At the Table with Our Father

He looks up at me with his blue eyes and his chubby little cheeks.  I can’t help but smile and almost laugh out loud as I swipe the small rubber-tipped spoon across his lips cleaning off the sweet potatoes that squeeze out of his little baby lips.  He looks at me and smiles with a smile that is much larger than it should be.  It’s an orange colored smile that extends onto his cheeks.  The last remnants of the baby food I have been spooning, as fast as I can, into his mouth.

My oldest son, when he was a baby, loved the orange colored baby foods like sweet potatoes and carrots but never seemed to like the green vegetables like peas or green beans.  These are the types of things that parents remember.  Now that our two sons are older my wife and I reminisce sometimes about the days when the boys were just babies, laughing and shaking our heads as we think about those days gone by.  It’s such a blessing to have memories like these, we’re lucky.  On one recent occasion as we had one of these conversations I remembered a time when my oldest son was about 3 years old.  He was eating solid food by now and it just so happened that we were having peas as our vegetable for dinner.  Now, I like peas, but even I know that you should probably eat them first while they are still warm, because cold peas, even for me, are not very appetizing.  However, my son being just 3 years old had not yet grasped this tidbit of wisdom and so he ate all of the things he liked and then refused to eat his peas.  A dinner table showdown was about to commence.  Any of you parents out there ever experience one of these?

As a father never having raised a 3-year-old before, my reaction was to take the strong dad stance and so I told him, “you are not allowed up from that table until those peas are gone”, and left it at that.  I don’t remember how long he sat there.  But he sat there staring at his plate, not moving for what seemed like an eternity.  As I think about this typical event, shared by many parents, I remember feeling bad for my son as he sat there.  He really had no perspective of why I wanted him to eat his vegetables, he wasn’t worried about eating healthy, he only knew they were cold, gross and he didn’t want to eat them.  I also remember, how even in the midst of this showdown, and maybe even because of it, I really loved him as he sat there.  I wanted to see him up and playing.  In a small way I caught a glimpse of how God, our father, looks at and loves us.  He sees us, in our mistakes and with our limited understanding, and loves us beyond words.  Although there is objective truth and rules for life, He doesn’t want us to be punished or to be stuck at the table, staring at our peas and separated from Him forever, he wants us with Him, living joyfully and according to His purpose.  He has created us for himself, we need to choose goodness and right, but He desires to be joined to us in a loving relationship.

Think about how much you love the people in your life, your spouse, your parents, brothers and sisters, your children and grandchildren.  Slowly close your eyes and think, see their faces, hear them talk to you, touch their hand.  Feel the love you have for them and let it rest in your awareness.  Now recognize and believe that the love God has for us takes these feelings we are experiencing to an infinite level.  Far surpassing anything we, as human beings, can feel for someone.  There is no end to His love for us.  “For God so loved the world that he gave his only son, so that those who believe in him might not perish, but might have eternal life”, John 3:16.  This is not just a slogan we hear all the time, it is truth.  A truth that we as Catholics need to marinate in so that it seeps into our bones.

The Catechism of the Catholic Church says, “Only in God will man find the truth and happiness he never stops searching for” (CCC 27).  Our joy exists in realizing that not only does God love us and that Jesus died for our sins, BUT, He is here, present to us today, accompanying us and being physically joined to us through the Eucharist.  Jesus Christ, body, blood, soul and divinity, is with us now and forever.  Think of this, His love, His sacrifice, His constant presence.  This is our God.  Calling us to His table.  Only desiring us to respond.

My son just sat there staring at his cold peas, as a father I finally decided to take action, I had set the rule and now I needed to provide a solution so that he could get up from the table.  I walked over, pulled up a chair next to him and said, let’s take care of those peas.  And as he looked at me, there present with him in his struggle, I ate the peas and off he went to play.