Holy Family, Suffering Family

There is a reason why we form children as much with images as with words. Images can be a powerful teacher. When I was growing up, my family had an image of the Holy Family that hung on our wall. When I was still very young, I remember asking my mother about it: “Who are they?” I asked. She responded: “That’s the Holy Family: Joseph, Mary, and Jesus.”

I think that image fascinated me because I could see that my family looked something like the Holy Family. My dad was like Joseph, my mom was like Mary, I was like Jesus, and best of all my little sister and brother didn’t fit in at all! That picture told me something about what God intended my family to be like, and when I didn’t go along with that – when, for example, I was mean to my sister and brother – it was as if I could feel that image of the Holy Family urging me to be better.

Today’s Feast of the Holy Family has a similar purpose. We can see in the Holy Family the purpose God has for family life: a community of persons formed and united in love. God intends the family to be the basic unit of human society, founded on the self-gift of spouses united by marriage and ordered to the good of their children, raising them and educating them in virtue. In the family home, the fruits of love and joy and peace are born forth: taught, learned, and shared.

Sadly, we know that our human families often fall short of that ideal. When we experience tragedy or difficulty, the Holy Family may sometimes feel like a distant ideal, very far removed from the reality of our own family lives. Perhaps today’s feast even causes us pain, as we compare the Holy Family with our own family’s sufferings and shortcomings. But lest we think that the life of the Holy Family was completely idyllic, the Gospel today reminds us that they were not immune to suffering. When Mary and Joseph take Jesus to the Temple in Jerusalem, the righteous man Simeon prophesies to them that their Child will be the glory of Israel, a light to all the nations. But he also tells them he will be a sign of contradiction – words that were proven true true when he was rejected, arrested, tortured, and murdered. And Simeon tells Mary that she too will be pierced by "a sword" – not a physical suffering and death, like her Son, but the spiritual cross of experiencing his death with him.

The Scene of Christ in the Temple (1516) by Fra Bartolommeo

Today’s Gospel tells us quite pointedly that suffering was right at the heart of the Holy Family. Consider the other things we know the other very difficult things they experienced: Mary was called to become the Mother of the Savior at a young age; Joseph was called to accept a woman pregnant with a Child that he knew was not his; they were forced to give birth in humble circumstances, far from their own land; they had to flee to Egypt because a king wanted to murder their son; Mary and Joseph even lost Jesus for three days on a pilgrimage to Jerusalem. All of these experiences would have been difficult, most of them traumatic, and yet all of them are merely a prelude to what comes later: Christ’s own passion and death.

What sustained the Holy Family in their trials? The same thing that can sustain us and our families when we suffer: grace. God allowed the Holy Family to suffer because it too was part of the mystery of redemption for which he sent his Son. That mystery of redemption culminates in Christ's cross, which is also the font from which every grace is given. In this way it was fitting that Jesus's family would experience suffering, since his own suffering was the source by which they also lived in grace. 

In other words, Jesus was born into our world to redeem every part of the human experience, and that includes the lived experience of the family. For our families to also experience his redemption, we will also experience the mystery of redemptive suffering. Sometimes that suffering comes from outside the family – e.g., death, illness, infertility, debt, unemployment – and sometimes it comes from within – e.g., marital strife, abuse, infidelity, addictions, loneliness, resentments, abandonment, and more. In all of it though, the grace of Christ can be made present. God can give to our Christian families the grace we need not only to endure the sufferings that come but to give witness in them to his Son, through our faith, hope, and love. It is for this reason that the Christian family can often be a place of both great love and great suffering – but never suffering hopeless or meaningless, but always suffering that can bring forth even greater love through the power of grace.

Friends, I hope you have an image of the Holy Family in your own homes; if you don’t, consider getting one. It can be a great way of forming your children, your grandchildren, and even yourselves – not just as a model to strive for but as a reminder of the power of grace in the midst of suffering. Just as God sustained the family of Nazareth by his grace so too he can sustain yours, but always in the degree to which you seek to unite your lived experience – whether as spouses, as parents and grandparents, as sons and daughters – to that of Jesus, and that is true especially for your sufferings.

