December 29: Feast of the Holy Family of Nazareth
A model of life for all believers
The Feast of the Holy Family of Jesus, Mary, and Joseph is celebrated on the Sunday following Christmas. The reason is simple. Whereas at Christmas we contemplate the birth of the Son of God in Bethlehem, surrounded by Mary and Joseph, on this feast day, the Church celebrates the daily life of the family in Nazareth.
We do not have much information on the time period between the birth of Jesus and the beginning of his public life. The Gospels provide little detail on this. They only mention that he grew in age, wisdom, and grace, but explain little about his daily life with his parents. It is likely that he learned the trade of carpentry from his father. When he was 12 years old, Jesus was lost in Jerusalem, until Mary and Joseph found him sitting among the teachers in the Temple, three days later.
At the age of 12, Jesus was just about to enter adulthood. This event marked the beginning of his public mission. He stayed in the Temple and was found three days later, a symbolic number that recalls the three days of his Passion, Death, and Resurrection. After a long search for him, Mary and Joseph found Jesus sitting among the teachers, listening to them and asking them questions. We can imagine his parents’ suffering at having lost him, and their difficulty in understanding what was happening, as well as their joy at having found him again.
The Gospel of today’s liturgy reminds us that Jesus also had a family story. In his account of the episode, Luke the Evangelist, says that the Holy Family had travelled to Jerusalem for Passover. On their way back, Mary and Joseph realized that Jesus was not with them. They were worried because, although they looked for him, they could not find him. When they did find him, Jesus returned home with them. (Luke 2:41-52). Jesus grew up surrounded by his family’s affection, in the warm embrace of his loved ones and their concerns.
The Catechism of the Catholic Church (n. 534) describes this episode as follows: “The finding of Jesus in the temple is the only event that breaks the silence of the Gospels about the hidden years of Jesus. Here Jesus lets us catch a glimpse of the mystery of his total consecration to a mission that flows from his divine sonship: ‘Did you not know that I must be about my Father`s work?’”.
The fact that the Lord chose to live the ordinary life of human beings, in order to understand what it means to be human is profoundly important. Welcomed by the love of a Mother and a Father, Jesus experienced every aspect of life: being nourished, expressing gratitude, speaking and listening, playing and working, dreaming, smiling, crying, sharing time, expectations, struggles, nights, and days.
In Jesus, God lived the human experience in its entirety, learning what it means to be human, from humanity, in a beautiful example of humility and closeness, that deepened the bond between God and humanity.
In 1895, Pope Leo XIII fixed the date of the Feast of the Holy Family, which was originally celebrated locally in the 17th century, to the third Sunday after Epiphany. It was extended to the Universal Church by Pope Benedict XV in 1921. Pope John XXIII moved it first to the Sunday after Epiphany, and then to its current date. The Feast of the Holy Family offers a model of life for families of all times and places: Jesus was not only a son to Mary and Joseph, but also their God. The simplest actions of a believer, such as praying, entering into communion with him, and listening to his Word, were intertwined with the everyday life of a mother, a father, and their Son. This means that Christian families can live any gesture, even the most ordinary one, as a sacrament.