Holy Family
Each year as we celebrate the Feast of the Holy Family with the universal Church, I am reminded that our founding pastor, Fr. Med Laz, commissioned us to not only follow the example of the Holy Family of Jesus, Mary and Joseph, but for us to BE a Holy Family.
It is a challenge and a mission for us to embrace that initial commission on a continual basis. The primary way that we accomplish the challenge of being a Holy Family is to carry out our Mission Statement:
We invite all to experience New Life in Christ through sacramental living, transformative
worship, lifelong spiritual growth,
and community in service to others.
I experience setbacks and triumphs in this endeavor regularly, but sometimes there are concrete examples of how we carry out that mission, such as the Bethlehem Marketplace that we celebrated the Sunday before Christmas. It was primarily a Family Faith event, but this year we placed a lot of emphasis on promoting it to the ENTIRE parish. As a result, students and families from our Academy participated. Adults with no children in either our Academy or Family Faith participated. Many people attended, and the energy and enthusiasm that the event created was very heartening for many, and especially for me.
The Saturday before Christmas we also celebrated Simbang Gabi, and our Multi-Cultural Ministry brought our entire community together as well, with joy and entertainment that put us in the Christmas spirit.
I hope that you all appreciate the community-wide effort that goes into hosting and celebrating Christmas at our parish. That was truly an all-parish effort. We welcomed thousands of visitors and parishioners alike who both caught and celebrated our vibrant spirit and hopefully a greater awareness of the mission statement cited above.
My instinct is to single out individuals for their hard work for these recent events, but in the spirit of our ENTIRE community responding to the challenge of being holy, I thank everyone for a wonderful communal effort.
In the spirit of being a Holy Family Catholic Community, I want to remind all of us that one of the greatest expressions of our response to be holier is to support and hopefully attend this year’s Gala on Saturday, March 7.
Our new Director of Development, Nick Fiddick, is eager to bring two major parts of our community together as ONE family – our Academy and our Parish. I am hesitant even to identify these two major constituencies, but my vision for the Gala is to continue to use it as a vehicle to unify and celebrate our ENTIRE Holy Family Catholic Community. Please contact Nick at nfiddick@holyfamilyparish.org for details on supporting the Gala, even if you are unable to attend.
This Year’s Holy Family Scripture Story
We hear about God’s angel appearing to Joseph, Jesus’ earthly father, in several scripture stories this year. Joseph actually has four dreams, each with a slightly different message.
On the fourth Sunday of Advent, we heard that the angel appeared to Joseph and assured him that Mary’s pregnancy was the work of the Holy Spirit and that he should take her into his home instead of divorcing her quietly – in other words, to make a wrong intention right. Dream number two tells us that the angel encourages Joseph to rise and take Mary and the infant Jesus to Egypt for safety from a king who wanted to kill all infant boys. Dream number three has the angel telling Joseph to rise, take his family, and return, but his observation is that it is really not safe because the new king may be as threatened by the Child Savior King as much as by the former king. Dream number four tells us that the angel encourages Joseph to take the Holy Family to Nazareth in Galilee, where they would be truly safe, and Jesus could grow in wisdom and grace.
I have italicized four phrases/words that may be used to guide our families as we seek to be healthier and, dare I say, holier.
It is never too late to make a wrong right amid the tensions or divisions within our families. Family life should provide safety from challenges and turbulence. Family home, either physical or emotional, should always be something that we can return to, hopefully not to be taken advantage of or misused. And finally, perhaps the ultimate challenge or purpose of family is to provide TRUE SAFETY, which can mean many things, like unconditional love, but also tough love that may not be immediately appreciated, but may serve as a vehicle towards TRUE SAFETY, healing, and reconciliation as Nazareth was at the end of a long, strange trip for the first Holy Family.