply, along with bonds of affection, a sense of duty and obligation beyond the parent to the larger family now is often seen within an expectation of a life of fulfillment with no or minimal pain. Parents of these children often remember a totally different childhood home and accuse some of these adult children of creating a new family history. Some of these parents recall trying to give everything to these children, taking them on great vacations and going to all the sporting events. All the effort of parenting seems to them to have been tossed aside. Of course, parents of these children also have every incentive to emphasize these things in their memory - both things can be true. It is also true that parents can break with children, this has just recently become comparatively less common.
In addition to being a child of imperfect parents, I am an imperfect parent of adult children. I would counsel parents to listen with humility if children describe the pain and disappointment of their childhood with them. And to seek forgiveness for what pain they caused, even if unintended and even if you were and are unaware of it. Because we are broken and imperfect people, anyone in any relationship is bound to cause some pain. Everyone falls short. One cause of family estrangement is parents who are unable to hear what their adult children are telling them about their own lives. The final straw leading to estrangement might be the feeling of being gaslit about the home they grew up in.
People who find a way to reconcile find a way to some perspective about their relationship - both sides of the relationship. People who claim to have no idea how this might have happened are probably not heading toward reconciliation. In all of this, we need to be willing to hear each other - and older people need to understand the more frequent use of the term ‘abuse’, which wasn’t used 30 years ago absent physical scarring. What constitutes abuse? I don’t view my relationship with my Father as abusive - but it could be because my bar for the use of that word is fairly high. Maybe it is too high. Or maybe the term is used too often now, I don’t know
But what I see in the tweets above is not the pain of the parent, it is the pain of the adult child. I am sure there is pain on both sides. Again, I don’t know any of these situations. But I can’t help wondering. Perhaps the pendulum has swung too far in the direction of estrangement. There are times it, or something close to it, might be necessary. But there is a lot of relational damage down that road.
I should have pursued a better relationship with my Father. I didn’t set hard boundaries on our relationship because I didn’t need to. There were mutual unspoken boundaries. Distances is probably a better word. He wasn’t capable or willing to review the pain of the past (which was a large factor in the pain of his life). We weren’t conflicted and we weren’t close. If I am honest, I don’t have regrets related to being closer, necessarily - because I don’t think we really would have been. He didn’t seem interested and I just can’t imagine what that would have looked like. But I have some regrets. I would like to be able to say - for my own sake - that I tried harder.
I would be heartbroken, of course, if one of our adult children broke off contact. But when I read the tweets above of adult children who will not know when their parent dies unless someone tells them, and nobody probably will, I want them to make contact for their own sake. Or if the parent broke off contact, I want the parent to make some sort of contact. Or at least attempt it. I know, that might be Pollyanna - and I realize some of these people need to not have an ongoing relationship with a parent who has been abusive. But there is a difference between not having a relationship and nobody telling you they are dead. There is a difference between deciding whether to attend a memorial service because it might be too painful and not knowing there is one. In some cases, distance and boundaries might be necessary for health. But there is a cost to the person on each side of those boundaries. There is a cost to others as well. The fifth commandment comes with a societal promise - that things may go well for us in this land. Which is to say, I believe, that a society that completely abandons this principle will pay some sort of price.
Honor your father and your mother, so that you may live long in the land the Lord your God is giving you. (Exodus 20:12)
Honor Your Father and Mother - in a broken world, this might take all sorts of forms. But even if you don’t think this is (or should be) a command - it is something to be hoped for, something to be attempted to whatever extent possible. Something that is at least intended for our own benefit and for the good of the world we live in. There is something in there that asks for a more humble and generous stance toward parents - because parenting is hard, because family is important, because my perspective isn’t perfect. Because I am going to fail, at least partially, as a parent - there isn’t another possibility. Because the world was different decades ago and everyone is adjusting to the difference in different ways. Because all of this will be repeated in the decades to come with slightly different rules. Because forgiveness and grace are virtues that bless those extending them. Because we are image bearers - and our Father will fill in all the gaps and heal all the wounds someday - those I experienced and those I inflicted.
I didn’t have the Father I probably should have and it took me decades to even realize that fully. At the same time, I wish I would have, for my own sake, thought a little bit more about what honoring him might have meant. I think I wish it for his sake as well, though I honestly don’t know what that would have meant.
What a world.
Links -
As always, some of these links are informative, others express opinions or viewpoints that I may not completely share or endorse. I share them to further understanding on what is happening or being said in our world related to what we are talking about:
https://www.familyreconciliation.org/video
https://www.theatlantic.com/family/archive/2019/02/my-adult-daughter-doesnt-speak-me-anymore/582361/
https://www.theatlantic.com/family/archive/2021/01/why-parents-and-kids-get-estranged/617612/
This podcast comes from the perspective of helping adult children interact with parents they have relational issues with:
This is not about estrangement, per se, but it includes some potentially helpful reflections on family and expectations:
https://www.thecut.com/2021/01/i-want-my-family-to-love-me-unconditionally.html
What a world. And it keeps turning. Many perspectives of our parents are outdated, as the perspectives of our generation are, also becoming quickly outdated. Some of this is clearly progress, and some of it is regression. I think two steps forward and one step back is kinda how we do things as imperfect humans. It's messy but somehow beautiful as well. Thanks for sharing these insights.
Thanks for sharing your story Mike. I didn’t have this experience but my father did. Good to have that perspective.