I wish I was adopted. Have your kids ever said that to you? Remember as a kid, did you ever say that to your parents? Why do we have that notion that we wish we were adopted? I want to talk about the second reading and tie in a little of Sigmund Freud. Sigmund Freud could have been a little bit out there at times, but I think this is one of the things that he had a good insight into. And he calls this as a child, a family romance, that from the time a child grows up in the world, he has this nostalgic and romantic idea of what he wants his family to be.
He says that the freeing of an individual, as he grows up, from the authority of his parents, is one of the most necessary, though one of the most painful, results brought about by the course of our development. It is really this essential stage that we all go through in a process of growing up. For a small child, his parents are the first and only authority and the source of all belief. The child’s most intense and most momentous wish during these early years, is to be like his parents. But as the children grow up and begin to understand, they can’t help but discover that other parents are different from theirs. And as the child gets to know these other parents that are different from their own, at some point there is a realization that casts some doubt onto the perfection of their parents that they have idealized. And inevitably, in a child’s growing up, there will be times when they will feel hurt, disappointed, overlooked or worse, abused. And there’s a time when we realize, we don’t hold 100% of our parents attention or love.
Why? Well, in the church language, it’s because of the fallen nature. Each and every one of us are sinful, including me as your priest. There are only too many occasions in which a child feels slighted, or at least feels that he has been slighted, or which he feels he is not receiving the whole of his parent’s love. And they discover their love is shared with others, even their brothers or sisters, aunts, uncles, spouses, friends. And children begin to sense that their own undivided love and affection, isn’t completely returned.
They would say that this later stage in development, begins in this matter, might be described as the family romance. It’s seldom remembered consciously, but can almost always be revealed by psychoanalysis. The activity first shows itself in a child’s play. And then takes over the topic of family relations. He (Freud)says this characteristic is an example of a kind of fantasy as to be seen in the familiar daydreams in which the child longs for love. He says at about that period that he mentioned, the child’s imagination begins to be engaged in the task of now getting free from his imperfect parents, of whom he now has such a lower opinion. He is replacing them by others, occupying as a rule some kind of higher situation, more all perfect or all powerful or all knowing, more all loving.
These works of fiction which seem at first to be so full of hostility, are not really bad intentions of the child. They’re trying to still preserve, under that slight disguise, the original affection that they once had for their parents. Their faithfulness and ingratitude are only apparent, but indeed the whole effort at replacing their real father by a superior one is only an expression of the child’s longing for the happy vanished days when his father seemed to him to be the noblest and strongest of men. And Mom, the dearest and loveliest of women. He is turning away from the Father who he knows day-to-day, to the Father in whom he believed in earlier in his childhood. And his fantasy is no more than an expression of regrets that those childhood days are gone.
So why do we wish that we were adopted? Well, we’re all desiring that perfection, that desire for the perfect family, for the perfect parents, for the perfect children. And this perfection can only come from God. The whole reason Jesus came into the world is because he wanted to show us that we were in fact, adopted by God.
We hear this beautiful litany of adoption in this reading from Saint Paul today. Paul begins by saying, “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavens.” He’s saying that we have this perfect Father that is just showering us with all the blessings in the heavens. He chose us. In him before the foundation of the world. To be adopted means that God just didn’t end up with us. He chose us. He made a choice from the foundation of the world to bring us into life at conception. He destined us for adoption to himself, according to the favor of his will. God and all his love, favors us. There’s something about us that he loves, and he wants to adopt us. In all wisdom and insight, He has made known to us the mystery according to the will of his favor, and set forth in him as a plan for the fullness of time. He’s helping us to see that God desires to give us everything over the fullness of time, to love us as his children. In him we were chosen. And he also accomplishes all things according to his purpose.
And finally, in him also, you have heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation. And you have believed in him. And you have been sealed with the promise of the Holy Spirit. So, this desire that we have for perfection, this belief that we once had as a child that our parents were perfect, and this longing to have perfect parents, is fulfilled by God. He is the perfect father. He is the one that can love us unconditionally. He is the one that can shower us with every grace under the heavens. He’s the only one in whom we can have his full attention, and his complete love. Isn’t that amazing? Each and every one of us has God’s undivided attention. Because he’s perfect and God can do that. When you were baptized, you were sealed with the gift of the Holy Spirit. In the rite of baptism, the priest takes Chrism oil and traces it over the crown of the child’s head. And they are sealed from that point forward with the Holy Spirit, and at that moment become adopted by God.
Each and every one of you is adopted by God. Each and every one of you, the Father loves as his own beloved son, his own beloved daughter. Maybe there is that yearning for the perfection still in our lives. Hopefully there is. But no human being can ever do that for us. No spouse, no parent, no friend, no priest, no one can ever do that for us but God. And he wants to. And he does that for us right here at this Mass, when he offers us the very Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity of Jesus. There is no greater love than we experience at this mass, where we are all adopted as children and brought together and fed by his unconditional love.
