10 for 10: Voting Vision not Division | On Family
In this episode of "10 for 10: Voting Vision Not Division," Rev. Dr. George Mason, Rabbi Nancy Kasten, and Mara Richards Bim dive into the complexities of family and what it means to support families in today’s world. From the diverse family structures seen in religious texts to the modern policies needed to uplift all families, they discuss how faith calls for a broader, more inclusive understanding of family. The conversation covers essential topics like childcare assistance, paid leave, and family unity, urging voters to reflect on how public policies can strengthen families in all forms.
What is 10 for 10: Voting Vision not Division? Starting on September 2, 2024 and continuing every Monday for ten weeks through November 4, Faith Commons is offering ten 10-minute reflections on topics related to the upcoming election through the lens of religion. Our premise is that religion should be used to unite people and groups of people rather than to divide them, and that the founders of our country shared our view.
Watch the video, here.
George (00:00):
Welcome to 10 for 10 Voting Vision, not Division. I'm George Mason and I'm joined by my colleagues Mara Richards, BIM and Rabbi Nancy Kasten. We are Faith Commons and we're doing this series of 10 episodes on 10 topics pertinent to the election coming up in November. We are trying to say that faith has an impact on our voting and actually should, but how does it have an impact on our voting and how does it help us shape our views about certain topics that will then translate into public policy. In this episode, we're talking about the family and Mara is leading us.
Mara (00:44):
Yeah. Thank you, George. So the family and family values, and I put that in quotes has kind of a loaded meaning for us these days, but that hasn't always been the case. I think it's important to note that what is traditionally today called the traditional family is nowhere in the Bible. Right. As a Christian, we obviously look to Jesus, who nowhere in the gospels are we told that he's married. He seems to be a single man around him. We see in the gospel of Matthew we know that Jesus healed Peter's mother-in-law, which implies that Peter is married, but there's no mention of children. We know that Mary the Magdalene, which in Aramaic is Mary, the Tower s was a woman of her own financial means. She was not tied to a man. She was, I guess, the proverbial cat lady of her day, <laugh>. And she was present as all the gospels attest to at Jesus' resurrection. We see in the book of Acts, different family formations. We see Priscilla and a Aquila, Aquila, Aquila, (multiple pronunciations)
George (02:04):
Aquila,
Mara (02:04):
Aquila.
George (02:04):
There it is.
Mara (02:06):
We see Priscilla and Aquila traveling together as a pair, working alongside Paul. Again, no mention of children. We see Paul himself a single man speaking to the fact that people should, if they are able to remain celibate, which is not without having sex, it is instead a singleness. So that one can devote oneself to the larger family of the time. So we also see Jesus talking about, you know, this expanded idea of family in a couple of places in the gospels, he refers know he's being asked about his mother and siblings, and he said, well, you are my mother and siblings. We see Paul constantly writing about my brothers and sisters in Christ. So there are all kinds of ideas about what family units might look like. We also see women like Lydia in the book of Acts, who is her own.
Mara (03:09):
She's in charge of her own household. There is no man. She's in charge of a household church. So all of these tell us that families were configured in very, very different ways in Jesus' time. And not to say that the, what we would consider today or what we hear is the traditional family unit wasn't important in Jesus' day. Jesus obviously one of the famous quotes telling the little children come unto me, right? But I think that when we think about family and family values in particular, what the New Testament shows us is that this idea of family is really expanded. It is not just as current definitions, you know, a man and a woman in a heterosexual marriage. First marriage, by the way, would be the traditional family and with children that they birthed on their own. That's just not the majority of Americans, and it's not what we see in the Bible. So as we think about policies that relate to family we should really embrace this idea that all families are sacred, all families have worth all families deserve love, care, and, and support .
George (04:32):
Thank you.
Nancy (04:34):
When we think about what is the purpose of family, right? But why do we need family? Why do we have family? And you think about, you know, we need family for financial security and backing. We need family to protect us from outside forces. And that has never been the role of just the people you're biologically related to, right? We've seen so many other cultures other than our own here in the United States where community is reinforced because we know we can't provide everything for ourselves. Right? And so when we talk about how to provide that you know, you look at, I always think about Jacob and his wives and the 12 tribes of Israel, right? Four wives, 12 children. And I always thought that wasn't necessarily a bad model. <Laugh>, <laugh>
Nancy (05:36):
Having raised three of my own children. You know, we need help. We need other people to help us, and we also need financial help. And so when we look at policies that our government can enact in order to, if we really care about strong families, if we care about supporting families, if we care about helping our workforce get what they need so that they can be maxi maximizing their productivity at work, and also being, you know, taking care of the children and the families that they have at home. Parents, not just children, right? Right. We are living in multi-generational households. Now, those are social policies that are very, very important. So, for example, child tax credits, those have been so instrumental in helping families be able to work and still put food on the table and still help their kids with the needs that they have.
Nancy (06:32):
You talk, you know, childcare support. We really need more childcare support in this country. We need to pay our childcare workers so that we can have that support. Paid leave. We’re one of the only countries and certainly the most wealthy country that forces parents to pay the medical costs for childbearing and then lose earnings when they have children because they aren't getting paid family leave. So we, if we're really serious about being pro-family in the United States of America, we have to look beyond, you know, somebody's idea of what an ideal family is, which, you know, Anna Karenina, it said, Tolstoy said it best, right? <Laugh> These families are, are flawed families, are not perfect. And even, and we all have different ideas about what a perfect family would be. So we really need to think about the kinds of public policy that will enable the light that us to have strong families in light of the culture, the society, and the economy that we currently have here in the United States.
George (07:52):
Well, I think you hear that this subject as others that we've already talked about is not just about social science, it's not just about politics even. It, it has to do with how faith envisions the world and how we order life together, how we live together. And honestly, that's what politics is about. A decision about how we will live together as neighbors. How we will sacrifice for one another. And this idea of family being supported in a larger neighborhood community and through the decisions we make about our tax dollars and their distribution and public policy are important ways in which our vision of faith can come to reality in our larger lives. So
Nancy (08:48):
Uh, George, I just wanna say one other thing because you know, I really, it is people of faith who are making the claim that they need to see families be a certain way. When we look at the people who separated families at the border, who did not make sure that those families could be reunited once, whatever threat they, they feared was alleviated. You know, let's talk about what our faith really does call us to do. Right? I mean, if we're separating families, no matter who they are, then we cannot claim to be a society that is pro-family, right?
George (09:31):
Well, as you can tell, we just scratched the surface of these conversations, <laugh>, and it's really hard for us not to interrupt each other or to come back and add, and we'd love to do this for an hour or two, but we're giving you 10 minutes and we'll have other subjects to come. So stay tuned with us as we continue this 10 for 10 series. Thank you for joining us on Faith Commons. We'll see you next time.