As we continue our Christmas celebrations, may the grace of this Eucharist renew us so that we can help make alive again the mysteries of faith, hope, and love in our family lives.

The Heavenly Light

[This homily refers to John 1:1-18, the Gospel for the Mass During the Day of Christmas]

Did you get to see the Christmas Star? If you know what I’m talking about, chances are good that you probably did. If it doesn’t ring a bell, then perhaps you at least heard about the phenomenon they called “The Great Conjunction”: on Monday night, the orbits of the planets Jupiter and Saturn aligned at their closest point in centuries, so much so that for the human eye they seemed to form one single point of light in the sky. Because it happened so close to Christmas, for many of us it is reminiscent of the star that the Gospel of Matthew says appeared over Bethlehem and guided the Magi to find the Christ Child.

It’s hard to know for sure if the astrological event this week is what the wise men saw. But there’s still something fascinating about the idea that it might be, something that captures our imaginations and brings home the reality of what we celebrate today. Human beings have long looked up into the heavens to contemplate their own place in the universe and even to try to understand something about the One who created it. In the desire to know about God, many believed that God could communicate to human beings through the movement of stars and celestial bodies, and that these events signified something about what was happening on earth. It was as if the lights of the heavens could also be a light for our minds as well, to understand the universe and our place in it. The great difficulty, of course, is that that’s really hard to do, and perhaps impossible to do. The orbits of the stars and the planets are fascinating, but in the end, they don’t really tell us anything more about ourselves than what we might read into them.

But – and if you’ve been wondering, “Father, why all of this astronomy stuff on Christmas?”, here’s what I’m leading up to: God’s message to human beings *has* been communicated to us from the heavens. He did send a light from on high to illuminate us, but it came not in the form of a star, but in the Person of the Eternal Word, as we heard in the Gospel for our Mass. This passage, known as the Prologue to John’s Gospel, may seem like a strange choice for a reading on Christmas, since it doesn’t mention any of the things we are used to hearing: a star, angels from on high, shepherds, Mary and Joseph, a child born in a manger. What it does do though is clearly communicate what those other stories all mean: that this Child Jesus born in Bethlehem is the Eternal Son of the Father, the Person of the Divine Word of the Holy Trinity. He who is literally Life, through whom all life and all things were made, has now himself come from heaven to dwell with us. 

Gerard von Honthorst, The Adoration of the Shepherds (1622)

That is who Jesus is, but the question still remains: why has he come? To redeem us, to save us from our sins, to make it possible for us sinful human beings to go to heaven? Yes, certainly. But even more fundamentally: Jesus has come to reveal God’s love. John’s Gospel puts it so beautifully: “this life was the light of the human race; the light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.” I don’t need to tell you how dark this year has been: a global pandemic; devastating financial crisis; massive job loss; social isolation; fear and anxiety; racial and political tensions; increase in incidence of addictions and mental illness; millions getting sick; hundreds of thousands, including members of our own families and communities, dying. So many people have suffered, and so many of us are still suffering. We think, “Why, God? Where are you in the midst of all of this?” And I think if we are honest with ourselves those questions always come from this vague, underlying fear that we all share to some degree: that the universe is a cold and unfeeling place; that our short human lives are insignificant; and that, if there is a God, he has better things to do than worry with us.

Christmas, in its essence, is about assuring us that those fears are flat wrong. God *loves* us – not just collectively, but individually. He loves *you*. In Jesus, he has given you the fullest possible assurance of that love; Christ is God’s messenger of love, who is also the message of love himself, who is also God himself. Every question and desire and struggle and doubt that we have – and think for a moment about the ones you have experienced this year, or in any year – all of them find a response, an answer (sometimes, a very mysterious one!) in the Person of Jesus Christ. In truth, we could even say that he is the Great Conjunction of divinity with humanity; his coming tells us what God truly wants us to know.

