Daily Meditations

Family

Family

Staying connected to family

By Abbot Tryphon, December 19, 2019 

It is always sad to lose a family member in death, but it is also sad that it often takes a funeral to bring together relatives who haven’t seen each other in years. It is from this perspective that I realize I, as the oldest of the cousins, am perhaps the one family member who remembers how important family reunions were to my maternal grandmother. Grandma Haraldson, with whom I was very close, often recounted her late sisters (who were all gone by the time I was born), her parents, and other long lost relatives, as though they were simply across town. Her vivid descriptions of what life was like when she was a child, and the love that bound the extended family together, were spoken of as though the events had taken place in the here and now.

An early memory for me were those picnics in Manito Park, where my grandmother would take all the cousins for a day of food and play. The large and exquisite Victorian park, located in the heart of the South Hill neighborhood of old Spokane, was a magical place where we kids could connect with our long deceased relatives who had played in that very park. My great grandmother lived in a large Victorian mansion near the park, as did numerous other relatives, so my sojourns to this park, whenever I find myself in Spokane, flood my mind with wonderful memories of a happy childhood.

Family, for me, are more than blood connections, for much of whom I am today is all about the boy who grew up in a loving environment, where faith and family intertwined. It was from this extended family that I learned the importance of accepting people just the way they are, and without any expectation that any of them should first be required to conform to my own standards or expectations. It was from this loving family that I grew to accept myself as a worthy person, and learned how to love other people.

I will forever be grateful to God for having blessed me with such an extended family, wherein I learn lessons that have stayed with me into old age. These lessons prepared me to be a monk and priest who is driven to reach out with love to everyone I meet, and ultimately become a Christian who desires that all come to the knowledge of the Truth, and be saved.

With love in Christ,
Abbot Tryphon

~Abbot Tryphon, The Morning Offering, https://blogs.ancientfaith.com/morningoffering/2019/12/family-3/.

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