FEAST OF HOLY FAMILY OF JESUS, MARY AND JOSEPH – SUNDAY HOMILY [YEAR B]
THEME: WORST FAMILY SITUATION
BY: Fr Andrew Ekpenyong
1. Ideal Family. Each member of the holy family of Jesus Mary and Joseph, had perhaps the worst family situation, compared to each of us and all of us, right now. Let’s start with St Joseph. All husbands and fathers, no matter the situation in your family and marriage right now, are in a better situation than St Joseph. Why? Imagine sharing a house with Mary and Jesus! Joseph shared his house with two sinless people, meaning, if something went wrong, it was Joseph’s fault! Jokes aside, Joseph had it tough as husband of the ever-Virgin Mary, Mother of God, and foster father of Jesus Christ, Son of God. From a merely human perspective, Mary and Jesus somewhat “messed up” Joseph’s life because they “deprived” him of conjugal relations and biological fatherhood. Besides murder you probably cannot hurt a man more than that. Yet, Joseph carried out his roles so remarkably well that in the entirety of Scripture, no word of his, is recorded: he didn’t seem to argue or complain.
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He just did what he was told and stayed in the background. He was the opposite of male chauvinism. Next is our Blessed Virgin Mary. All wives and mothers, no matter the situation in your family and marriage right now, are in a better situation than Mary. The BVM had it “worse”. Imagine giving birth in a manger. A powerful king Herod seeking specifically to kill your child. Having to escape with your baby to a different continent on foot or with donkey. Having the constant fear induced by what we just heard in today’s Gospel reading (Lk 2:22-40): “… and Simeon blessed them and said to Mary his mother, “Behold, this child is destined for the fall and rise of many… and you yourself a sword will pierce…” (Lk 2:35). Mary watched the execution of her only son. And so on. Truly, it is hard to be envious of the Family of Jesus, Mary and Joseph considering all the crises they went through, for the sake of our salvation. They form the model or ideal family and show us how to live our lives in our families and in the wider society in spite of any hardships such as poverty, uncertainties, displacement due to violence, war and persecution.
2. Real Families. For those who are not (yet) spouses or parents, we are certainly children of our parents and we belong to real families, not an ideal one. Today’s 1st reading (Sir. 3:2-6, 12-14) reminds us of some of our duties as children of our parents and citizens of our country. It makes a beautiful synthesis of the 1st and 4th Commandments: “…he who obeys the Lord brings comfort to his mother. He who fears the Lord honors his father and serves his parents as rulers.” (Sir. 3:6-7). Our duties as children cannot be more complicated, than the situation of our Lord Jesus Christ since, as God-man, He had to obey both His heavenly Father, with whom He is co-eternal and equal, as well as His earthly parents. In today’s Gospel reading, we see the ideal situation where His earthly parents took Him to the temple in Jerusalem where they carried out precepts based on God’s covenant with Israel in view of the salvation of mankind. Note that the law which they carried out (Ex 13:2, 12) during the presentation in the temple could have been done elsewhere but His earthly parents chose to do more than what was required, the extra piety of doing it in the temple. However, an apparently conflicting situation did arise about 12 years later (Lk 2:49-50) when our Lord asked his earthly parents: “‘Why were you searching for me?’ ‘Didn’t you know I had to be in my Father’s house?’ But they did not understand what he said to them.” You see, even living with saints still calls for conflict resolution. What followed showed our Lord as obedient to both His heavenly Father and earthly parents: “He went down with them and came to Nazareth and was obedient to them; and his mother kept all these things in her heart.” So, both Mary and Joseph knew how to be silent, how to contemplate God’s wonders, so that their home became not just the model family but also the model church, model family of God.
3. You and Me. We have many lessons to learn from the Holy Family, depending on our state in life. From our Lord, from our Lady and from St Joseph, I learn the lessons of today’s 2nd reading (Col 3:12-17), including “heartfelt compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness, and patience…” which combine to help me live a fruitful celibate life as a spiritual father in the Church, just as St Joseph was a foster father. What about you? The Church offers us more opportunities to learn from the Holy Family in 2024 which has been declared “Year of Prayer”. I suggest we use the Litany of the BVM, the Litany of St Joseph, and the Litany of the Sacred Heart of Jesus, to pray, to praise God and to imitate Jesus, Mary, and Joseph. May 2024 be a year of growth in holiness for you and me, and for the entire human family. Amen.
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