The Sunday within the octave of Christmas is
always dedicated to contemplation of the Holy Family, giving us the opportunity
to meditate on the way in which the family structure, established by God and perfectly
mirrored in the Holy Family, reflects His own familial nature (as Father, Son,
and Spirit) and shows us the truth about ourselves and our deepest longings for
love, acceptance, and communion with other persons.
The Readings for this beautiful feast provide
the celebrant with two options for a set of Readings: the standard Readings for
the feast (ABC): Sirach 3:2-14; Psalm 128; Col 2:12-21; and Matt 2:13-23. Then, there are the optional alternative
readings for Year C: 1 Sam 1:20-28; Ps 84 (selections); 1 John 3:1-2, 21-24;
and Luke 2:41-52. The Readings are
chosen as a thematic whole, so it is best not to “mix and match” between the
two sets of Readings. [Strangely,
the USCCB website provides both sets of Readings except for the Gospel, for
which they give only the Year C alternative (Luke 2:41-52).] In what follows, I will
provide comments on all the Reading options, both ABC and C. (See here for the full readings options:
https://bit.ly/2BKn3Ia)
1. The
First Reading (ABC) is Sirach 3:2-6, 12-14:
God sets a father in honor over his children;
a mother’s authority he confirms over her sons.
Whoever honors his father atones for sins,
and preserves himself from them.
When he prays, he is heard;
he stores up riches who reveres his mother.
Whoever honors his father is gladdened by children,
and, when he prays, is heard.
Whoever reveres his father will live a long life;
he who obeys his father brings comfort to his mother.
My son, take care of your father when he is old;
grieve him not as long as he lives.
Even if his mind fail, be considerate of him;
revile him not all the days of his life;
kindness to a father will not be forgotten,
firmly planted against the debt of your sins
—a house raised in justice to you.
a mother’s authority he confirms over her sons.
Whoever honors his father atones for sins,
and preserves himself from them.
When he prays, he is heard;
he stores up riches who reveres his mother.
Whoever honors his father is gladdened by children,
and, when he prays, is heard.
Whoever reveres his father will live a long life;
he who obeys his father brings comfort to his mother.
My son, take care of your father when he is old;
grieve him not as long as he lives.
Even if his mind fail, be considerate of him;
revile him not all the days of his life;
kindness to a father will not be forgotten,
firmly planted against the debt of your sins
—a house raised in justice to you.
Sirach is the last of the wisdom books in the
Catholic order of the canon, and may be regarded as a massive summation of the
Israelite wisdom tradition composed c. 200 BC.
In fact, Sirach is truly a meditation on the entire body of Israel’s
Scriptures from the perspective of wisdom, that is, the practical knowledge of
successful living. Because Sirach
provides such a useful digest of the moral message of the Old Testament
Scriptures, the early Church used it heavily in catechesis, earning it the name
“Ecclesiasticus,” that is, “the Church book.”
Sirach excels in giving practical
advice—teaching people the application of natural virtues in daily life. Early on, the Church realized that it was
difficult to catechize pagan cultures that did not practice the natural virtues
well. Theological virtues—faith, hope,
and love—rest upon and perfect the natural virtues—prudence, justice,
fortitude, and temperance. The Book of
Sirach was employed to form people in basic Judaeo-Christian morality and
family life. Leading a moral and
well-ordered natural life is, of course, not ultimate goal of the Christian
life—union with God is. However, it is
very difficult to make progress in union with God in the midst of immorality
and disorder.
The teaching of the Book of Sirach frequently
strikes us these days as quaint or dated.
However, our modern alternatives to the moral vision laid out in this
book have not been empirically successful—by almost any psychological or
sociological measure, our culture is growing more unhealthy and
dysfunctional. Sirach has been treasured
in Christianity (and even in Judaism) for centuries because its principles
work.
The first paragraph of this Reading from Sirach
focuses on the responsibility of children to revere their parents. One’s relationship with one’s parents affects
one’s relationship to God: it preserves one from sin, merits forgiveness of
sin, and makes one’s prayers efficacious.
Happy is the person who finds it easy to revere
his father and mother, because they are virtuous and admirable people! You are truly blessed in body and soul. But many of us meditating on these Readings
struggle with this command to revere parents, because we have been hurt by them:
perhaps we are children of divorce, or were abandoned my father or mother. Perhaps we suffered abuse of some kind. How then do we react to this Reading?
It is still applicable to us. Our identity is so strongly bound up with our
parents that hatred of them becomes self-hatred, damaging us at the core of our
being. So for the sake of our own health
and the health of our relationship to God, we need to pray for divine
strength—what we call “Grace”—to forgive hurts that otherwise are beyond our
ability to forgive, and ask God to show us whatever was good, true, and
beautiful in our parents, in order that we may emphasize and dwell on that.
