Caritas Christi Urget Nos

Category: Liturgy

  • Thursday of the First Week of Ordinary Time

    Thursday of the First Week of Ordinary Time

    Today’s reading

    My grandmother used to say that, although she liked to read the Bible, she really didn’t like the Old Testament because of all the violence.  And certainly today’s first reading helps me to understand how she felt.  But it’s a reading that I think has very important things to say about the spiritual life.  I’m going to be clear though, as a pastor I approach this with fear and trembling, because I could well be judged in the same was as Eli and his sons.

    So we have been hearing the story of Eli and his sons this past week.  But there are significant parts of the story we haven’t heard, and that’s too bad, because they explain the massacre we get in today’s first reading.  Eli was the high priest at the time that Samuel was conceived, and his two sons, Hophni and Phinehas assisted him.  His sons were also terrible human beings.  They would steal the peoples’ sacrifices off the altar while they were still boiling, and were known to be extremely promiscuous.  When Eli, their father, was made aware of this, his response was more or less, “Now boys, you can’t be doing that.”  So they ignored their father and did it all the more. 

    It’s easy to see the sin of Hophni and Phinehas, but Eli was actually more at fault.  In the theology of the Old Testament, the appropriate response from Eli would have been to put them both to death.  I know that sounds harsh, but we need to look at it from the spiritual perspective.  Anything that gets in the way of bringing people to God, anything that gets in the way of right worship, anything that gets in the way of taking care of those in need, has to be radically blotted out.  That’s why all those Egyptians pursuing the Israelites in the desert came to a watery end in the Red Sea.

    And Hophni and Phinehas were only part of the problem.  The problem is that Eli, as high priest, has been ignoring his duties in such a way that he allowed not only the sins of his two sons, but also the sins of the people.  More and more, they were turning away from the Lord.  All of this comes to a tipping point in today’s reading.  When they had been initially defeated by the Philistines, only then did they think to consult the Lord.  So they bring the Ark of the Covenant down like it was some kind of rabbit’s foot instead of the Holy Presence of God.  And so God gave them over to the hands of their enemies and allowed the Ark to fall into the hands of the Philistines.  Their depravity caused not just the fall of the nation, but also the fall of their religion.  The Ark was a sign of God’s presence in the community, a treasured holy vessel crafted by the hands of Moses, and they let it go.  I’ll tell you right now, friends, no one gets to this Tabernacle while I still have a beating heart, and I’m not the high priest.  But that’s how depraved things had become, all because Eli was asleep at the altar.  (Incidentally, he is frequently noted as sleeping in the stories that preceded this one.)

    None of this is ever going to get better for Israel until David is anointed king of Israel, and a type of messiah for the people.  Of course this foreshadows the actual Savior of the World, the Christ and Messiah who would be anointed by the Holy Spirit to break the power of the most insidious enemy and gain us all the salvation we need.

    So the moral of the story, if you want one, is to put to death whatever in us is keeping us from completely, freely, following God.  It’s not easy.  It wouldn’t have been easy for Eli to put his sons to death.  But if he had, he would have saved the lives of thousands of soldiers and prevented the fall of Israel and her religion.  There is too much at stake to let things go; we have to be ready to do whatever it takes to stay in relationship with our God.

  • Tuesday of the First Week of Ordinary Time

    Tuesday of the First Week of Ordinary Time

    Today’s readings

    It is always interesting to me how clearly the unclean spirits know who Jesus is.  For them, Christ our God inspires fear and rebellion.  But even these unclean spirits, hearing his voice, begrudgingly obey.  Jesus teaches with authority, as the people standing by admit of him.  This is a teaching that cannot be ignored. Each person may hear it and respond differently, but they do respond.  Many hear his voice and follow.  Others turn away.

    In these early days of Ordinary Time, we essentially have the continuation of the Epiphany event.  We continue to see Christ manifest in our midst, and continue to decide what to make of him.  Today we see him as one who teaches with authority and who has authority over even the unclean spirits within us.  Today he speaks to our sinfulness, to our brokenness, to our addictions, to our fallenness, to our procrastinations, to whatever debilitates us and saddens us and says “Quiet! Come out!”

    This Epiphany of Christ as dispossessor of demons is an epiphany that does more than just heal us.  It is an epiphany that calls us out of darkness, one that insists we come out of our hiding and step into the light, so that the light of God’s love can shine in us and through us.

