The Holy Family of Jesus, Mary, and Joseph

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.St. Edward on the Lake, Lakeport, MI
December 30, 2012
Sir 3:2-6, 12-14; Col 3:12-21; Lk 2:41-52

As we continue our celebration of Christmas, we take time in the Church’s calendar to celebrate the Feast of the Holy Family of Jesus, Mary, and Joseph.  Christmas is always a time about family, and so it makes sense that we take time to include the Holy Family in our celebrations.  But today we not only celebrate them; we hold them up as an example and model of all Christian families.  The Holy Family is what every Christian family must look like in terms of holiness.  Obviously, you have one member who is the Son of God, one who is the Queen of Heaven and Earth, and one who is the greatest saint after Mary, so we’re never going to reach that high bar mainly because of our own sinfulness and human weaknesses.  But this feast reminds us that we have to strive to imitate their virtues even in our day-to-day lives.  Most of us aren’t going to be called to great feats of holiness that are going to find their way in the history books.  Most of us are called to strive for holiness by living in a virtuous way our ordinary lives.  What makes us holy is not the greatness of our acts, but how much love we put into our acts.

Unfortunately, there are many challenges that the world throws at us that often keep us from being what we are called to be both as individuals and as families.  And in fact, our culture is becoming less and less hospitable toward families.  Everything from abortion and contraception on demand to the push to legalize same-sex unions to our culture’s acceptance of promiscuous living works to undermine the strength of our families which has led to terrible consequences in our culture.  That’s why this Feast of the Holy Family is more important today than perhaps any other day in our lifetimes.  Today, we come together as a Church to ask the Holy Family to pray for us so that all Christian families may be strengthened and protected and that they can be more like theirs everyday.

But why is it so important for our families to strive to imitate the Holy Family?  Blessed John Paul II put it this way: “As the family goes so goes the nation and so goes the world in which we live”.  The Church has always believed that the key to a healthy society is healthy families.  Families form the building blocks of our culture.  To weaken the family is to weaken what our societies are built on.  Everything that we do, all the values that we learn all start within the family.  The Catechism of the Catholic Church puts it this way:

In our own time, in a world often alien and even hostile to faith, believing families are of primary importance as centers of living, radiant faith. For this reason the Second Vatican Council, using an ancient expression, calls the family the Ecclesia domestica (the domestic church).  It is in the bosom of the family that parents are “by word and example . . . the first heralds of the faith with regard to their children.”[1]

I love that description of the family as the domestic church.  Yes, we come here to worship God and to be nourished by Him.  But it’s at home where we learn how to put what God has given us to use.

So what can families do?  What can our families here at St. Edward on the Lake do so that 1) we can imitate the virtues of the Holy Family and 2) be a positive impact on the culture around us?  Well, the key word that describes the foundation of every family is sacrifice.  And three words from our Second Reading today really point to this idea of sacrifice.  St. Paul uses the words subordinate, love, and obey.  They all have to do with sacrifice as long as we truly understand what they mean.  As Christ humbled Himself to become one like us, as Christ humbled Himself to die on a Cross, so must you and I humble ourselves to one another.  And it’s in the family where that skill to humble oneself is learned and practiced.

To subordinate ourselves means to place ourselves under another, to regard another as more important than ourselves.  That of course means denying ourselves and our own will.  To obey means to do what another asks of us, which again means to deny ourselves in favor of another.  To love means to seek the good of another which again means to forget about ourselves in favor of the one we love.

But our culture hates these words.  Much of the culture is allergic to the idea of sacrifice.  It’s more about looking out for number one.  Entitlement.  And these ideas are what destroy a culture.  We have to recover the idea of sacrifice, of living not for myself but for God and neighbor.  Sacrifice breathes life into the world, into parishes, into marriages, and into families just as our Lord’s sacrifice on the Cross breathes eternal life into our souls.  We have to return sacrifice to the heart of every family and every parish.  And that works starts with parents.  Parents have to live it and teach their children how to live it.

Children, all of the dull and mundane chores that you have to do around the house sometimes are designed to teach you to look out for the good of others.  St. Therese of Lisieux taught us to do all of those little things with great love and God will fill you with the love of Christ.

Parents, teach your children to strive for greatness, but especially to teach their children who God is.  God has given them many gifts to be used for the good of the Church and of the world.  Teach them to use those gifts for the glory of God.  Parents (and I know that I’m preaching to the choir here), bring your children to Mass.  Nothing is more frustrating as priest than to hear children’s confessions and when they confess that they haven’t been to Mass in a week or month or longer.  Obviously, it’s not their fault.  They depend on their parents.  Maybe you’re tired and maybe you don’t feel like getting out of bed on a cold Sunday morning.  That’s why they call it “sacrifice”, and when you obey God’s commandment to keep the Lord’s day holy, and when you do it simply out of love for Him, what a great gift that you offer to Him!  And what an example of sacrifice that you teach to your children.

All of us have the duty to pray for families: our own families, troubled families, and families throughout the world.  And lastly, we as Christian families have an obligation to stand up against the cultural attacks against the family.  The issues of marriage and family and life are the issues of our time.  Who would have thought ten years ago that there would be this debate about the traditional definition of marriage?  But that’s how far our culture has fallen.  We certainly can’t look to the government to defend the family, so we as Christian have to do this work ourselves.

May the Holy Family be our guide, and may they sanctify all of our families.

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.