Isn’t this part of “loving our neighbors as
ourselves”? Aren’t we conscious of ways
we sinned against our own children, and don’t we hope they will come one day to
forgive our vices and emphasize our virtues?
This Reading from Sirach is, in a way, an application to the
child-parent relationship of the principle of the Lord’s prayer: “Forgive us
our trespasses, as we have forgiven those who trespass against us,” because “if
you forgive men their trespasses, your heavenly Father also will forgive you; but
if you do not forgive men their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive
your trespasses. (Matt 6:14-15).”
The second paragraph of this First Reading
especially commends honoring one’s father in his old age. These verses remind us of the times that Pope
Francis, like his predecessors, has emphasized that the moral measure of a
society—and we may add, of individuals, too—is how we treat the very old and
the very young, those who don’t seem to “contribute” very much to the
economy. This de-supernaturalized way of
evaluating human worth is contrary to the Gospel of Jesus Christ. The elderly deserve honor and care for their
own sake, as image-bearers of God.
Moreover, since there is an order to charity, those closest to us (like
our parents) have the first claim on our love.
Therefore, much later in salvation history, St. Paul will affirm: “If
any one does not provide for his relatives, and especially for his own family,
he has disowned the faith and is worse than an unbeliever” (1 Tim 5:8). Why “worse than an unbeliever?” Because he brings discredit to the Christian
faith.
1c. The
First Reading option for Year C is 1 Sam 1:20-22, 24-28, the preferred choice to complement the Gospel Reading of the Finding
of the Boy Jesus in the Temple:
In those days Hannah conceived, and at the end of her term bore a son
whom she called Samuel, since she had asked the LORD for him.
The next time her husband Elkanah was going up
with the rest of his household
to offer the customary sacrifice to the LORD and to fulfill his vows,
Hannah did not go, explaining to her husband,
"Once the child is weaned,
I will take him to appear before the LORD
and to remain there forever;
I will offer him as a perpetual nazirite."
Once Samuel was weaned, Hannah brought him up with her,
along with a three-year-old bull,
an ephah of flour, and a skin of wine,
and presented him at the temple of the LORD in Shiloh.
After the boy's father had sacrificed the young bull,
Hannah, his mother, approached Eli and said:
"Pardon, my lord!
As you live, my lord,
I am the woman who stood near you here, praying to the LORD.
I prayed for this child, and the LORD granted my request.
Now I, in turn, give him to the LORD;
as long as he lives, he shall be dedicated to the LORD."
Hannah left Samuel there.
whom she called Samuel, since she had asked the LORD for him.
The next time her husband Elkanah was going up
with the rest of his household
to offer the customary sacrifice to the LORD and to fulfill his vows,
Hannah did not go, explaining to her husband,
"Once the child is weaned,
I will take him to appear before the LORD
and to remain there forever;
I will offer him as a perpetual nazirite."
Once Samuel was weaned, Hannah brought him up with her,
along with a three-year-old bull,
an ephah of flour, and a skin of wine,
and presented him at the temple of the LORD in Shiloh.
After the boy's father had sacrificed the young bull,
Hannah, his mother, approached Eli and said:
"Pardon, my lord!
As you live, my lord,
I am the woman who stood near you here, praying to the LORD.
I prayed for this child, and the LORD granted my request.
Now I, in turn, give him to the LORD;
as long as he lives, he shall be dedicated to the LORD."
Hannah left Samuel there.
Hannah is one of the more important types of the
Blessed Virgin Mary in the Old Testament.
Hannah’s name is a feminine form of the Hebrew word for “grace” or
“favor,” (Heb. hēn), so her name is
quite literally “Grace,” a foreshadowing of a woman who would be “full of
grace” (Luke 1:28). Both women, Hannah
and Mary, had natural impediments to childbirth: Hannah was barren, Mary was
virginal. Both bore sons who were
answers to prayer, boys who became priest-prophets and saviors for their
people. Thus it has long been recognized
that the narratives about Samuel’s childhood in the early chapters of 1 Samuel
have influenced Luke’s telling (or else his source materials) for the infancy
narratives in Luke 1-2. For example, it
is useful to compare Hannah’s song of thanksgiving in 1 Sam 2:1-10 with the
Blessed Mother’s “Magnificat” in Luke 1:46-55 and note the many
similarities. Again, we may note that
Luke twice refers to Jesus “growing in wisdom and favor with God and men” (Luke
2:40,52), which is modeled on the summary of Samuel’s childhood in 1 Sam 2:26.
The point of the similarities is that the life
and ministry of Jesus is not unexpected and unanticipated. Though he is the unique God-Man, yet the
people of God have been prepared for his coming over centuries by a chain of
great prophetic saviors who foreshadowed him.
This First Reading has a particular parallel to
the Gospel of Luke 2:41-52: in both narratives, the young boy-prophet is
brought up to Israel’s central sanctuary and left there.
