Month: December 2020

Today is my good friend’s birthday. We always used to joke with him about how he was so innocent because he was born on the feast of the Holy Innocents. He is actually a priest now, but his personality still holds more than a hint of mischief, so he is far from innocent.

But really, are any of us? The First Reading states: “If we say, ‘We are without sin,’ we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.” That is the whole reason Jesus came to this world, because we are not innocent.

There is certainly sadness to be felt this day, knowing that so many little children who were innocent had to die due to one man’s (Herod) anger and jealousy. It makes me think of all of the tiny lives lost through abortion every single day.

Today’s Gospel contains one of the saddest passages in Scripture: A voice was heard in Ramah, sobbing and loud lamentation; Rachel weeping for her children, and she would not be consoled, since they were no more.” Yes, it is right that we mourn such an evil injustice and it is right that we mourn our own losses as well.

But let us not remain in this sadness. Let us shift our focus to the first part of the Gospel.  An angel appeared to Joseph in a dream instructing him what he must do, and without argument “Joseph rose and took the child and his mother by night and departed for Egypt.”

I am so inspired by Joseph’s holiness, his blind trust and obedience, that I named my firstborn son after him. He is mentioned so little in the Gospels and very little is known about him. Yet we know that he was so favored by God that he was chosen to be an integral part of the Holy Family. Was he scared?  Yes. Did he feel unworthy? Yes. Was he sure about what to expect? No. Yet in the end, he always made the virtuous decision to obey. And his obedience was blessed by God allowing him to live under the same roof as the Son of God.

The First Reading says: “If we walk in the light as he is in the light, then we have fellowship with one another, and the Blood of his Son Jesus cleanses us from all sin.” Joseph certainly was a man who walked in the light. He is such a great example for us! And maybe, just maybe, as he was walking toward Egypt and all the children were being slaughtered behind him, he recited to himself today’s Psalm to calm his spirits: “Had not the Lord been with us-when men rose up against us, then would they have swallowed us alive, when their fury was inflamed against us… Our help is in the name of the Lord, who made heaven and earth.”

May we follow the example of St. Joseph today and keep listening, keep obeying, and keep walking along no matter what sadness or distress or loss life throws at us.

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Christmas, when you come down to it, is about family. When we look into our nativities at Christmas time, we see a family. We live in a family. The Father has invited us into the heart of the Trinity, the community where we know we belong, are loved, are truly ourselves in Christ, hidden in God. St. Ambrose wrote that Jesus lived on earth that we might live among the stars. He was a slave to make us God’s children. We are his brothers and sisters and co-heirs.

This Christmas we may or may not have been able to gather as family. But this isn’t exactly what I was thinking of as I read the readings for this Feast of the Holy Family.

I’m thinking of my father, and his absolute fidelity to my mom. For just over a year they have lived in an independent living complex that she might be safe. You see, she suffers with Alzheimer’s. I noticed this year that the First Reading sounds one way when we hear it as a child, another way when we hear it as a young adult, and still another when we hear it in our fifties, as we watch the two dearest people in the world who gave us life, begin to struggle, and stumble, and hold each other to the end.

It’s no longer about obedience. It’s no longer about having to take care of them when they are old. It is about reverencing all that they have become.

In the Second Reading, the letter to the Colossians reminds us of how to live in the family instituted by Jesus, as his brothers and sisters… and in any and every family.

“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.”

With every day my love for my parents grows deeper as I watch them heroically stand by and for each other through these years, even as I suffer not being able to be with them or make things just a little easier for them.

I understand that your feelings about family may be different than mine, your experience, your history, your own memories, may perhaps be tainted with sorrow. But for all of us, in our own unique ways, we can receive the words of Simeon spoken to Mary as spoken in some mysterious way to us: “…and you yourself a sword shall pierce….”

On this Feast of the Holy Family may we find our own way to reconciliation with our own families, as best we can. May we have new eyes to wonder at the courage and the love we witness, a new heart to hold the suffering and the weakness, a new will to be there for them as best we can.

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