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BERNARDO M. VILLEGAS
May 16, 2008
THE VALUABLE ROLE OF GRANDPARENTS
My mother, Isabel Malvar Villegas, will turn l00 next October 9, 2009, Godwilling. She is definitely above-average in life expectancy in the Philippine setting where women can beexpected on the average to live up to the early 70s. I thought of her when I read a recent declaration of Pope Benedict XVI about the role of grandparents in fostering family unityand as mediators in the relationship between the married couple and between the parents and their children. At her "youthful age," she has 13 grandchildren and 14 great-grandchildren(including one still to be born). Thanks to her good health and especially clear mind, she has been doing exactly what was described in the April 3-5 conference held in the Vaticanon the theme "Grandparents: Their Witness and Presence in the Family." She has indeed been the strongest source of unity and harmony among all the siblings, their children andtheir children's children. As in any human family, there are always frictions and misunderstandings--no matter how small--that can lead to disunity. Thanks to my mother, who hasthe wisdom of Solomon, these differences are always addressed amicably by the parties involved.
Fortunately, in the Philippines the role that my mother has been playing in our clan is not uncommon. Grandparents indeed have been playing a very important role of fosteringtraditional family values, especially in faith education and in the conservation and safeguarding of the culture of society. I am in close touch with former students who belong to theBeatle generation of the decade of the 1960s. They are now in their sixties and are doting grandparents. They may live another twenty to thirty years. During this period ofsemi-retirement, many of them will spend a great deal of their time helping their married children cope with the more demanding task of bringing up children in the 21st Century, oftentimes in a household were both parents are working.
If this important role of grandparents is prevalent among the A and B homes with whom I am familiar, it becomes even more indispensable among the C,D,and E householdswho are struggling to make both ends meet, in which the wife's decision to work outside the home is not an option but a necessity. Grandparents are much more involved in theday-to-day running of the household and the upbringing of the children. The role reaches its maximum in the case of parents who have to work abroad and are obliged to leave their childrenwith the grandparents. It was notable that the one who spoke in behalf of the participants in the congress on grandparents held in Rome was Cardinal Ricardo Vidal, archbishopof Cebu and member of the Pontifical Council for the Family. In his response to Pope Benedict XVI, Cardinal Vidal remarked that during the conference "there emerged feelings of gratitude with regard to grandparents, persons rich with affection, delicacy, authority and goodness, who lovingly hand on religious and moral values."
As reported by Mirko Testa in Zenit International (April 6, 2008), the Holy Father spoke about grandparents as "a treasure that we cannot take away from new generations." In fact, he explained, "it is not possible to plan the future without relating to a past rich with significant experiences and spiritual and moral points of reference." Benedict XVI followed thiswith a plea that grandparents "return to being a living presence in the family, in the Church and in society" and that they "continue to be witnesses of unity, values founded onfidelity to a single love that generates faith and joy in living."
Filipino grandparents today must be keenly aware that the unhealthy winds of "widespread relativism" and the "new models of the family" are blowing through the mass mediaand the contact of overseas Filipino workers with other cultures, especially in Europe. As the Pope lamented, "Unfortunately, the culture of death seems to be advancing, threateningeven the older generations. With growing insistence one arrives at proposing euthanasia as a solution for resolving certain difficult situations...Today economic and social evolutionhas caused profound transformations in the life of families. The elderly, among whom there are many grandparents, find themselves in a kind of 'parking lot': Some feel themselvesas a burden on the family and prefer to live alone or in nursing homes, with all the consequences that these choices have."
Those of us who are concerned about the stability of the Filipino family must do everything possible to preserve the very positive role played by grandparents in our society. The Pope emphasized: "We must join together to defeat together every marginalization. It is not only grandfathers, grandmothers, and the elderly in general who are overwhelmedby an individualistic mentality. Everyone is affected. If grandparents constitute a precious resource, as if often said and from many quarters, then consistent choices must be made thatpermit this resource to be properly valued."
Those actively fostering the unity of families may want to attend the Fourth World Meeting of Families that will be celebrated January 13 to 18, 2009 in Mexico City. Given theirenergy and vitality, many grandparents in the Philippines and other Christian countries will be actively participating in this World Meeting of Families that will be held in the Landof Our Lady of Guadalupe. For comments, my email address is .