Feast of the Holy Family of Jesus, Mary and Joseph

 Lectionary: 17

Brothers and sisters:

Put on, as God’s chosen ones, holy and beloved,

heartfelt compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness, and patience....

Annually, on the Sunday between Christmas and New Years Day, the Church celebrates the Feast of the Holy Family of Jesus, Mary, and Joseph. 

We have to notice that churches, both Catholic and Protestant, use family words like brother, sister, father, and mother to describe their membership. They appear often in the writings of the New Testament, where they’re also called saints. We saints are brothers and sisters to one another; and it's hard to tell which model comes first. Should saints love one another like brothers and sisters; or should human families be holy like saints? 

There is something charming and alarming about families, whether they’re biological or religious. That is, we're not given a choice about who we should love. Dad took Mom off to the hospital one day. Two people went and three people came back two days later. Not once did they ask me if I wanted another brother or sister. Given a choice I'd have asked for a horse or a swimming pool, either of which is less trouble than another baby. But there you are! Deal with it! 

Someone comes to our church. They say they believe in Jesus as their Savior and Lord. They speak with an accent, hail from the wrong side of town, wear the worst clothing, sport tattoos, or belong to an alien race. They may have a criminal record. But they’ve been baptized and made their First Communion. They belong, and we welcome them. 

The Lord gives us the members of our family; he doesn’t give us a choice of who we want to love or not love. Deal with it.

 

That’s not the American Way, someone might say. But the American way of picking and choosing family members we love for as long as we want to love them, and no longer – causes loneliness, confusion, anguish, distress, and despair. And no one is happy about it. Freedom is not free, nor is it a free choice. 

As a chaplain in two different hospitals, I met many people who had married several times. They had chosen, loved, divorced, and disowned their way through many shattered families. Some had completely lost touch with their first wives and husbands; and the children they’d had by them. They had grandchildren they had never seen, could not name, and would disown if they were to meet them. I met some who didn’t know if their parents were alive or dead, and didn’t want to know. Picking marriage and choosing divorce has become a way of life, a nuclear cloud that blocks the  sunlight from millions of homes, children, and lonely adults. They’re like sheep without a shepherd. 

When Saint Joseph was first betrothed to Mary of Galilee, the charming young woman was a virgin. And then she was pregnant. But they were nonetheless betrothed and he was committed. Saint Matthew says he was reassured by an angel in a dream that she had conceived by the Holy Spirit; that he should receive her into his home; and name the child Jesus. By an angel? In a dream? Deal with it.

And then, hearing of the magis’ meeting with Herod in Jerusalem, Joseph had a very bad feeling followed by an ominous dream. And that very night he took the child and his mother into Egypt. We can suppose he grabbed some tools but he left his native town and all his connections and everything he knew and lived in Egypt for twelve years – until they moved back to Galilee, which was not his home; and not his plan. Saint Matthew says, “He did as the angel had commanded him.” 

As he neared death, Saint Francis reminded the friars of how God worked when he created the fellowship of Franciscans. He said, “The Lord gave me brothers.” He didn’t expect to start an Order; he wanted to live as simply as possible, without home or property, as Jesus had lived. But the Lord gave him brothers and created a community which was far more complicated and far more difficult to manage than anything he’d ever dreamed of. Suddenly there were rules to be enforced, chains of command to be worked out; young friars to be educated, aging and infirm friars to care for. And in that messy complexity Francis heard the will of God. “The Lord gave me brothers,” he said. 

We’re not given a choice of our brothers or sisters, in family or in church. Many married people – perhaps all of them – wake up one morning and look at their companions and say, “Who is that? Where’d he come from? What is she doing in my bed?” And that’s when marriage begins. 

The Lord gives us free will; but that is not the choice of this brother or that sister, this husband or that one; this wife or that one. These inlaws or those. Our choice is life or death. I will love the people God gave me: this family and this church; and I will die to every other choice. They can all drop dead because this one is my husband or wife, this one is my child or parent, brother or sister because God gave this one and these people to me. And if I would be saved from everlasting death, I will find my salvation in the sacrifice of forgetting everything I wanted or expected or needed. With God’s help we will make it work.  

The Lord was not kidding when he said you must take up your cross and follow me; nor was he joking when he said, “Unless you eat my flesh and drink my blood you have no part in me.” Our Most Blessed Sacrament is intimately, intensely related to family and church. Some Christians say they do not believe, and will not commit themselves to  the institutions of marriage and religion, or the Most Blessed Sacrament. They don’t want to make that kind of sacrifice. They want their free choice they say; but the Eucharist, and sacrifice, and family all mean the same thing for Catholics. They are inseparable. We eat his flesh and drink his blood and die with him as the people he has called, chosen, and gathered into his family, into his Body, so that we might be raised up with him on the Last Day.