Faith, family and food

We would have this funny dynamic where my position at the dinner table was the closest to the pantry. So, if there was something missing at the dinner table, such as the butter, the pepper or the salt, dad would say, “Derek, can you get the pepper?”

But as soon as I got up, they would start grace (without me). I thought, “Am I just a family slave? They’re all starting grace while I’m getting their food.” I remember thinking at the time, I would never do that to my family. It’s important that everyone is there and have dinner as a family.

That experience of grace and coming together is an important part of my family starting a meal together. It’s not always possible on a daily basis, but certainly weekly. It’s really healthy for families to find that place of connection … and that place of coming together and sharing a meal with one another.

Family, faith and sharing meals all go together. We have a tendency sometimes to think about the Church and our local parish as separate from our home, but it’s all about family. Pope Francis recently made a wonderful statement in one of his documents about the definition of the Church. He said the Church is simply a family, and that our experience of faith should really be a family experience.

It’s about people who care about one another and who build a life together.

The Church defines the Mass as the source and summit of our faith. Likewise, the meal in the home is a source of family faith. When we come together as a family, there are all these good things for individuals and the family, generally.

It can be defined as a source of life for a family to come together and share a meal. It’s also the summit and a celebration of all of those things that are happening in our lives. That’s why we want to celebrate birthdays and anniversaries with a meal. It’s the summit of our experience of a shared life together.

There is something profoundly Eucharistic in that experience of a family meal when we come together regularly. The story of Zacchaeus climbing up the tree to see Jesus. Jesus is saying to him, “I’m coming to your house for dinner tonight.” Jesus connected with people in their homes by having a meal.

As a counsellor and thinking about the spiritual side, I spend a lot of time with couples, families and individuals hearing about their very personal stories. Their life experiences. Eighty per cent of teenagers say the one place they are most likely to talk to their parents is during a family meal at the dinner table.

The family meal is probably the most powerful way to form those relationships in faith and love, and it’s a part of God’s plan. I think God’s plan is that one day we will live in perfect harmony with one another.

So, when am I the happiest in my life? At dinner time with my family. Everyone is there and getting on. Everyone loves one another and cares for one another. And we are joking and we’re sharing stories. There’s a sense of belonging, a sense of happiness, and I imagine that’s what God’s plan for heaven might be like.

Building rituals around family dinner time is also important. For example, in the lead up to Christmas when Advent starts, my family usually puts an Advent wreath on the table. It connects us with the season and what’s happening in other areas of our lives. We might also say a simple prayer. ‘‘God, thanks for this food and thanks for our family’.

Another ritual in my family is to ask each child what was the best thing that happened to them today? A highlight of their day? There is so much for us to be grateful for in our lives and gratitude is a powerful way to fight back against anxiety and depression. Research shows that gratitude is the best way to combat negative feelings, ‘God, right now it’s good. And thank you. Thank you for these people who care about me. Thank you that we’ve got food on the table.’

It’s important to tap into our core values and let those beliefs guide our decision making. One of the simple rules in our family is that people should always come before things. People are more important than who’s holding the TV remote control. So, if the children are fighting over the remote control, it will be put away because the siblings need to work on their relationship.

If the kids aren’t getting along, we reflect on their virtues. If they’d shown more patience or been humbler and gentler, this problem would not have occurred. We need other people, and they need us. And it’s at the meal table where we have the primary opportunity to build those relationships with one another.

Our mealtimes are an important opportunity to grow closer to one another, but they have a deeper meaning, and a deeper purpose in the spiritual sense … nurturing the fullness of who we are, bodily, with the food that we eat, socially and our relationships.

There’s a real challenge for us in terms of our families around mealtime. When I think about the ancient world and the experiences of the early Christians and the early church, we often think about the church as being parishes, buildings, priests and religious, but the reality is for the first 400 years in the life of the church, it actually grew in people’s homes.

It was about families joining together, sharing a meal, sharing each other’s journeys and reaching out to others, not just their own family. Not everyone (unfortunately) has that experience of ‘family’. But by inviting people who are lonely and struggling into our homes for a meal is an extraordinary gift, including at Christmas and Easter.

A real challenge for us in this day and age is for families to bless the world by making their family mealtimes a gift for others as well.

This is an edited version of a Figuring out Families podcast with Derek Boylen, titled Growing in Faith at the Dinner Table. The full podcast and other Dinner Table podcasts can be accessed at: The Dinner Table Podcast– for gathering, sharing, being family – Majellan Media