Everyone who’s seen George Lucas’ movie franchise series, Star Wars, remembers that shocking moment in the second original film, The Empire Strikes Back, when Darth Vader tells the Jedi-in-training Luke, “I am your father.”

It was the line that changed everything for Luke (and the audience), but why?

Because fatherhood is supposed to be the source of strength and security that we all need growing up–that irreplaceable person who imparts wisdom, protection and guidance, who helps us to flourish and grow.

The difference is, Vader was using this familial connection to emotionally manipulate Luke so that he would betray his friends and join him in his enterprise of evil.

The temptation for Luke was real: accept Lord Vader’s offer, and he would finally have a father.

But the truth is, he wouldn’t have gained a father–not really.

Darth Vader did not have the fatherly love he should have had for Luke; he chose to abandon that path (and his fatherhood) long ago.

Had Luke joined him, he would have sold his adopted family (his friends who actually loved and supported him) to torture and death.

How easy it would have been for Luke to give in to the lie.

How easy it is for all of us.

Protect and safeguard

Luke must have realized somewhere along the way (probably during their lightsaber dual sometime after the Sith Lord cut off his hand) that fatherhood is not about power–it’s about protection.

Fatherhood (like motherhood for women) is in fact a vocation all men must either embrace, or run from.

It demands that men selflessly protect, provide and lead their families through various perils to safety.

It also compels them to fulfill their role as “shepherd” (guarding and defending their families from both spiritual and physical attacks).

And when they fail to do these things (or have them taken from them), they lose their sense of purpose.

And when this problem reaches a societal level it is devastating, and that civilization simply cannot survive.

Women, children and its defenseless members become open to predation and exploitation, and are left exposed to fend for themselves.

It’s the same with spiritual fatherhood: If shepherds of the Church do not safeguard the truth and feed and protect their “sheep”, the sheep scatter, are picked off one-by-one, and devoured by “wolves”.

Just as a father would lay down his life for the sake of his family, a good shepherd must lay down his life for his “sheep”.

As St. Augustine of Hippo (354-430 AD) put it: “So the shepherds of Christ’s flock must never indulge in self-love; if they do they will be tending the sheep not as Christ’s but as their own. And of all vices this is the one that the shepherds must guard against most earnestly: seeking their own purposes instead of Christ’s, furthering their own desires by means of those persons for whom Christ shed his blood.”

Attack on fathers

The destruction of fatherhood weakens and crushes of the family unit.

It doesn’t take a genius to see that fatherhood has been under attack in the United States for decades. Since the influence of the Women’s Movement in the 1960’s, proponents of the Sexual Revolution have sought (and continue through the Transgender Movement) to destroy the gift of fatherhood, leaving a trail of tears in its wake.

But who suffers the most? Always, the children.

Divine fatherhood

When adults experience pain, they too, become like children, reaching out to God, begging for His help and asking Him “why.”

Then, His divine fatherhood steps in, embraces them and helps them get back up again.

Unlike Luke Skywalker, who’s biological father renounced his fatherhood, God cannot because there is no deception in Him.

That means, no matter what we do, we have a Father who loves us unconditionally. We are not orphans.

Christianity is the only religion that boasts of a God as a “father”, and can therefore, be addressed as such.

It was forbidden for the average Jew to utter God’s name (except during specific feast days, and only inside the Temple), for fear of violating the second Commandment.

In fact, blaspheming God’s name was punishable by death (stoning) (Lev 24:16).

That’s why the disciples were amazed and shocked when Jesus instructed them to pray: “Our Father who art in heaven, Hallowed be thy name” (Matt 6:9).

Distinctions

So why is this seemingly small distinction between religions important?

A child knows his father owes him nothing; but he comes to him anyway, because he knows his father loves him.

Since God is Creator and we are creatures, He also owes us nothing.

Yet we depend on Him every second of our existence, because He is existence (“I am who Am”). In fact, we can do absolutely nothing without Him.

A human father loves his own imperfect children no matter what they do.

How much more than, does God. Even with all our frailties, faults and sins, it is entirely appropriate that we can call God, “Father” because of the nature of His divine Fatherhood.

“You, Lord, yourself are our Father” (Isa 63:16).

“…and a little child shall lead them.”

The Israelites had waited for centuries for their Messiah, and suffered through many crushing empires before He arrived–such as the Babylonians, the Persians, the Greeks and the Romans–each one worse than the last.

They wanted a military leader to rally around, a warrior who would re-establish them as a world-power to be reckoned with, as it was in their former glory-days.

Earthly power and political gain seemed to be the answer to all their troubles.

Instead of a warrior like the kings of old, God gave them a helpless Child.

Yet even after the Messiah, the Romans decisively crushed the Second Temple in 70 AD, the source of their religious life and sacrificial worship.

This was hard for many Jews (especially the leaders) to accept.

But God’s Son didn’t come to earth merely to provide them with worldly prominence and military domination.

He wanted to give His people eternal life.

He wanted to let them (and eventually the whole world) know that God longs to set them free from sin and eternal death.

He wanted them (and us) to recognize His Father living in Him.

King David knew this well, 1,000 years before God sent the Christ, as he exclaimed in his Psalm, “You are my father, my God, the rock who saves me” (Ps 89:27).

“He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning nor crying nor pain any more, for the former things have passed away” (Rev 21:4).

Have a blessed Advent season.

Laura