Calming the storm

At the beginning of the holidays my daughter, our last child at home, moved out to flat with a friend. She hasn’t moved far. Next door in fact. Yet she now has a power bill in her own name, buys her own groceries, and with her flat mate, she cleans bathrooms, cooks and does her own dishes. She still visits regularly to use the internet and joins us for a family meal on Sunday evenings.

We have a long corridor that leads to five bedrooms. But for our room, the four other bedrooms are empty, their occupants now moved on, and perhaps never to return permanently. It’s a quiet ache. Tidy bedrooms don’t make up for children who have to grow up and start looking after themselves.

This is, after all, what we as parents aspire to. It’s our job. We have faith in our children, in the way we have taught them.

One of the richest, allegorical texts of Mark’s Gospel (4:35 – 41) is the story in which Jesus’ calms the storm. It has been understood as a picture of the confusion of the early church. Jesus’ questions his disciples, ‘Why are you so frightened? How is it that you have no faith?’ The disciples had failed to recognise Jesus’ presence, thinking him ‘asleep’. It is no surprise, that at the heart of this story, there is a story about who I am. It is no trouble being a person of faith when the going is good, but when my life is thrown into turmoil I struggle to see God walking with me. Notionally I know he is there, but in my anxiety doubt grows. Mark clearly tells us that his presence is constant and real, we need but call on his name.

And while this story still has an application to the life of the church today (clerical abuse, women and married priests, left-wing radical theologies, right-wing ‘traditionalists’, etc.) it is applies equally to letting our children go, to make their own decisions, to be independent, and trusting them to do right. They will experience life in a turbulent world, have enormous ups and downs, but in the end, we trust that they will know that you are there to love and support them. And, it’s your job. For the duration of your life. And as we live in Christian hope for life eternal, it’s forever.

This Sunday the cycle of our Church’s calendar returns to Ordinary Time. Isn’t it time too that you returned to join this cycle?