Now, that is the beginning of the mystery, not the end. To understand that Christ has come out of love for us doesn’t eliminate our sufferings and woes, but it does allow us to begin to see with eyes of faith. At times, the darkness of the world can be thick and oppressive; it blinds so many still. Even we who profess faith, at times we can cast around in the darkness, grasping onto all kinds of things, desperate for something to illuminate our blindness, to assure us that God does love and wishes to communicate that love to us. But the fact is the Light is here; we just need to see it. We need to behold anew its coming – not as a star that appears only every few centuries, not even just in the Birth that we celebrate once a year, but in the presence of a Person always here with us – Really Present among us all the time. He is the Light shining always for us, and not just for us but for all. Having seen the Light, we can bear it also for others – to illuminate the path of those in darkness, to show them a Light no darkness can overcome.

Friends, there is no getting around that this Christmas feels different. Many of the things we like to do are not possible; the warm and fuzzies of the season may feel largely absent. But rather than let that lessen the joy of the season, I suggest it makes it sharper, all the more powerful and meaningful. Jesus is the Light of the World, born for us to show us God’s love, and perhaps we recognize that most clearly when the lights of this world are dimmed, when it’s only his heavenly Light shining in the darkness. May this Christmas be for all of us an opportunity to see that Light anew – not in the sky, not in a manger scene, but present in our minds and hearts, shining even in our darkest moments. Because “the light shines in the darkness” and now we see “his glory, the glory as of the Father’s only Son, full of grace and truth.”

God's Greatest Secret

How good are you keeping a secret? That word often has a negative connotation; we think of secret societies, government secrets, secrets that we don’t want others to know. But some secrets are good, and it is good to keep them – planning a surprise party, for instance, or knowing about a special gift that someone has no idea is coming. Sometimes the hardest secrets to keep are the good ones, the ones we are tempted to share out of joy and excitement.

In the Gospel today, we hear God’s greatest secret – that he himself will be born as a Son to the Virgin Mary in order to save humanity. This reality is, of course, the very reason for the coming Christmas season celebrated by the whole world. Because we know it so well, it can be easy for us to forget that it was originally a secret. From the fall of Adam and Eve in the garden, God had planned to save his people: he formed a covenant with them through Abraham; in Moses he gave them a law to follow; in David he raised up a king to rule over them. All of this was to prepare them for the final redemption, in which a Messiah would come to form God’s people to be a light to the rest of the world. But the wondrous secret – the greatest secret since the foundation of the world – was that this Messiah would be none other than God’s own Son. He would be born into time and history so that in a human way he might show us the depths of divine love, even by dying on a Cross, so that by rising again he could also raise us mere humans to the divine light of heaven.

And that is the Christmas story in a nutshell – the Christian story, too. It is what St. Paul describes as the “mystery kept secret for long ages” now revealed for all the world to believe. It is the realization of the the promise God makes to David to establish his line as unfailing; as the angel says to Mary, Jesus is the true heir to David and “of his kingdom there will be no end.” That God would plan, from all of time, to save his people by himself becoming part of his people, by desiring to walk among us – that is the joyous secret at last revealed, because of which we celebrate, in which we rejoice, by which we have our hope.

The Annunciation by George Lawrence Bulleid (1903)

That God’s greatest secret has at last been made known does not meant that he does not still have joyful secrets to share with us. In Christ, he has revealed his great plan of salvation but how that plan unfolds for each of us is still a mystery to be encountered, to be lived out each day. His plan of redemption came to life in the birth of his Son, but it must be born anew in our lives – in the desires of our hearts, in the pursuits and endeavors of our day to day, in our relationships and encounters with each person we meet. All of that and more takes on a new character in light of this greatest secret made known, the great birth that announces God’s saving plan for you and for me.

The Christmas season feels very near now, but until it arrives we are called to continue our Advent preparation. Perhaps we do that best not by taking away from today’s readings a Scriptural insight or moral teaching, but an invitation to reflect anew upon the mystery of Christ’s birth – maybe according to how we are familiar with keeping a secret. Have we marveled at how God, the master planner of this surprise, has ordered all things well? Do we share in the mystery with eager anticipation, like a man planning to propose to his beloved? Do we treasure it with joy, like a couple who has not yet shared with their family that they are expecting?

