What is a Family?
Family is the small community where love is practiced daily, faith is passed on, and each person learns what it means to serve and be served — a home meant to reflect the life of the Church itself.
The Orthodox Church does not, in fact, have a definition of family. What we see in the Scriptures and tradition is a focus on what is called the “home Church,” kat’ eikon ekklesia, or the Church of the home. (St. John Chrysostom). When the daily life of the home is connected to the life-giving Body of Christ, the Church, daily life becomes a place where we are each growing in love as we learn to love (Scripture reference).
As such, The Orthodox Family is here to connect the daily life of the home to the life of the Church.
We don’t have perfect families, but we are here to offer what we’ve learned in our journeys; where we’ve stumbled, found peace, repented, forgiven and grown. There is no “perfect” Orthodox family and we offer guidance and support to the many different types of families that make up our community.
Single Life
Single life is a season — or a calling — of its own, offering the freedom to seek Christ wholeheartedly and to grow in faith, community, and purpose outside of marriage. Most everyone, at one point in their lives, will be single. For some of us, it is before we marry. Others, it is after a season of marriage, when we experience death or divorce, and some of us may remain single our whole lives.
We see in the lives of the Saints a long tradition of people who live beautiful, meaningful lives who are single, but not alone. Rather, they live their lives in relationships in community with others.
Blended Families
Increasingly many of our homes do not reflect the narrow pattern of an intact nuclear family. Yet, each home is invited to be Christ-centered, connected to the life of the Church. In this way, each of our homes, with our unique structures, is potentially a little Church. When the home is connected to the Church, daily life becomes the same path of growing in love, no matter what the arrangement. Blended families face unique and, at times, complicated, challenges as families bring together separate histories and hearts into one home, learning to build unity, patience, and shared faith even amid the complexities of past chapters.
They are, in no lesser way, still invited to live as little Churches, deeply loved by God, and places where God’s grace moves deeply. The Orthodox Family seeks to support those who seek to learn to live as the Church of the home.
Single Parent Households
Parenting is one of the most challenging tasks for any adult, and when a parent is single, the responsibilities can seem overwhelming. When one is a single parent it is common to feel alone, separate and unsupported. The Orthodox Family seeks, specifically, to support single parent households as a resource for support, information, and community. Single parent households are an important part of our Church communities and belong closely connected to the life of the Church.
Interfaith Families
Interfaith families navigate the beautiful and sometimes challenging work of honoring different traditions under one roof, seeking unity in love even where beliefs may differ.
The Church of the Home
The ‘church of the home’ is the ancient Orthodox understanding that every household is itself a small church — a place where prayer, love, and daily life become the ordinary means by which a family grows closer to Christ.