Before moving on to the other Readings, let us
remark briefly on the moral or practical sense of this First Reading, that is,
how it may instruct us in a lifestyle that pleases God. In this passage we see that the conception of
Samuel is the answer to his mother’s prayer, demonstrating God’s ultimate power
to open and shut the womb. The Catholic
Church always shows reverence for God’s sovereignty over matters of life and
death, in part by refraining from the illegitimate manipulation over both
processes, whether through contraception, in
vitro fertilization, surrogate motherhood, euthanasia, or unwarranted
application of the death penalty. It is
strange that in an era in which there is such respect for the natural order,
such efforts not to disturb the environment through “excess carbon emissions,”
destruction of the rainforest, or the introduction of genetically modified
organisms, there yet remains such contempt and disdain for Catholic reverence
for the natural order of conception
and childbirth, and for the natural process
of death. Again, this Catholic reverence
is an expression of deference to the sovereignty of God in matters of human
destiny, a deference supported in today’s First Reading. Hannah also respects the natural order by
breast-feeding her child until he is three, the traditional time of weening in
the ancient world. Physiologically this
is ideal for childhood development and the bonding between mother and
child. But it is often not possible in
modern society which prioritizes employment outside the home and pressures
mothers to “work” in addition to raising their children, as if the raising of
children were not the most important “work” a human being could be engaged in,
short of the explicit worship of God.
Again, in this Reading we note the generosity of
Hannah, that she corresponds to God’s
generosity toward herself (God gave her a son) by returning God’s love (giving
her son to God). This correspondence of generosity is a virtue we also see in Our Blessed Mother, who,
having received Jesus from God, in turn gives him back to God at the foot of
the cross (John 19:25). This example is
instructive for those of us who are parents. We need to be reminded that our
children are ultimately gifts from God, given to us not to simply please us and
perpetuate a family legacy, but given to us to be cared for on God’s behalf,
and ultimately offered for his service.
And although our children can serve God in many ways, this text reminds
us that many are needed for the service of “the sanctuary,” which is now the
Church. Vocations are desperately needed
for the religious life and the priesthood, and these vocations are fostered at
home, by parents with generous hearts, gladly willing to offer their children
for a life of service to God and his people.
P. Responsorial
Psalm (ABC) is Psalm 128:1-2, 3, 4-5:
R. (cf. 1) Blessed
are those who fear the Lord and walk in his ways.
Blessed is everyone who fears the LORD,
who walks in his ways!
For you shall eat the fruit of your handiwork;
blessed shall you be, and favored.
R. Blessed are those who fear the Lord and walk in his ways.
Your wife shall be like a fruitful vine
in the recesses of your home;
your children like olive plants
around your table.
R. Blessed are those who fear the Lord and walk in his ways.
Behold, thus is the man blessed
who fears the LORD.
The LORD bless you from Zion:
may you see the prosperity of Jerusalem
all the days of your life.
R. Blessed are those who fear the Lord and walk in his ways.
Blessed is everyone who fears the LORD,
who walks in his ways!
For you shall eat the fruit of your handiwork;
blessed shall you be, and favored.
R. Blessed are those who fear the Lord and walk in his ways.
Your wife shall be like a fruitful vine
in the recesses of your home;
your children like olive plants
around your table.
R. Blessed are those who fear the Lord and walk in his ways.
Behold, thus is the man blessed
who fears the LORD.
The LORD bless you from Zion:
may you see the prosperity of Jerusalem
all the days of your life.
R. Blessed are those who fear the Lord and walk in his ways.
This psalm emphasizes the natural blessing that family
life is. One of the blessings God grants
to the one who fears him is the joy of married love and fruitfulness:
Your wife shall be like a fruitful vine
in the recesses of your home;
your children like olive plants
around your table.
in the recesses of your home;
your children like olive plants
around your table.
This does not rule out the possibility that
person may sacrifice the great good of family life in order more radically to
be devoted to God through a life of celibacy (Matt 19:10-12). But the person
who gives up family life because he or she has contempt for them, misunderstands
the call to religious life. Marriage
and family life are a great good. They
mirror the life of the Trinity, since God Himself—Father, Son, and Holy
Spirit—is familial in his nature.
“Father” and “Son,” after all, are family terms. Apostolic celibacy gains its value because it
is the sacrifice of a great good (a spotless lamb) in order more fully to
dedicate this temporal life to God and to His sacramental family, the Church.
Sadly, marriage and family life are not even
perceived as desirable goods by many in our culture. Marriage rates are dropping and too often
children are perceived as a burden and distraction from our career or hobbies. Is that well-ordered? Is one’s job at some corporation really a
greater eternal good than one’s own child?
We are very far from seeing reality through the eyes of God.
