December 28, 2014

Holy Family- Luke 2: 22-40 or Lk 2: 22& 39-40

On the last Sunday of the year, we celebrate the Feast of the Holy Family. The Feast of the Holy Family is connected to Christmas. At Christmas we commemorate the incarnation of Jesus, God becoming a human being to save us. But Jesus was fully divine as he was fully human. In his humanity he lived like us in all things but sin. He lived a perfect human life, a life dedicated to His Father, and obedient to his parents and helping them like any human child.

The first reading is a commentary on the fourth commandment: "Honor your father and your mother." Sirach reminds children of their duty to honor their parents – even when it becomes difficult. He also mentions the five-fold reward which God promises to those who honor their father and mother. The first reward is “riches,” and the second long life: “Whoever reveres his father will live a long life.” Forgiveness of sins and God’s prompt answer to prayers are the fourth and fifth rewards. He reminds children that God blesses them if they obey, revere and show compassion to their father.

Pope Francis said that as a child, he heard a story of a family with a mother, father, many children and a grandfather. The grandfather, suffering from Parkinson’s illness, would drop food on the dining table, and smear it all over his face when he ate. His son considered it disgusting. Hence, one day he bought a small table and set it off to the side of the dining hall so the grandfather would eat, make a mess and not disturb the rest of the family. One day, the Pope said, the grandfather’s son came home and found one of his sons playing with a piece of wood. “What are you making?” he asked his son. “A table,” the son replies. “Why?” the father asks. “It’s for you, Dad, when you get old like grandpa, I am going to give you this table.” Ever since that day, the grandpa was given a prominent seat at the dining table and all the help he needed in eating by his son and daughter-in-law. “This story has done me such good throughout my life,” said the Pope, who celebrated his 78th birthday on December 17. “Grandparents are a treasure,” he said. “Often old age isn’t pretty, right? There is sickness and all that, but the wisdom our grandparents have is something we must welcome as an inheritance.” A society or community that does not value, respect and care for its elderly members “doesn’t have a future because it has no memory, it’s lost its memory,” Pope Francis added.

In an audience Pope Paul VI told how one day, when he was Archbishop of Milan, he went out on parish visitation. During the course of the visitation he found an old woman living alone. ‘How are you?’ he asked her. ‘Not bad,’ she answered. ‘I have enough food, and I’m not suffering from the cold.’ ‘You must be reasonably happy then?’ he said. ‘No, I’m not’, she said as she started to cry. ‘You see, my son and daughter-in-law never come to see me. I’m dying of loneliness.’ Afterwards he was haunted by the phrase ‘I’m dying of loneliness’. And the Pope concluded: ‘Food and warmth are not enough in themselves. People need something more. They need our presence, our time, our love. They need to be touched, to be reassured that they are not forgotten’

Today, the Church encourages us to look to the Family of Jesus, Mary and Joseph for inspiration, example and encouragement.   They 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.

Holy- means healthy. A family can grow healthy only on the key virtues of forgiveness and patience. "Put on... patience," St Paul writes, "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."

There is no way to create an atmosphere of forgiveness without being ready to ask for forgiveness. The best gift we can give our families is to make a commitment to always be the first one to say "I'm sorry" whenever there is the slightest need. That little phrase is like super-glue for family relationships. We need to make the family a confessional rather than a courtroom.  A senior Judge of the Supreme Court congratulated the bride and groom in a marriage with a pertinent piece of advice: “See that you never convert your family into a courtroom; 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.” 

A husband and a wife had a quarrel and they started silent treatment towards each other. When one wanted to communicate something to the other, they wrote the matter on a piece of paper and handed out to the other. One day the husband wanted to on a trip and he wanted to get up early morning at 4.30 to catch a train. He wrote a note to his wife to wake him up at 4.30. At 6.00 am he woke up and found out that it is late and he missed the train. He got angry with his wife when she showed him the piece of paper on which she wrote and kept on his bed. Hi, wake up it is 4.30. (He wrote on a piece of paper asking her to wake him up and she gave back to him on the same coin.) Silent treatments may be good for just a little bit of time, but don’t take it long. As Paul says: let not the sun set in your anger. Lack of communication is the primary cause of marriage break ups. There was a little lack of communication between Joseph and Mary when Jesus was lost in the temple. One thought the other had him and vice versa. But they did not accuse each other for that.

We need to live our daily lives with the awareness that we are dedicated people consecrated to God and that we are obliged to lead holy lives. May the Holy Family intercede for all families that they may remain one and united in the model of Holy Family of Nazareth. Let’s pray for the families that struggle and on the verge of break up that they give up stubbornness and be willing to follow the example of the Holy Family.