Friends, in the end, God’s greatest secret is the one he wants us to share with everyone: the joy and love of his Son Jesus Christ. But perhaps we do that best only when we have taken time to reflect upon it ourselves, and thereby come to a new appreciation for its mystery and grandeur – this secret from long ago that still means so much for us today.

May this Eucharist, itself a mystery of the Lord’s coming to us, inspire us to await with joy and with faith the salvation that Mary’s Child has come to bring.

A Year of Favor

I have said it often enough lately that you may be tired of hearing me say it: it has been a difficult year. Thankfully, it is drawing to a close, and it does seem as if good news is coming. The first approval for a vaccine has now been given, and so perhaps we can begin to see the light at the end of the tunnel for this pandemic. Of course, it hasn’t ended yet, and we know there will still be difficulties ahead; nonetheless, I imagine we all will be very ready to turn the page on this year and start fresh in a few weeks.

I have remarked to a few people that I hope 2021 is everything that 2020 has not been. Can you imagine if instead of what we experienced this year, when it felt like there was wave after wave of difficulties and discouraging news, instead we had a year of good news, happy occasions, and one long continued celebration? Maybe we can even imagine what particular thing we would want to happen, or whom we would like to visit with, or what blessing we would want to receive. To have a year of favor would be a blessing indeed.

In the first reading, the prophet Isaiah announces just such a year to God’s people. What he prophesied was more than just the end of sorrows: it was a revitalization, a spiritual and moral renewal that would touch every part of their lives. And it would be ushered in by a particular messenger, a righteous one through whom God would act – the Messiah, the Anointed One. It is he who will come “to bring glad tidings to the poor, to heal the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to captives and release to the prisoners, to announce a year of favor from the Lord and a day of vindication by our God.” If that passage sounds familiar, it is because it is claimed by Jesus, who in the Gospel of Luke quotes this very passage from Isaiah in his home synagogue in Nazareth. Jesus is the fulfillment of what Isaiah prophesied; it his coming into the world which communicates God’s favor and revitalizes his people.

And yet, Isaiah didn’t live to see that day; Jesus was born several hundred years later. John the Baptist, about whom we heard once again in the Gospel, did live to see Jesus, but he didn’t live to see the revitalization that Jesus began; it’s only after John’s arrest by King Herod that Jesus begins his public ministry, and of course he is executed shortly afterward. And even us today – who live 2000 years after Christ, who believe that he is the Messiah, the Lord’s Anointed, the very Son of God – we have not yet seen the full manifestation of his power and glory, the final restoration of all things. We believe that is coming, but in the meantime, we wait.

Domenico Ghirlandaio, The Preaching of John the Baptist (c. 1490)

In order to wait well, we need something, something that John the Baptist had, something that Isaiah had. It’s a virtue that could be said to sum up the entire season of Advent, maybe even the entirety of our lives as Christians: hope. The word “hope” today often is used to mean little more than wishful thinking. We say, “Let’s hope so,” or “I hope that’s the case,” and we mean a vague notion that perhaps what we want will come true. But that’s not what Christian hope is. St. Thomas Aquinas defined the virtue of hope as “the certain expectation of future happiness.” The hopeful person believes, and believes with *certainty*, that the good thing they are waiting for *will* be fulfilled. They believe it so completely that they have, to a certain degree, the joy of that good thing. It hasn’t come yet, but because it surely will, it already brings joy to those who have hope.

Maybe we can think of this in relation to what I mentioned earlier: about what it will be like when this pandemic comes to an end and when life can go back to normal. We’re not there yet, but even now we can feel a whisper of joy at the idea. Hope is always that way; it must always involves something that hasn’t yet come to fulfillment. As St. Paul says in the Letter to the Romans (8:24-25) who hopes for something they already have? No, hope has to involve an act of faith – to believe, to fully *expect* that happiness is coming, even if it can’t yet be seen.