P. The optional Psalm for Year C is Ps 84:2-3,
5-6, 9-10:
R. (cf. 5a) Blessed are they who dwell in your house, O Lord.
How lovely is your dwelling place, O LORD of hosts!
My soul yearns and pines for the courts of the LORD.
My heart and my flesh cry out for the living God.
R. Blessed are they who dwell in your house, O Lord.
Happy they who dwell in your house!
Continually they praise you.
Happy the men whose strength you are!
Their hearts are set upon the pilgrimage.
R. Blessed are they who dwell in your house, O Lord.
O LORD of hosts, hear our prayer;
hearken, O God of Jacob!
O God, behold our shield,
and look upon the face of your anointed.
R. Blessed are they who dwell in your house, O Lord.
In its canonical context, Psalm 84 is embedded
among psalms that reflect the oppression and decline of the Davidic monarchy
(kingdom of Judah) culminating in the exile reflected at the end of Psalm
89. In the midst of this difficult time,
the Temple is a place of consolation for the faithful of Israel, who come to
learn that true peace is not found in the houses of men, but only the house of
God.
This Psalm fits with the First Reading and
Gospel for Year C. In both these
Readings (1 Samuel 1 and Luke 2) we see faithful families making pilgrimage to
the House of the Lord, either the Tabernacle or the Temple. The lifestyle of a believing family should
reflect respect and devotion for the place of worship—getting to Sunday Mass is
the weekly “pilgrimage” of the modern Catholic family.
There is also an interesting dynamic going on
between the faithful family and the place of worship: both are icons or
quasi-sacraments of God’s heavenly Temple.
The Catholic family and the Catholic church building are both images of
this reality. The family is the domestic
church, and the church building is an external image of the true Church, which
is built of “living stones” and consist of the mystical body of Christ, Christ
alive in all his members. In the end,
Church, family, and Temple are all the same thing. God’s “Temple” is the Church, which is
composed of persons, all of whom have been united by the Holy Spirit into the
Family of God.
It is natural, then, that individual nuclear
families of believers would want to make pilgrimage to places of worship that
image God’s true Temple. The Catholic
family finds itself at home in a Church, because the Church building is an
external representation of the family’s true nature.
On a practical note, the Church building can
become a place of solace and refuge in the confusion of this present life. When the news both outside and within the
Church seems continually filled with confusion and strife between competing
parties, the Catholic family needs to tune out the noise and rediscover God’s
presence in such devotions as Eucharistic adoration.
2abc. The
Second Reading (ABC) is Col 3:12-21:
Brothers and sisters:
Put on, as God’s chosen ones, holy and beloved,
heartfelt compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness, and patience,
bearing with one another and forgiving one another,
if one has a grievance against another;
as the Lord has forgiven you, so must you also do.
And over all these put on love,
that is, the bond of perfection.
And let the peace of Christ control your hearts,
the peace into which you were also called in one body.
And be thankful.
Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly,
as in all wisdom you teach and admonish one another,
singing psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs
with gratitude in your hearts to God.
And whatever you do, in word or in deed,
do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus,
giving thanks to God the Father through him.
Wives, be subordinate to your husbands,
as is proper in the Lord.
Husbands, love your wives,
and avoid any bitterness toward them.
Children, obey your parents in everything,
for this is pleasing to the Lord.
Fathers, do not provoke your children,
so they may not become discouraged.
Put on, as God’s chosen ones, holy and beloved,
heartfelt compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness, and patience,
bearing with one another and forgiving one another,
if one has a grievance against another;
as the Lord has forgiven you, so must you also do.
And over all these put on love,
that is, the bond of perfection.
And let the peace of Christ control your hearts,
the peace into which you were also called in one body.
And be thankful.
Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly,
as in all wisdom you teach and admonish one another,
singing psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs
with gratitude in your hearts to God.
And whatever you do, in word or in deed,
do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus,
giving thanks to God the Father through him.
Wives, be subordinate to your husbands,
as is proper in the Lord.
Husbands, love your wives,
and avoid any bitterness toward them.
Children, obey your parents in everything,
for this is pleasing to the Lord.
Fathers, do not provoke your children,
so they may not become discouraged.
This Reading breaks down into two main sections:
the first concerns how to behave with the spiritual family which is the Church,
the second how to behave within the natural family, the ecclesia domestica, the domestic Church.
The second section lays out responsibilities of family
members toward one another. “Wives, be
subordinate to your husbands, as is proper in the Lord.” This is because, throughout Scripture,
beginning with Adam in the Garden-sanctuary of Eden, the ideal held up for the
father and husband is to serve as the priest or spiritual leader of the family,
the domestic church. To do this, he
needs the support of his wife. He needs
her both to expect and to respect him as the “family priest,” as
it were. The children will take their
cue from their mother. If they see she
does not respect her husband or look to him for spiritual leadership, the
family becomes disordered. Let’s
remember the Blessed Mother, who—though she was the sinless Mother of
God—looked with respect on St. Joseph and honored him as her husband.
