Jesus' Stance On Familial Unity

It is seldom the case that a personal quest for truth results in unity, but it does often result in thorough division.  Family is not exempt from this trend.  That which is controversial is often brushed aside in order to simplify familial relationships, and challenging that status quo will likely offend people who are comfortable with relationships built purely (or largely) on arbitrary or emotional connections.  Theological conservatives tend to have a particular anxiety about criticizing one's family.

The Bible does not elevate family above all other relationships, contrary to what some might expect due to the claims of evangelicals.  In fact, Jesus explicitly said that he came to turn family members against each other, with spiritual differences being the dividing factor (Matthew 10:34-37).  This is far from the conservative idea that family deserves extreme loyalty by virtue of being family, as if even unchosen relationships have some special status as long as siblings or parents are involved.

Jesus himself regarded familial devotion as trivial by comparison to another kind of devotion: one which is oriented towards truth at the expense of human relationships.  Relationships founded on a mutual commitment to discovering and understanding truth have a superior foundation to that of relationships that lack this mutual concern for truth--even if the relationships in question are with parents or siblings.  Social harmony is ideal, but only if that harmony is not based on existential superficiality or petty assumptions.

The only kind of unity that is universally valuable on the Christian worldview is philosophical unity.  Some people may subjectively appreciate general cooperation with others (and others may even enjoy relational conflict), but there is nothing truly important about such non-ideological cooperation other than the potential for pragmatics, even when family is concerned.  Ideological siblings are more significant than biological brothers and sisters could ever be on their own.  Cultural pressures to treat parents and siblings with a default level of respect exceeding that which one is encouraged to show to the average person are irrational at best.