Kristina Chetcuti, in her Sunday column entitled ‘The Perfect Family does not Exist’ (March 26), states, “We need key people in society – like priests – to support the diversity of a modern family, and to keep in mind that not even Jesus’ was a perfect family after all.”

Though it is a fact that no family is perfect and today’s society comprises different family structures, it doesn’t mean that one should not aim at the ideal family.

Chetcuti rightly asserts that “even if the image of the family has changed, what defines it hasn’t”, for, after all, rigid structures do not guarantee good families. Individuals, on their own, without any communion, love and commitment, do not make up a family, even if they live under one roof. What is important, though, in a fast-changing society, is safeguarding those values that help members of a family achieve their aim.

By insisting that the perfect family does not exist, Chetcuti seems to imply that the various family forms that have cropped up due to society’s exigencies have diminished the importance of the traditional, nuclear family, and this can no longer be considered as the ideal family.

For the good of society we have to promote what the social doctrine of the Church states about the family and reaffirm that “the family constitutes much more than a mere juridical, social and economic unit, a community of love and solidarity, which is uniquely suited to teach and transmit cultural, ethical, social, spiritual and religious values, essential for the development and well-being of its own members and of society”.

Though no family is perfect, we all aim at the ideal through our ongoing commitment, selfless love and dedication.