To lead the family toward God is the
responsibility of a husband and father, but one that is frequently
shirked. When I worked in urban
ministry, I encountered fathers who were willing to send their kids to Church or
youth programs, as long as they weren’t involved. I told them they’d do more for their children
by leaving the kids and home and coming to worship themselves.
St. Paul moves on to speak of the husband’s
responsibility: “love your wives and avoid any bitterness toward them.” A longer treatment of the husband’s
responsibility is found in the famous passage of Ephesians 5, that likens the
husband’s love of his wife to that of Christ for the Church. Thus, the model of Christ’s love even to a
sacrificial death is held out as normative for husbands. This is a high calling. It also rules out any abuse, any selfishness,
any chauvinism, any “machismo” on the part of the husband. Any such thing is a disorder incompatible
with the command to love one’s wife as Christ loved the Church. Though the husband many be the priest of the
domestic church, this is for him a role of service, not one of “lording it over
others” (see Luke 22:25-26).
St. Paul moves on to speak of children and
fathers. “Children, obey your parents in
everything.” Of course, this does not
mean to obey parents in anything that is sinful. Obedience is always guided by the moral law
of God. In moral issues, “we must obey
God rather than men” (Acts 5:29). This
holds true also for sins against our person.
We are not called to submit to offenses against our person perpetrated
by one in authority.
But St. Paul presumes the good will of parents
in this passage, and so says, “obey your parents in everything,” knowing that
parents typically have the best interest of their children at heart, and that,
moreover, willful disobedience just introduces chaos into the home.
Then he says, “Fathers, do not provoke your
children, lest they become discouraged.”
Notice that he addresses fathers!
He assumes that fathers take an active role in the raising of their
children, and of setting family policy!
He assumes they do more than come home from work and sit on the couch
drinking beer and watching football! The
role of the father is so important in children’s development. Let’s not listen to the lies of those who say
the father can be replaced without harm: that is bad science and bad
theology. The father who is a strong,
loving, and directing presence in his children’s lives contributes greatly to
their spiritual and psychological health, and makes it easier for them to find
faith in a God who calls Himself “Father.”
2c. The optional Second Reading for Year C is 1 Jn 3:1-2, 21-24:
Beloved:
See what love the Father has bestowed on us
that we may be called the children of God.
And so we are!
The reason the world does not know us
is that it did not know him.
Beloved, we are God’s children now;
what we shall be has not yet been revealed.
We do know that when it is revealed we shall be like him,
for we shall see him as he is.
Beloved, if our hearts do not condemn us,
we have confidence in God and receive from him whatever we ask,
because we keep his commandments and do what pleases him.
And his commandment is this:
we should believe in the name of his Son, Jesus Christ,
and love one another just as he commanded us.
Those who keep his commandments remain in him, and he in them,
and the way we know that he remains in us
is from the Spirit he gave us.
See what love the Father has bestowed on us
that we may be called the children of God.
And so we are!
The reason the world does not know us
is that it did not know him.
Beloved, we are God’s children now;
what we shall be has not yet been revealed.
We do know that when it is revealed we shall be like him,
for we shall see him as he is.
Beloved, if our hearts do not condemn us,
we have confidence in God and receive from him whatever we ask,
because we keep his commandments and do what pleases him.
And his commandment is this:
we should believe in the name of his Son, Jesus Christ,
and love one another just as he commanded us.
Those who keep his commandments remain in him, and he in them,
and the way we know that he remains in us
is from the Spirit he gave us.
The liturgical season of Christmas is marked by
the reading of 1 John. The Church turns
to this epistle from the Beloved Disciple in order to “go back to basics” at
the start of the liturgical year. St.
John reminds us of the fundamental truths of our faith.
One such truth in this reading is the fact that
we have become “children of God.” This
is not simply a metaphor for the creator-creature relationship. This is a literal statement. Through Baptism, we have received the Holy
Spirit, which works an essential or ontological change—a change of our nature—conferring
on us a likeness to God which makes us his children.
True childhood is to share in nature of the
Father. It is not that spiritual
childhood through the Holy Spirit is similar to real childhood which is
biological. Rather, biological childhood
is similar to real childhood which consists in partaking of the Father’s
nature through his Spirit.
This is a unique truth of the Catholic faith—other
religions do not teach that we are the children of God, or else they mean it
only in a metaphorical way. The truth of divine childhood is even obscured in
some non-Catholic forms of Christianity: many Protestant theologians deny
divine filiation or reduce it to a metaphor.
