Integrating your upbringing

Each one of us enters into life through a family and at the right moment we leave this first environment of life and love in order to pass to a new one. We leave home with our upbringing “within us” and by which we are linked permanently to our parents and our whole family background. Indeed, it is this very inheritance which we will pass on to others. Here, the fourth commandment holds great importance – “Honour your father and your mother.”

What do we mean when we speak of our upbringing? We mean first of all what it means to be a human person and secondly, how we are defined by our culture, our physical similarity to our parents, our daily life, the way we speak and communicate, how we share in the culture and values of our society. It is our family who first introduces us to the culture of our society and nation.

Our upbringing in its values and its cultural content is always marked in a moral way. We are not passive inheritors but we are called to respond to our upbringing – by acknowledging it, confirming it, maintaining it and increasing it. This is an important task for each new generation and every society, as we read in the parable of the talents (Lk 19: 12 – 26).

Dear young people, the task you have of forming your own plan of life happens not just from without, but from within you. The awareness of what you have inherited from your family, your culture, your country becomes a question on your heart, of your conscience. The experience of what bonds your family, your society leads you to share in the responsibility for the common good of both your family and your country.