“Happiness is having a large, loving, caring, close-knit family in another city.” – George Burns
Christmas dinner is an event we look forward to with excitement but want to leave soon after it has started. Rows and arguments over the turkey can replenish our resentments towards other members of the family for months to come. So, although unintended, today’s feast of the Holy Family is well placed to pour oil over the troubled waters. This year it’s supported by Tier 4 restrictions, effectively separating extended families and locking them under house arrest – light version.
How can today’s Feast of the Holy Family help our families who are far from being ‘holy’, sometimes actually closer to the opposite? Well, let’s throw out of the window first the most common misconception that a holy family means a trouble-free, argument-free, all-agreeable, nausea-inducing sweet collective of perfect people. No such thing ever existed! It might be a high, noble and admirable goal for a family but – let’s be brutally honest – unlikely to be achieved. Families are made of individuals; each with their own personalities, traits, needs, desires, expectations, plans and so on. Moreover, these can and often do change over time. It’s true about each and every family that ever existed, including the Holy Family. Some religious purists may frown upon such a statement, but that’s what we can derive from a good number of snippets about Jesus’ close and extended family, found in the gospels.
Let’s put aside what we know with the benefit of hindsight and look at the start of the domestic life of Mary and Joseph, as seen by their neighbours. St Matthew’s gospel doesn’t mince its words; Mary became pregnant out of wedlock and the situation led Joseph, her future husband to the conclusion that he should dump her. Eventually, Joseph came to a different decision that St Matthew depicted as caused by the angelic intervention. By the social standards of the times, the whole situation was hardly a pattern of moral perfection. Twelve years later Mary and Joseph lost Jesus for three days during their traditional pilgrimage to Jerusalem. Today they would be branded as negligent parents and referred to social services. Neither were their neighbours impressed, I guess. When Jesus became a public figure and itinerant teacher, some members of his extended family were supportive; a couple of his cousins were admitted to Jesus’ closest circle called the Apostles. But others tried to intervene and stop him: ‘When his family heard it, they went out to restrain him, for people were saying, “He has gone out of his mind”.’ (Mark 3:21) St John reported that ‘not even his brothers believed in him’ (John 7:5). Jesus was nearly killed by the inhabitants of his hometown of Nazareth (Luke 4:16-30). That and other domestic experiences led Him to the damning conclusion that ‘prophets are not without honour except in their own country and their own house.” (Matthew 13:57). So, that’s all you need to know about the perfect family of Jesus…
As parents, you know what it means to be like God. Bear with me. You give life to lovely new creatures who from day one ruin your life. As babies, they recklessly ignore your plans and schedules and drive you to sleep deprivation and exhaustion. You patiently put up with that and any new developments over the years only to then get resentful, grumpy, thankless teenagers, ignoring you at best, or actively accusing you of ruining their lives. Then they grow into adulthood and leave for the open, wild and seemingly unrestricted world of freedom. Sometimes they fly far and wide; sometimes they return broken, beaten and crushed looking for shelter and healing. Not to mention the fortune you have spent on them – the money you will never get repaid. If you have put up with all that and you still hold your arms open to them – it must be love. As a parent, you are like God the Father, who gives everything and often gets little in return, sometimes only grudges and resentment. And yet He always keeps His arms wide open, happy to see us back when we are shattered, or broken, or disillusioned, or fearful. Or perhaps, just to be with someone that we can be close to, someone whose love never expires, never changes, and who always has time for us.
A holy family is never a perfect family. The holy family is the one that despite all its shortcomings, arguments, personality clashes and dissimilarities remains a safe-haven. An environment that offers warmth, shelter and a caring acceptance that no one else can offer. As a family member, don’t strive for perfection; strive for love, unconditionally given and taken.
Image by Narcis Ciocan from Pixabay