But the Apostle John was enthralled with the
truth of divine filiation, and to the end of his life, his joy over being a son
of God was not diminished. Even as a
very old man—for such he was when he authored this epistle—the excitement about
being a child of God had not dimmed: “See what love the Father has bestowed
upon us, that we may be called ‘children of God’. And so we are!” John uses the term “called” in its ancient
Hebrew sense as “defining the nature of a person.”
Even though divine filiation is arguably the
central truth of the Christian faith, in practice it has been and continues to
be forgotten by so many Christians. St.
Josemaria Escriva “rediscovered” this truth in his early priestly ministry when
God gave him the gift of infused prayer.
He writes about this experience as follows:
“I felt the action
of God, bringing forth in my heart and on my lips, with the force of something
imperatively necessary, this tender invocation: Abba! Pater! (‘Abba! Father!’). . . . Probably I made that
prayer out loud. And I walked the streets of Madrid for maybe an hour, maybe
two, I can’t say; time passed without my being aware of it. People must have
thought I was crazy. I was contemplating, with lights that were not mine, that
amazing truth. It was like a lighted coal burning in my soul, never to be
extinguished.”
“I understood that
divine filiation had to be a basic characteristic of our spirituality: Abba,
Pater! And that by living their divine
filiation, my children would be filled with joy and peace, protected by an
impregnable wall. And they would be apostles of joy, communicating their peace,
even in the face of their own or another’s suffering. Because we are convinced
that God is our Father.”—St. Josemaria Escriva
G. The Gospel (ABC) is Matt 2:13-15, 19-23:
When the magi had departed, behold,
the angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream and said,
“Rise, take the child and his mother, flee to Egypt,
and stay there until I tell you.
Herod is going to search for the child to destroy him.”
Joseph rose and took the child and his mother by night
and departed for Egypt.
He stayed there until the death of Herod,
that what the Lord had said through the prophet might be fulfilled,
Out of Egypt I called my son.
When Herod had died, behold,
the angel of the Lord appeared in a dream
to Joseph in Egypt and said,
“Rise, take the child and his mother and go to the land of Israel,
for those who sought the child’s life are dead.”
He rose, took the child and his mother,
and went to the land of Israel.
But when he heard that Archelaus was ruling over Judea
in place of his father Herod,
he was afraid to go back there.
And because he had been warned in a dream,
he departed for the region of Galilee.
He went and dwelt in a town called Nazareth,
so that what had been spoken through the prophets
might be fulfilled,
He shall be called a Nazorean.
the angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream and said,
“Rise, take the child and his mother, flee to Egypt,
and stay there until I tell you.
Herod is going to search for the child to destroy him.”
Joseph rose and took the child and his mother by night
and departed for Egypt.
He stayed there until the death of Herod,
that what the Lord had said through the prophet might be fulfilled,
Out of Egypt I called my son.
When Herod had died, behold,
the angel of the Lord appeared in a dream
to Joseph in Egypt and said,
“Rise, take the child and his mother and go to the land of Israel,
for those who sought the child’s life are dead.”
He rose, took the child and his mother,
and went to the land of Israel.
But when he heard that Archelaus was ruling over Judea
in place of his father Herod,
he was afraid to go back there.
And because he had been warned in a dream,
he departed for the region of Galilee.
He went and dwelt in a town called Nazareth,
so that what had been spoken through the prophets
might be fulfilled,
He shall be called a Nazorean.
This Gospel is one of the few that focuses on
St. Joseph as the protagonist. Let’s
recall a few facts about such a great but overlooked saint. St. Joseph was of royal blood. In fact, he himself was heir to the throne of
Jerusalem: that is the point of the genealogy of Matthew 1. However, although he is the legitimate heir,
he has to flee from the imposter who actually sits on the throne: Herod, a
half-Jewish, half-Edomite aristocrat and politician who bribed, manipulated,
and married his way onto the throne of Israel.
Herod is one of the original anti-Christ figures of the Bible.
Although St. Joseph was of the royal line of the
tribe of Judah, he’s named after the patriarch of a different tribe, one that
always rivaled Judah for leadership of the twelve tribes of Israel (cf. Gen
49:10 & 26, NAB). Like Joseph of the
coat-of-many-colors fame, St. Joseph is particularly open to communication from
God, and receives revelatory dreams that involve traveling to Egypt and
preserving God’s people from harm.
In this period of salvation history, the safety
of the Holy Family and thus the preservation of the hope of salvation for the
entire human family is all in St. Joseph’s hands. Mary is immaculate, the child Jesus divine,
but like many good action movies, at the moment of crisis the plot is all in
the hands of the one character who does not have “superpowers”! In this way St. Joseph is a type of the
believer: Jesus entrusts himself to us, he dwells within us through his Spirit
and the Eucharist. In a way, too,
through the communion of saints in the Spirit, the Blessed Mother dwells with
us (John 19:27). But how well do we
cherish the Lord and his mother who have been entrusted to us? Do we allow their life to flourish, such that
we can say, “It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me?” (Gal.
