My wife, Ever, and I laughed and glanced knowingly at one another. Just a few minutes before arriving at the parish, we had gotten into an argument. The details are fuzzy now, but I do remember that the acrid taste of that spat—within eyesight of the church—was still lingering. We had rushed out of the house that morning seeing chaos everywhere: piles of laundry, unwashed dishes, unopened bills. This is insane! we thought. Standing up in front of parents to share a vision for thriving as a family when we can’t even fold our own clothes! We felt like hypocrites. And rather than offering up to the Lord that constant tension between ideals and reality, we had taken it out on each other.

Truth be told, every parent faces a tsunami of challenges: overwhelming schedules, media overload, financial anxiety, and concerns about being able to pass on the faith. We knew we wouldn’t be the only ones in that room feeling like a failure.

Our Journey. So is it possible for families to feel even a glimmer of tranquility in their homes? And where’s the blueprint for marriage and family life in the first place? These are some of the questions we have been asking—and, at times, arguing or weeping over—from our first days as parents more than two decades ago.

Not surprisingly, within months of welcoming our first of five children, we felt that our backs were against the wall. We had very little time or energy to think through, much less put in place, any sort of plans for making our ideals a reality. In the years that followed, we did experience the joys of family life, but there have also been a number of times when we hit bottom and fell into a kind of spin cycle of frustration.

Today, after years of learning—often the hard way—we believe with every fiber of our being that any family can take steps that will help them thrive. It happens as we learn better how to love and be loved, how to forgive and be forgiven. Bit by bit, we can pattern our family’s daily life after the model of love we see in the Holy Trinity, and that pattern can transform our relationships over time. We believe this so strongly that we founded a ministry intended to help families bring heaven into their homes, both for their own sake and for the sake of the broader culture.

So what does this ministry look like? It begins with a workshop called Heaven in Your Home, where we hope to give parents the kind of head start we wish we’d had.

Getting on the Right Path. One of the first things we do at our workshop is acknowledge how easy it can be to start off on the wrong path. We might equate heaven with our own ideas of peace and comfort. For example, we might focus on having a beautiful home, well-behaved children, and thoughtfully prepared dinners every evening. We might imagine creating attractive social media posts about our curated lives, and then spend all our energy trying to make this picture come together.

We’re all guilty of this to some degree. But we know that the more we pursue such a vision, the more likely we are to end up with impersonal lifestyles and weaker faith—and maybe even at-risk families taken over by anxiety, isolation, and division. Instead of forming an intimate circle of people using their gifts to care for each other, we end up serving ourselves. But the heaven we really want—the image of heaven we present in our workshop—is so much better than this. It’s nothing less than our enjoyment of God’s own life.

Scripture tells us that we are made in God’s image and likeness (Genesis 1:26-27). It also tells us that God is a Trinity—a communion of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit in which each One is focused not on self but on the others (2 Corinthians 13:13; John 17:10). This is the life of communion, marked by mutual giving, that we believe God wants families to strive for and even experience. As the Catechism of the Catholic Church states, “The Christian family is a communion of persons, a sign and image of the communion of the Father and the Son in the Holy Spirit” (2205). That’s why we like to call a home in which a family strives to image God a “Trinity House.”

Building a “Trinity House.” Now this is where we tell parents that instead of being intimidated by such a lofty ideal, they can breathe a tremendous sigh of relief! That’s because the “communion of persons” in a family already resembles God’s “communion of persons” more closely than anything else on earth. Every family that is founded in love, no matter how haltingly it lives in love, is already made in the image of God. The dynamics of God’s life already belong to that family. So our goal is to help them discover and deepen the life they already have.

But what does this mean practically?

During our workshop, we hone in on five levels of family life. Each level is arguably vast, but we are careful to point parents to just one core practice they can initiate on each level and one special place that will help them flourish in that core practice. Once these core practices and special places have been established, families can then use our online Trinity House resources to keep building their lives together.

• The first level is called Faith Life, and the focus is on how we as families receive our communion from God. If our goal is communion, there is no better place to start than with the core practice of keeping a holy sabbath, anchored with Sunday Mass. There, as we celebrate the Eucharist, we can be rooted in our communion for the week ahead. The special place that supports this level is a home altar, a space set aside in the home where the family can gather for daily prayer. Even if that gathering lasts only a couple of minutes, it can become a habit that helps make the faith come alive.
• We call the second level Person and Relationships, and this is where we focus on strengthening our communion, first as husband and wife, and then with our children. The core practice here is a regular date night, when a couple invites God’s love into their marriage so that it can flow out into their family and other relationships. The special place for this level is a quiet place, like a cozy bedroom, a reading nook, or a backyard swing. It’s any place where a couple can share with each other what is on their hearts.
• In level three, Household Economy, we talk about caring for our communion as a family with the core practice of establishing a weekly family meeting and a chore day (or just a chore morning!). This is a time of shared work as a family. The special place here is some kind of dedicated workspace in the home that can act as a command center as we work together.
• In the fourth level, Family Culture, we celebrate our communion as a family. The core practice here is a family meal, which is ideally a daily gathering when we enjoy one another and share about our work from the day. Naturally, the special place is the kitchen table, an inviting place where we can celebrate together.
• Finally, level five is Hospitality and Service. Here is where we share our communion with those around us. The core practice involves our being faithful to one outreach, one small way that we can develop our relationships outside the home. The neighborhood is the special place for this level—the natural starting point from which we can reach out and share with other people our family’s taste of heaven.

Receiving communion from God in the Eucharist and then strengthening, caring for, celebrating, and sharing that communion: this is how families can find heaven. This is how we can create an atmosphere of communion with one another and with God in our homes.

Finding Heaven. Watching young parents glimpse this vision makes our years of floundering seem worthwhile. As that young dad said so well, experiences of purgatory are sometimes necessary to help convince us that we all need to find heaven!

So as we took to the stage at that parish workshop, we began with a confession: “We have glimpsed heaven in our home, but not nearly as often as we’d like! So wherever you are in this journey of parenting, you’ve come to the right place.” A sense of relief washed over the room, and we felt our recent argument fade away as we shared with them our vision of finding heaven in our homes. 

Soren and Ever Johnson are founders and directors of Trinity House Community, whose mission is to “inspire families to make home a taste of heaven for the renewal of faith and culture.” To learn more, visit www.trinityhousecommunity.org.