Fr. Jarek Kurek It is rather perplexing that on the feast of the holy family of Mary, Joseph and Jesus we get a picture of their family that is far from perfection. It seems rather like an experience of any of our own families. Jesus leaves his parents, which leads them actually to a desperate search. Jesus who should be a model of human behaviour for us comes across as seemingly unkind, or inconsiderate to put it differently.
Not without reason then Mary asks her son ‘Child, why have you treated us like this?’
And Jesus gives her this bewildering response ‘Why were you searching for me? Did you not know that I must be in my Father’s house?’
He leaves his human family to be with his Father, Jesus leaves Mary and Joseph to stay in his heavenly Father’s house. An important step towards manhood, towards his spiritual maturity takes place. And yet, having asserted his independence, Jesus returns obediently to his parents.
Now this desire to be and stay with the Father is in us also, I believe, perhaps not as clear and compelling as in the twelve-year-old Jesus. We want to be in our Father’s house, but maybe we are not as determined to step out of our human family, and the human conditions we live in. There may be a feeling in us that we are stuck there, we are not moving on…
But… think of what happened in your life four days ago. On the day of Christmas all of us here renewed this very important desire to be with the Father, the Father of Jesus and our Father. It happened in a very solemn way when we reverently knelt at those powerful words of the Creed, while speaking of Jesus: ‘who for us, and for our salvation, came down from heaven, and was incarnate by the Holy Spirit and of the Virgin Mary, and was made man’.
Something of a tremendous importance took place. On that day once again we were given power by God to become his children. A good reminder that what we perform here is not in vain, it has its far-reaching and wonderful consequences.
That’s how the desire that was in Jesus at the time is aroused also in us, with Jesus we want to stay in his and our Father’s house a little longer, maybe we’ll do so after this celebration of Mass?
Jesus was also happy to please the Father and to do what he commands. And what is God’s commandment for us today so we can please our Father too? Something we apparently heard so many times before: ‘love one another’. But today, if we truly recognise that Jesus’ story is in fact ours, step by step we may be able to uncover a deeper meaning of that commandment. Slowly but surely, we’ll realise that the story of Jesus’s family is ours and that it is in the God’s house that we can learn the best lessons about love and family.
And my last thought, or rather a sort of wishes for you gathered here and for those who join us through the webcam: today, when we say Our Father together as one family during this Mass, may it have a different, somewhat renewed, and hopefully deeper sense for all of us.
May everyone find their own way, in the depth of their heart, to address him truly as My Father.