2:20).
What does the Scripture highlight about St.
Joseph? What qualities does it put
forward as the virtues that made him successful in the role to which God called
him?
We note two qualities in this passage: (1) He was open to hear the voice of God,
and (2) he was prompt in obedience.
Practically speaking, being open to hear the
voice of God in our own lives usually requires certain habits, among which we
may list: (1) devoting adequate time to prayer, including silence in prayer
when we can let our heart be moved by God; (2) reading and meditating on
Scripture, through which God speaks to us; (3) the counsel of a holy confessor
or spiritual director; (4) the practice of penance and (at least small)
mortifications, through which we develop detachment from the material goods and
pleasures that often dull our spiritual senses.
Hearing the word of God for us must lead to
action, however. Some spiritual writers
say that God stops sending inspirations when we habitually refuse to act on
them.
St. Joseph sets an example for all Christian
fathers in particular, and for all believers generally, of how to hear God’s
Word and obey it. St. Joseph, pray for
us!
Gc. The Gospel
for Year C is “The Finding of the Boy Jesus in the Temple,” Luke 2:41-52:
Each year Jesus' parents went to Jerusalem for the feast
of Passover,
and when he was twelve years old,
they went up according to festival custom.
After they had completed its days, as they were returning,
the boy Jesus remained behind in Jerusalem,
but his parents did not know it.
Thinking that he was in the caravan,
they journeyed for a day
and looked for him among their relatives and acquaintances,
but not finding him,
they returned to Jerusalem to look for him.
After three days they found him in the temple,
sitting in the midst of the teachers,
listening to them and asking them questions,
and all who heard him were astounded
at his understanding and his answers.
When his parents saw him,
they were astonished,
and his mother said to him,
"Son, why have you done this to us?
Your father and I have been looking for you with great anxiety."
And he said to them,
"Why were you looking for me?
Did you not know that I must be in my Father's house?"
But they did not understand what he said to them.
He went down with them and came to Nazareth,
and was obedient to them;
and his mother kept all these things in her heart.
And Jesus advanced in wisdom and age and favor
before God and man.
of Passover,
and when he was twelve years old,
they went up according to festival custom.
After they had completed its days, as they were returning,
the boy Jesus remained behind in Jerusalem,
but his parents did not know it.
Thinking that he was in the caravan,
they journeyed for a day
and looked for him among their relatives and acquaintances,
but not finding him,
they returned to Jerusalem to look for him.
After three days they found him in the temple,
sitting in the midst of the teachers,
listening to them and asking them questions,
and all who heard him were astounded
at his understanding and his answers.
When his parents saw him,
they were astonished,
and his mother said to him,
"Son, why have you done this to us?
Your father and I have been looking for you with great anxiety."
And he said to them,
"Why were you looking for me?
Did you not know that I must be in my Father's house?"
But they did not understand what he said to them.
He went down with them and came to Nazareth,
and was obedient to them;
and his mother kept all these things in her heart.
And Jesus advanced in wisdom and age and favor
before God and man.
New Testament scholar Richard Bauckham proposes a rather direct connection between the text of our First Reading this Gospel portion. Bauckham suggests that the boy Jesus may have understood himself a priest-prophet designated from birth, on the model of Samuel, and that when his parents brought him up to the Temple on this occasion, he believed that the plan and expectation was that he would stay and begin his service in the Temple, as Samuel did. The theory is speculative, but worth considering. It would explain Jesus’ apparent confusion when his mother and father finally arrive: “Why were you looking? Did you not know … ?” In other words, Jesus thought his parent’s plan was that he would stay.
One of the obvious themes in this Gospel is the
true origin of Jesus, or in other words, the true Fatherhood of Jesus. Though Joseph is (rightly) called Jesus’
“father” by the Our Blessed Mother (“your father and I have been looking for
you”), nonetheless Jesus responds “Did you not know that I must be in my
Father’s house?”, reminding us of Jesus’ divine origin, and that Joseph was in
the end only his adopted father.
At first we are tempted to say that for most of
us, this is a difference between Jesus and ourselves. We have natural biological fathers, but Jesus
had God as his Father. But again on
further reflection, we have to admit that there is not so much difference—or
better said, there is a closer analogy between our origin and Jesus’. Like Jesus, those of us who have been
baptized have been “born of God,” born in a supernatural way from a heavenly
father: “To all who received him, who believed in his name, he gave power to
become children of God; who were born, not of blood nor of the will of the
flesh nor of the will of man, but of God” (Jn 1:12-13). This is the point of the Second Reading option
from 1 John 3:1-2, 21-24. Our biological fathers are in a
sense merely adoptive fathers, stewards of our education and well-being until
we can begin our lives of prophetic and priestly service to God. All fatherhood has its origin in God (Eph
3:15 [Greek patria]), a point Jesus
himself drives home with great force: “call no man on earth ‘father,’ for you
have one Father in heaven” (Mt 23:9). In
the church’s spiritual tradition, this powerful doctrine of childhood to God is
called divine filiation, and it is
the source of great joy for believers.
