FEAST OF THE MOST HOLY FAMILY

FEAST OF THE HOLY FAMILY
1Samuel 1:20-22, 24-28: 1John 3:1-2, 21-24.,Gosple: Luke 2:41-52

A kindergarten teacher was helping one of her students put his boots on. He asked for help and she could see why. With her pulling and him pushing, the boots still didn't want to go on. By the time the second boot was on, she had worked up a sweat. She almost whimpered when the little boy said, "Teacher, they're on the wrong feet." She looked and, sure enough, they were. It wasn't any easier pulling the boots off than it was putting them on. She managed to keep her cool as together they worked to get the boots back on, this time on the right feet. He then announced, "These aren't my boots." She bit her tongue rather than get right in his face and scream, "Why didn't you say so?" like she wanted to. Once again she struggled to help him pull the ill-fitting boots off. He then said, "They're my brother's boots. My Mom made me wear them." She didn't know if she should laugh or cry. She mustered up the grace to wrestle the boots on his feet again. She said, "Now, where are your mittens?" He said, "I stuffed them in my boots .

Kids can drive you nuts sometimes. It is part of their growth process. Elders who are not directly involved with them or not directly responsible for their growth look at their pranks and enjoy them, but not really the parents. Each child born in this world is a mystery. Sam Levinson says “Each new born child arrives on earth with a message to deliver to mankind . Clenched in his little fist is some particle of yet unrevealed truth, some missing clue. He must be treated as top sacred”. Each child that comes into the world proclaims that God has not given up on this world.

The confessions of the church hold that Jesus is "fully human, fully God," and in today's familiar story from Luke, we can see both sides. Jesus, fully human, is growing up as all mortals must. In the process, Jesus has scared his parents half to death as all teen-agers do. Jesus is asking questions, as should we all, and he is listening to learn, as all we must. And in this story, we see the twelve-year old Jesus fully divine with everyone amazed at his understanding and his answers. We hear Jesus declaring his unique relationship with God the Father as only the Son can do.
On the last Sunday of the year, the church celebrates the Feast of the Holy Family. Today’s gospel describes how the Holy Family of Nazareth lived according to the will of God, obeying all the Jewish laws and regulations, and brought up Jesus in the same way, so that He grew in wisdom as well as in the favor of God and men.
Children are integral part of the family. If any couple at the time of their wedding decides to do away with children in their marriage, their marriage is invalid before the eyes of the church. Parents and children together make the family. Not the couples alone. Children are gift from God. Couples who don’t have children in their marriage due to biological factors stand before the community as prophets proclaiming to the couples having children that Children are gift from God, you don’t deserve to get them by the fact of your marriage. See we don’t have children, though we like to. So take care of your children as responsible parents. God trusts you with a great responsibility.
Luke gives a detailed story of Jesus’ infancy, with the details of Jesus’ first visit to the Temple of Jerusalem to take on the obligations of the law when he was twelve years old. Every adult Jew (12 years and above) who lived within fifteen miles of Jerusalem had to attend the Passover feast.
Since women and children in a caravan started earlier than men, on the return leg of the trip, Joseph and Mary each thought that Jesus, newly promoted to adult status, was with the other group. But Jesus had actually lingered behind in the Temple, attending the Sanhedrin classes on religious and theological questions as an eager student of Mosaic Law. The gospel tells us that he returned with his parents to Nazareth and there grew up like any other child. Here the evangelist gives a pertinent piece of advice to all the children and youth specially. He obeyed his parents and discharged all his duties to God, to his parents and to the community, faithfully “advancing in wisdom and age and favor before God and man”.
Joseph and Mary were a model family in which both parents worked hard, helped each other, understood and accepted each other, and took good care of their Child so that He might grow up not only in human knowledge but also as a Child of God. To find answer to what makes a family holy we don’t need to go anywhere, just look at the life of Joseph, Mary and Jesus. For example consider the life of Joseph. No Husband ever went through struggles and pain more than what Joseph had to go through. He found his wife pregnant even before he had any relations with her. He experienced humiliation because he could not find a place for her wife to give birth to her son. He had to flee to Egypt at midnight. But he did all this faithfully. In all these things, what he did consistently was that he obeyed God. He knew precisely whom to obey. He subordinated every thing to the will and purpose of God. That made him holy and his family holy. When Mary asked Jesus, “Why did you do this to us?” Jesus replied, “Didn’t you know that I must be about my Father’s business?” For Jesus, Joseph and Mary, the Father’s business was the number one priority. That made them Holy.

A senior Judge of the Supreme Court recently congratulated the bride and groom in a marriage with a pertinent piece of advice: “See that you never convert your family into a court room; instead let it be a confessional. If the husband and wife start arguing like attorneys, in an attempt to justify their behavior, their family becomes a court of law and nobody wins. On the other hand, if the husband and the wife -- as in a confessional -- are ready to admit their faults and try to correct them, the family becomes a heavenly one.” Mary and Joseph did not turn their accusing fingers on each other when they found that the boy Jesus was not with each of them. Natural reaction of any husband or wife would be to accuse each other on finding that their dear child is lost. They serve as great model to families to face any challenge in their life.

The families in today’s society are facing disintegration. The devil upgraded and modernized his tactics to destroy the families. First of all, he makes our lives busy with too many attractive activities and programs. They present these things as vitally important and unavoidable. He convincingly presents religion as a private enterprise and makes us believe that God and religion can wait. So people push God away from the center of their life and make it one among many. When God is pushed away from the center of our life, then I become the center of my life. My primary concern becomes the glorification of my self and not of God .Devil is successfully using the tactics of taking God away from the family by keeping us and our children busy.

The second step to the disintegration of families is Redefining the divine institution of Marriage. Marriage is and marriage can be only between a man and a woman. This is natural law. Even the animal kingdom follows this natural precept. There are concerted attempts from certain corners to destroy this sacred reality of marriage. If their intention is to procure the same economic right and privileges of the married couple to them, they could do it very well through other means. It is time to wake up. As we celebrate the Feast of The Family, let us be aware of it and take bold steps to form our families after the image of the Holy Family of Nazareth.
Theodore Hesburg says “ the best thing a father can do to his children is to love their mother”. And I would say the best thing a mother can do to their children is to love their father. Joseph and Mary loved their son by loving each other. Let the families we live be blessed by the presence and assistance of the Most Holy Family.