Isaiah had hope for Christ, even though he never saw his coming. John the Baptist did, too, even though he never saw the extent of his power. Hope is always what sustains us – through this long and difficult year, but also in any form of suffering, public or private, that we have to endure. To hope is to believe that despite the sufferings of the present moment, God will surely give us happiness. Perhaps we ask – but what about those things that we can't hope for: a relationship that has has broken, a loved one who has passed away? How can I hopeful about those things. For the Christian, hope is never rooted in a particular good – a thing, even a person, – but must be rooted ultimately only in the happiness of the life to come. It is only in salvation, in the happiness of eternal life, where sorrow and suffering will be no more. 

Perhaps, therefore, a good exercise for us at this point in Advent is to ask ourselves a few questions: What am I hoping for? Is that hope related to Jesus? Where in my life do I need to be revitalized, to receive what God can give me: glad tidings, healing, liberty, favor, vindication? Do I expect to receive those things, or does it just seem like wishful thinking? Can I trust God enough to believe that he will give me what I need – maybe not always what I want, but what will bring me closer to eternal life?

Friends, in a year as difficult as this one, it may seem hard to be hopeful, and even harder to be joyful, especially with the many difficulties we face. And yet that’s what the Church bids us today – to be renewed in hope, to be joyful. Whatever the new year will bring, nothing will happen that is not permitted by God, and so we can be hopeful, even joyful, because we know he is faithful. May this Eucharist strengthen us to endure the sufferings of the present so as to anticipate with joy and hope the salvation that is to come.

The Grace Not to Hide

It is part of human nature perhaps to hide from our mistakes. A child who breaks something might try to hide the evidence, hoping to not get caught, or will hide themselves, delaying the moment that they will. We adults are often not much better. We avoid those with whom we have had disagreements, and we’d rather make excuses than admit our faults.

This is not a new problem. In today’s first reading, we hear that our first parents behaved the same way with God when they broke the one commandment he had given them. If we struggle with understanding why this was so terrible, it’s important to focus less on the action itself – eating the fruit of a particular tree – and more on what the action was: blatant disobedience. And what’s more, it wasn’t like the disobedience of a child; Adam and Eve had greater powers of intellect and will than we have, and so they truly *knew* what they were doing went against everything they had been given by their friend, the God with whom they dwelled in the garden. And so, having been deceived, having realized their sin, Adam and Eve hide in shame and fear from God.

The rest of the reading is really about God’s mercy. He seeks out his sinful creatures, not to destroy them as he could have done, but to assure them that all is not lost. It is true that their sin has some definite ramifications. They have to leave the paradise of the garden, and as a result of their sin, things that weren’t originally part of God’s creation enter the world: sin, concupiscence, suffering, and death. But, despite their infidelity, and despite ours too, God does not abandon us. In fact, we might say that the rest of history is God’s great rescue mission to save human beings from sin and death.

Today we celebrate the feast which marks the first glimmer of God’s plan of salvation coming at last to its culmination. Long before Jesus died and rose again in Jerusalem, or was born in Bethlehem, or was announced by an angel in Nazareth, his Blessed Mother was herself conceived without sin in the womb of her mother. In other words, from the moment of her conception, Mary was Immaculate, and that spotlessness stayed with her throughout her life, the free gift of grace from God that accorded completely with her will. We often think of Mary’s most glorious moment as her fiat to the angel Gabriel – her response, “Let it be done to me according to God’s word.” And while it was indeed the shining moment of her faith and her humility for the Lord’s plan, it was also possible because she was, as the angel said, “full of grace.” It was God’s gift of grace from the moment of her conception that made it possible for her to say “Yes” to being the Mother of our Lord. 

