The
Feast of the Holy Family of Jesus, Mary, and Joseph
Dear brothers and sisters,
Up
until a relatively short time ago, we, as a society, recognized the family as
the most important institution to the building of a just and harmonious
society. The family was seen as the place in which we learned fundamental
values, among which are how to love one another, how to forgive one another,
and how to put others before myself. The family was seen as a school of love
and self-forgetfulness. This selflessness was learned from watching the example
of a husband and wife whose principle task was to “establish between themselves
a partnership of their whole life, … which of its own very nature is ordered to
the well-being of the spouses and to the procreation and upbringing of
children” (canon 1055 §1).
We
knew that for a happy and successful marriage, a husband needed to put the
needs of his wife ahead of his own. We knew that for a happy and successful
marriage, a wife needed to put the needs of her husband ahead of her own. We
knew that for a happy and successful marriage, a husband and wife had to
safeguard their relationship and look to it first. We knew that parents needed
to put the needs of their children ahead of their own and that children should
honor and respect their children, just as parents should honor and respect
their children. We knew that if each member of the family looked to the example
of Christ Jesus family life would be beautiful, attractive, and lifegiving.
But
something happened along the way and we decided it was acceptable to ignore centuries
of wisdom. Rather than continuing to protect and safeguard the family because
of its importance to the common good, we decided it was acceptable to redefine
and to refashion the family because of our selfish desires.
We
first decided that no longer should children be received and welcomed as gifts
and blessings from God, but that we should instead be able to determine when
and how many were accepted. When contraception was widely used and considered good,
despite its clear violation of the law of nature, husbands and wives decided
they could separate the two aims of the marital act; they changed its primary
focus from that of a complete gift of self to each other and turned it into the
satisfaction of individual desires. No longer would marriage be about the
mutual well-being and unity of the spouses that increased their love and made it
fruitful; it would no longer be about each other, but what other others can do for
me. From here, a second decision that children could be done away with if they
were not wanted seemed an obvious – even if grotesque and deplorable - consequence.
Once
marriage was no longer seen as the full sharing of life and love between the spouses,
it was an easy jump to say that marriage was also no longer permanent. First we
decided that marriages could simply be dissolved in difficult and tragic
circumstances. Then, quite against the very clear words of the Lord Jesus, we
decided that marriages could be ended for any reason, or even no reason at all.
As
these changes to the long-standing and accepted definition of marriage were
made over the course of just a few decades, most Christians regrettably went
along with them and even welcomed them gladly. From this, as many rightly
warned, the family received a very great wound from which it has not recovered.
Family life began to fall apart and, with it, society, as well. These are not
popular words today, but the truth is not always very popular.
Christians
accepted these changes, and even pioneered them because we largely forgot that
The Bible is full of families,
births, love stories and family crises. This is true from its very first page,
with the appearance of Adam and Eve’s family with all its burden of violence
but also its enduring strength (cf. Gen 4) to its very last page, where we
behold the wedding feast of the Bride and the Lamb (Rev 21:2, 9).[1]
We forgot that family life – and
even life generally – is not necessarily meant to be easy, but rewarding. We
forgot that marriage and the family is to be the school of love and
selflessness. We forgot that the family is not about me, but about us.
It is a curious reality of the
inner workings of the mind of God that he continually chooses to allow us – weak
and sinful as we are - to be instruments of his grace.
The ability of human couples to beget life is the path along
which the history of salvation progresses. Seen this way, the couple’s fruitful
relationship becomes an image for understanding and describing the mystery of
God himself, for in the Christian vision of the Trinity, God is contemplated as
Father, Son and Spirit of love. The triune God is a communion of love, and the
family is its living reflection. Saint John Paul II shed light on this when he
said, “Our God in his deepest mystery is not solitude, but a family, for he has
within himself fatherhood, sonship and the essence of the family, which is
love. That love, in the divine family, is the Holy Spirit”. The family is thus
not unrelated to God’s very being.[2]
We came to reshape marriage
according to our own desires because we forgot that we are made in the image
and likeness of God and that marriage is meant to reflect the inner life of God,
to make his love the foundation of our lives.
This is, in part, why the Second
Person of the Most Holy Trinity chose to be born of a woman and to take on our
flesh at Bethlehem.
In
the Gospel we do not find discourses on the family but an event which is
worth more than any words: God wanted to be born and to grow up in a
human family. In this way he consecrated the family as the first and
ordinary means of his encounter with humanity.[3]
The importance of the family is
intimately involved with the mystery of Christmas and gives us good reason to
ask how well our families reflect the love of the Trinity.
The presence of so many young
children in this parish is a sign of great hope for the future, not only for
the future of this parish, but for that of society as a whole, and their chattering
and laughs makes my heart smile. We know it takes only a little yeast to leaven
the dough and only a small flame to dispel the darkness. You, young parents,
have a tremendous and beautiful opportunity and mission.
Husbands and wives, strive to love
each other well and freely, not because of what your spouse gives or brings to
you, but simply for the sake of your spouse; love your spouse because of your spouse. If you do, you
will imitate the love of God who loves us not because of what we can do for
him, but because we are. Follow the counsel of Saint Paul and
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. And let the peace of Christ control your hearts, the peace into
which you were also called in one body. And be thankful (Colossians 3:12-15).
Allow your marriage to be marked by
gratitude, forgiveness, and love so that you may always reflect the merciful
love of the Christ Child to a hurting world. Let your marriage always shine out
as a beacon of hope to the suffering. Teach your children how to forgive one
another and how to let go of grudges. Teach them, through your own example, the
beauty of a life lived for others. Teach them to trust in God and not in
themselves. Teach them to open their hearts to God and to allow him to dwell in
them richly.
If you do this, if you make your
marriages a full sharing of life and love and a true and complete self-gift to
each other, your marriages will be happy and successful and, more importantly,
you will be reflections of God’s love; you will attain your purpose. You and
your children, by the grace of God, will be able to begin slowly rebuilding and
refashioning society by restoring a recognition of the beauty of marriage.
Standing
today at the close of this calendar year and at the threshold of a new year, we
can look forward in gloom or in hope; we can look at the wound that we have
inflicted on the family and on society, or we can look at the remedy. Some
sixteen hundred years ago, Saint Augustine said, “Bad times! Troublesome times!
This men are saying. Let our lives be good; and the times are good. We make our
times; such as we are, such are the times.”[4]
Let
families, then, be again schools of love and selflessness. Let them place the
Child Jesus in the center of their hearts! Let us always give thanks to the Father
for the gift of his Son and, like the prophetess Anna, speak of him to all who
will listen, both in our words and in the manner of our lives. Let us strive to
conform our lives to him and so change the times in which we live that we may
all come to dwell in the joy of the Father’s house. Amen.