As we contemplate the Holy Family this Sunday, we need to ponder the
fact that, like Jesus, we have a supernatural origin from God the Father
through the power of the Holy Spirit.
Having God as our Father makes it possible for us to break out of
patterns of sin that we may have learned, consciously or unconsciously, from
our human fathers—good men though they may have been—and live in “the glorious
freedom of children of God” (Rom 8:21).
The moral sense of this Gospel also contains
important reminders. Although the whole
incident with the loss of Jesus in the Temple was finally resolved without harm
to anyone, nonetheless we must recognize the event must have been a terrible
stress and strain on St. Joseph and the Blessed Mother. This account reminds us that even in a family
of two great saints and a divine child, misunderstandings arise and can cause
strain on relationships. Faithful living
of the Christian virtues can alleviate many of the more obvious dysfunctions in
family life, but are not a guarantee of
freedom from all stress and difficulty. There
is some consolation in realizing this, and we can thank St. Luke for recording
this incident, which reminds us that Jesus, Mary, and Joseph also had to bear
with the sufferings of a fallen world, even though they did not participate in
sin.
We are also instructed by the humility of Jesus,
who being already wise in the Scriptures at the onset of his manhood (age
twelve being a traditional time of transition from boy to man), nonetheless
submitted to his parents and was “obedient to them.” In families, as in all human organizations,
there has to be some order of authority for the sake of the common good. Often it happens that the one exercising
authority is less gifted in various ways than those he or she is entrusted to
lead and care for. Such was the case in
the Holy Family: St. Joseph was entrusted with its leadership, though he was
neither immaculately conceived like his wife, nor divine like his son. Perhaps he was tempted at times to feel
inadequate to the job. Yet in his role
as father, he had the support of his obedient son and the trust of his wife,
which certainly must have been a great encouragement.
The role of the father is greatly under attack
in contemporary culture, and it is even becoming politically correct—even if
wholly false from a scientific and objective perspective—to claim that fathers
are optional, and children do just as well or better being raised, for example,
by two women rather than by their own father and mother. Yet the Scriptures assume that the Christian
father is one who takes responsibility for, and thus leads, his family under
the ultimate guidance of Christ himself.
So, going back to the Second Reading, we find that within the love of
the Christian family, there remains an order of authority:
Wives,
be subordinate to your husbands,
as is proper in the Lord.
Husbands, love your wives,
and avoid any bitterness toward them.
Children, obey your parents in everything,
for this is pleasing to the Lord.
Fathers, do not provoke your children,
so they may not become discouraged.
as is proper in the Lord.
Husbands, love your wives,
and avoid any bitterness toward them.
Children, obey your parents in everything,
for this is pleasing to the Lord.
Fathers, do not provoke your children,
so they may not become discouraged.
This beautiful yet challenging text
lays out the reciprocal responsibilities of the members of the Christian
family. Jesus’ example of obedience to his parents reminds us that deference to
proper authority is not based on some “superiority of essence,” for certainly
the Lord’s parents were not superior beings to him.
The limit to obedience to authority is
always the threshold of sin, for to obey someone to sin is to disobey a higher
authority, God. Therefore this text of
St. Paul has to be understood in light of the full teaching of Christian and
biblical morality. Children are not
obliged to follow their parents into sin—including sins against themselves,
that is, against the children. Likewise
in the husband-wife relationship, the injunction to be “subordinate” only holds
in the realm of morally permissible action.
The leadership of the husband is only valid as he follows Christ—a
father’s authority in the home does not extend to violation of the law of
Christ and the Church.
As we mature in our relationship with
Christ, we begin to realize more and more than any position of leadership,
whether in civil society (mayor, governor), business (boss, manager), the
church (pastor, bishop), the home (father, mother) is a responsibility for the
well-being of others, and more of burden (from a human perspective) than a
privilege (see Matt 20:27-28; Mk 10:44-45; Lk 22:24-27).
Whatever our role in our respective
families, this Feast Day presents an excellent opportunity for us to make an
examination of conscience concerning whether we are living the virtues that make
for “happy and cheerful Christian homes” (a phrase of St. Josemaría Escrivà).
These virtues are largely listed in Colossians 3, one of the options for the
Second Reading. This text from
Colossians would be an excellent one to take to personal prayer sometime during
this Feast Day.
This Feast also presents us an
opportunity to ask for the intercessions of the Holy Family to live family life
while. In a particular way, those of us
who are fathers may wish to invoke St. Joseph for the help we need to fulfill a
role for which we often are inadequate if left to our own resources.
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