The Immaculate Conception (c. 1628) by Peter Paul Rubens

This truth of Mary’s life has significance not just for what we believe but also how we live. The serpent had told Eve that disobedience would make her “like God”; but that was a lie. It only led to shame and hiding, and all of humanity suffered as a result. Sin is always that way; whatever attraction it holds in the moment, it always is a letdown, an illusion. And yet God does not abandon us, but he offers us his grace anew. Through her obedience made possible by God’s gift of grace, Mary received what Adam and Eve had desired – to be like God, and even more, to become the Mother of God, and all of humanity has benefited as a result. So too in our lives, God’s grace never restricts our freedom; rather, it perfects it, and it makes it possible for us to obediently follow his will – so that we can be like him in this life and even live with him in the next.

Friends, in a few weeks we will celebrate the birth of our Savior, but we can be celebrate already today the grace of Christ which redeems us – the grace given to Mary at the moment of her Immaculate Conception, and the graces he offers to us as well. May we never hide from the Lord but allow him to find us, to make us whole, to give us his grace anew, so that like Mary, we can glorify him in all that we do.

God on the Move

The shortest path between two points is a straight line – that is, unless an obstacle is put in the way. For example, a highway is going to get you where you want to go much faster than a country road. But if a pileup happens, that thoroughfare can quickly become a bottleneck, or worse. Just a few weeks ago, I saw an accident on the interstate that led to a complete standstill for miles and miles in the opposite direction. No one could get through because the path was obstructed.

In today’s first reading, Isaiah prophesies to Israel that God is preparing to come to rescue his people, and so they should build a highway in the desert to make straight his path. This text dates from the end of the Babylonian captivity, that period about six hundred years before the birth of Christ when much of Israel had been forced into exile to live under the rule of a foreign kingdom. It was a devastating experience. However, after some seventy years, the Babylonians were themselves defeated by the Persians. Sorrow turned into joy, as the people were permitted to return to Israel. We hear that elation in the reading today, when Isaiah prophesies that God himself will come through the desert to accompany his people back to their native land. In exuberance, he says, “Prepare the way of the Lord! Make straight… a highway for our God!” The Lord comes to bring comfort and peace.

In many ways, this is the central message of Advent, and sometimes I think we lose sight of it. Our preparations are important, and we should make straight the paths of the Lord. But we do so not because we are the ones striving to reach him, or because we must labor to be in his presence. No, God is the one who is on the move! John the Baptist, in the Gospel today, purposefully echoes the words of Isaiah to announce the Lord’s coming – not his coming through the desert to bring his people out of exile, but his coming in the flesh, into time and history to redeem all the world from sin and death. Jesus is the Savior and he seeks to come to us anew, in this season and every season, with the salvation we so desperately need.

It’s important, therefore, that we consider our Advent preparations not so much in terms of the things that we are doing for God – as if we are doing him a favor – and more in terms of how we need to get out of his way. What spiritual blockage is obstructing his path? What crooked twists and turns need to be straightened out for him to deliver what you need? Often, it seems, we complain about not being able to find God in what is happening in our lives, in feeling distant from him. But do we ask ourselves in what ways we are throwing up roadblocks to his coming? Are we doing something to hinder his coming? We have nothing to fear except the things we cling to in lieu of his comfort and peace. 

Desert Road (c. 1940) by Jean Mannheim

So, my friends, how will you prepare the way of the Lord in these next few weeks? Perhaps you will do it by fasting from a favorite food or from TV or social media so that you have more time for prayer or reading Scripture. Or perhaps you will want to get to the sacrament of reconciliation, so that you permit God to unburden you of your sorrows and sins to experience anew his healing and mercy. Or perhaps it will be by sharing more of what you have with those who are in need, especially the poor and the stranger, so that the obstacles of pride and selfishness will be removed from you heart. Let the Lord speak to you in this season; take time to listen to him! In whatever he says, he wants to bring you his comfort and peace, so don’t be afraid to do what it takes to build a highway for his coming – not out of sluggish compliance but with exuberance and joy.

Even in this Mass, Jesus our Savior comes to bring us his salvation. May we prepare the way of the Lord to receive him in this Eucharist so that by his strength we may make straight his paths in all facets of our lives.