Monday January 1, 2024
Matthew 2:13-15,19-23
A very Happy New Year to you. I wish you all the blessings to fill your cup this year. Remember my family as we begin 2024. My brother is in the ICU in Ohio. Yup 2023 ended on a very bad note but thank goodness we are in America. God’s grace and the advanced medicines and medical care he is in a safe place. You never know folks, don’t ignore your visit to the doctor.
For our reflection we are given the feast of the Holy Family. It is my favorite homily to preach actually. The church puts before us the family of Joseph, Mary and Jesus so that we can have a model on which to build our families. I just wish the church did not do that. Here is why. We have Joseph, the man gets orders in his dreams. God tells him at every corner what to do. My dad did not have angelic dreams to tell him what to do! He had his buddies at the tavern/pub. Between drinking the local brew they solved the world’s problems. You should have heard my dad talking with his buddies. Mama would just shake her head and walk away muttering “oh men!” The mother in this holy family is the blessed Virgin Mary. Well I won’t get into it but mama is as far away from the Holy Blessed Mother of the Lord. She once threw a pot at me. She sent us to church so she can have a minute of silence. And the child in the story is the Son of God, Jesus. The most perfect person to have ever lived. Well I don’t have to tell you about myself, and I am the good one in the family . We are nothing like Jesus.
This is why I think it is unrealistic to ask us to model our families on this perfect family. UNLESS all this holycization (I made up that word) is bologna. Maybe Joseph had no angelic dreams but he was, with the help of God and friends, very connected to what was happening around him. Maybe all he wanted was safety for his family. Think of a young family in Ukrain that is fleeing violence. Are they getting angelic dreams? No!! Think of a man breaking himself in half to provide for his family. We just read the world around us. Come to think of it, dad’s drinking buddies were angels. Pretty happy angels at that. Mom and the blessed mother have so much in common. They both did not have all the answers to all the world’s problems. They both had to figure things out. I can go on and on.
Here is the deal, this family is HOLY because it understands itself as belonging to God. Holiness has to do with how you understand yourself. I am Holy to the extent that I see myself as separate for the Lord. Did you hear me? The nation of Israel is holy because it belongs to YAHWEH. So with all our dramas... we are HOLY too.