The Holy Family of Jesus, Mary and Joseph / Msgr. Owen F. Campion
The Sunday Readings
The Book of Sirach, the source for the first reading for Mass this weekend, is part of the wisdom literature of the Old Testament. As are many other books in this body of writing, it is highly practical.
When these books were written, albeit at different times and in different places, Jewish parents and elders needed to pass along to their children and to their contemporaries a knowledge of the revelation given the chosen people by God.
They had their reasons. Very often, the culture around them was hostile to their faith. Given the circumstances, the force of the culture was powerful. They lived and worked among pagans who often scorned the ancient Hebrew beliefs. Of course, they had to confront irreligious tendencies of human nature.
In this reading, the author looks carefully at the family, the basic unit of society and of civilization.
The passage calls for honor for parents. Here, the egalitarian sense of the ancient Jewish writings is clear. While the father is acknowledged as head of the household, the mother is entitled to equal respect and veneration. She is in no sense merely a servant or secondary figure.
Sirach especially calls upon children to care for their parents when their parents are old.
The second reading for this feast is from St. Paul’s Epistle to the Colossians. The first part of the reading is addressed to all disciples. It admonishes followers of Christ to love one another. More than a charming platitude, this advice asks the faithful to forgive one another and to be concerned about one another.
In the next part of the reading, Paul urges wives to obey their husbands. Obviously much influenced by the culture of the time, he ends his admonition with these words. He says that husbands should love their wives.
This advice may seem to be little better than a truism. At the time of Paul, spouses rarely wed for love. Parents offered their daughters to the most promising suitors, almost as if the father of the bride sold his own daughter to the highest bidder.
Once married, wives often merely were domestic workers or a means to the ends of parenthood or physical pleasure for their husbands.
Paul’s urging husbands to love wives was thus revolutionary.
St. Matthew’s Gospel supplies the last reading. Of the four Gospels, only Matthew and Luke mention details of the Lord’s birth and early years on Earth. This weekend’s reading is the familiar story of the flight into Egypt.
Shrines in modern Egypt declare themselves to be the sites of the Holy Family’s movement away from the threat of the king’s order in Judea, or of their respite in Egypt, but the Gospel gives no exact details about the Holy Family’s flight, its path or its precise destination.
This is certain. The Holy Family fled from Palestine to safeguard Jesus. They fled into the pagan territory of Egypt.
Finally, this text identifies Jesus of Nazareth, whom many heard and saw, as one and the same as the child born of Mary, and rescued by divine intervention from a scheming, evil king.
Reflection
Still feeling the warmth of Christmas, we this weekend follow the Church in reflecting upon the Holy Family of Jesus, Mary and Joseph, and by extension upon family life itself.
These readings have strong, practical lessons. Families must bond themselves in love. Parents must love children. Children must love parents. Spouses must love each other.
Most importantly no family can survive simply by good intentions. Threats await all families, maybe not threats from evil rulers, but real, nevertheless. Families need God’s protection.
Also clear in Matthew is the concept of mission. Every Christian has a mission. The role of the family is to support each member’s mission, as Mary and Joseph supported the mission of Jesus. †