The first three commandments tell us how to love, honor, and serve Our Lord.
I. I am the Lord your God: You shall not have strange Gods before me.
II. You shall not take the name of the Lord your God in vain.
III. Remember to keep holy the Lord’s Day.
Commandments four through ten tell us how to love our neighbor: our family, our friends, our enemies. It’s no coincidence that the first of these tells us to “Honor Your Father and Mother.”
What does it mean to “honor” our parents? At different stages of our life, this can mean very different things. When we are young, honor for our parents, guardians, and figures of authority is tied tightly to obedience.
“Children, obey your parents [in the Lord], for this is right. ‘Honor your father and mother.’ This is the first commandment with a promise, ‘that it may go well with you and that you may have a long life on earth.'” (Ephesians 6:1-3)
Even Jesus, God made man, lived a life of obedience as a child. When Joseph and Mary lose Jesus in Jerusalem following the Passover feast, they search everywhere for Him. After three long days, they find Him in the temple, conversing with the teachers.
“When his parents saw him, they were astonished, and his mother said to him, ‘Son, why have you done this to us? Your father and I have been looking for you with great anxiety.’
And he said to them, ‘Why were you looking for me? Did you not know that I must be in my Father’s house?’
But they did not understand what he said to them.
He went down with them and came to Nazareth, and was obedient to them; and his mother kept all these things in her heart.
And Jesus advanced [in] wisdom and age and favor before God and man.” (Luke 2:48-52)
There are few circumstances that are universal among all human beings. Among them is the fact that without our parents, we would not have life. With that gift of life comes a duty to respect our elders and ancestors, from the moment we are born to the moment we die.
Fr. Larry Richards is a well-known Catholic priest from the Diocese of Erie, Pennsylvania. Throughout his priesthood, he has served as a parish pastor, high school chaplain, retreat leader, mental health counselor, and has also offered guidance through books and video series.
In his videos, Fr. Larry often shares a story about a dying man he once knew, whom he went to visit in the hospital when he was in college seminary. The man was a former police officer who had turned to alcohol to numb the pain of all the suffering he had encountered throughout his career. He became an alcoholic, left his wife and kids, and moved to Las Vegas. Now, he was dying of sorosis of the liver at 43 years old.
Knowing that the man was in his last days, Fr. Larry went and spent a week with him. He joked with him, prayed with him, and kept him company. At the end of the week, he knew it was time to say goodbye.
“‘Listen, I got to go. But you know I’ll be graduating from college in May, and it’d be great if you could be there.’ And he shook his head up and down but we both knew this wasn’t going to happen. This man was going to die.
“And I start walking out of the room and I thought, ‘I want to get one last look at this man.’ And so I turn around and there he is, desperately calling me back but he couldn’t talk to me because he was on a respirator. He couldn’t say anything.
“And so I hurry up to the side of the bed and go, ‘What’s the matter? What can I do for you?’ And this man took me. With what strength he had left in his body, he grabbed me and he started pulling me closely to himself. He started hugging me [tightly]. And as he’s hugging me [tightly], I look up and I go, ‘Yeah…I love you, too, dad.’
“And a little later, my dad died. The only time I told my dad that I loved him was on his deathbed. Why? Because he wasn’t the type of dad I wanted. He was an alcoholic, and he was a mean alcoholic. And I spent my whole life judging my father instead of loving my father.”
Fr. Larry ends his talk by giving the audience homework: Go home and write two letters, one to your father and one to your mother. In the letters, tell your parents that you love them and why. Write the letters as if they were on their deathbeds. What would you say?
Our parents are not perfect. Nobody is. But even through the most difficult situations, through the pain and the tragedy, through the suffering, they are still the ones who gave us life.
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