Church leaders address family disintegration
TACLOBAN CITY — Leaders of the Church of Jesus Christ of LatterDay Saints (LDS Church) will put family disintegration in the spotlight as it observes the 26th National Family Week on September 24-30.
“As a church, we are for the idea in giving better position to improve the status of the family. We are pushing to go back to the God-inspired view of strengthening the family. The strength of any organization will not depend on the leaders, but on the individual members of the home,” Mark Espedilla, one of the church’s bishops in its Tacloban stake said.
Pedro Bimbo Tan, an LDS leader in the Tacloban stake which has over 5,000 members, urged the public to participate in the four activities during the celebration: Family History and Genealogy, Family Home Evening Program, Church Welfare and SelfReliance Program and LDS Family Services.
Espedilla said Family History and Genealogy helps members trace their roots through Family Search, an app which keeps a collection of records, resources, and services to help people learn more about their family history.
The church has the biggest shared collection of genealogical records in the world.
Family Home Evening Program also promotes family bonding. Every Monday, families dine, pray and eat together for at least 30 minutes.
Although technology has brought a lot of advantages, Tan expressed alarm over parents and children spending more time with their gadgets and on the internet than with their family.
“Parents should know when to stop using mobile phones and other gadgets. Restrain on social media should also be taught. How can we have strong family if the family life is dominated by social media and other online activitie,” he said.
Joy Alban, director of Tacloban Institute of Religion, said their LDS Family Services not only covers an addiction recovery program covering alcohol, tobacco, drugs, coffee and tea, but also gambling, pornography, inappropriate sexual behavior, code- pendency and disorders associated with eating.
“We have a 12-step program dealing with addiction, including social media disorders. We want to call back our family together. We want to have a balance on the spiritual side and inculcate the value of family together with the good programs of the government in order to lessen social ills such as drug addiction,” Tan said.
“The church is using a lot of social media, but we want restrain in doing that. We want to be responsible. We do not want to hurt other people, other faith, because that is not being Christlike and the Church does not stand for that,” he pointed out.
Espedilla said a food and business bazaar, skills training and other self-reliance seminars will cap off the celebration as part of their Church Welfare and Self-Reliance Program.
Pursuant to Presidential Proclamation No. 60, National Family Week is celebrated “to increase awareness on various family issues; enhance effectiveness of national and local efforts to carry out specific programs concerning families by generating new programs concerning families by generating new activities and strengthening existing ones; and promote collaboration among national and local non- governmental organizations in support of multi-sectoral activities.”