  • The Feast of the Baptism of the Lord

    The Feast of the Baptism of the Lord

    Today’s readings

    What wonderful words we have in today’s Gospel to close out the Christmas season: “You are my beloved Son; with you I am well-pleased.”

    We have come a long way since December the 25th.  Jesus, the Son of God, has become the son of Mary, and has consecrated the world through his most loving presence.  The Second Person of the Holy Trinity has taken on flesh and become one like us in all things but sin.  He took that flesh as the lowliest of all: as a baby born to a poor young family in the tiniest, poorest region of a small nation.

    But during his Epiphany, which we have been celebrating ever since last Sunday, we saw the importance of this Emmanuel, God with us.  Magi came from the East to give him symbolic gifts: gold for a king, frankincense for the High Priest, and myrrh for his burial.  Today, the Epiphany continues with the second traditional reading of the Epiphany: the Baptism of Jesus.  Today, we fast-forward to Jesus as a grown man, ready to begin his ministry, and doing that by taking part in Saint John the Baptist’s baptism, a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins.  Obviously, Jesus didn’t need to be forgiven of his sins, because he was like us in all things but sin.  So Jesus’ taking part in that baptism manifests himself as One who has come to be with sinners, to take on their sinfulness, and to sanctify those waters of baptism so that they can wipe away our sins.

    And here’s a wonderful thing: even though the Christmas season officially ends today, we continue to celebrate it in some ways, all the way up to Candlemas day, the Presentation of the Lord, February the 2nd.  We see that especially this year, because next week, we get the third traditional reading of the Epiphany, the Wedding Feast at Cana, in which Christ is manifested in his ministry, and the superabundance of wine foreshadows the outpouring of his blood for our salvation.

    The secret to our celebration of the Epiphany is that we must be ready to accept the manifestation of Jesus in our own lives.  We have to let him be our king and priest, accepting his death for our salvation.  We have to celebrate our own baptism, which is only significant because Christ has gone through it first, long before us, sanctifying the waters.  We have to let him minister to us as he did at the wedding feast, giving us the very best of food and drink, in great abundance, to nourish us into eternal life.

    This is the One with whom the Father was well-pleased; he is the One with whom we are in awe.  We are moved to silence before our Christ who came most mercifully to sanctify our way to heaven.  That silence can only be appropriately broken by the exclamation of the Father:  “You are my beloved Son; with you I am well-pleased!”

  • Saturday After Epiphany

    Saturday After Epiphany

    Today’s readings

    “He must increase; I must decrease.”

    By these words, St. John the Baptist indicates that the Epiphany, the manifestation of our Lord in the flesh, is complete.  John’s disciples have got it wrong; they took offense at Jesus baptizing when he himself had been baptized by John.  They assumed that because John had baptized Jesus, that Jesus must in some way be inferior to John.  But John knows his mission was to be the Forerunner.  He knows that his ministry was one of paving the way for Jesus and the Gospel.  He knows that his own baptism was a mere precursor of the baptism that Jesus would bring, a baptism that imparts the fullness of the Holy Spirit to all believers.

    “He must increase; I must decrease.”

    St. John the Evangelist tells us in his letters that we are to be on guard against those who come in the name of Jesus but are not of him.  We must be wary of pretenders and totally turn away from false idols.  He has spent this past week in our first readings giving us the standards of discernment that help us to know the Truth.  Anyone of the Truth will testify to the Incarnation of Jesus in the flesh.  Anyone of the Truth will love deeply, and will love neighbors as well as God.  Anyone of the Truth, he tells us today, will cast out sin, from himself and from others.  Even though he may not be perfect, still he will battle sin and turn to Christ incarnate in the flesh for the indwelling of the Spirit, for the grace of his baptism.

    “He must increase; I must decrease.”

    Christ came in the flesh because, as the Psalmist tells us today, the Lord takes delight in his people.  As his people then, we must also delight in him.  We must remember that we are all in the service of the one who came to set us free.  We must remember that our own thoughts, our own desires, all of these are not the be-all and end-all of existence, and quite often, we must die to them in order that God be manifested among us.  We must remember that we are not the center of the universe.  As we offer and prepare our gifts for the Eucharist today, may we also offer the decreasing of ourselves in order to pave the way for the increasing of Jesus Christ in us, around us, and among us.

  • Friday after Epiphany

    Friday after Epiphany

    Today’s readings

    Today, as we continue to celebrate the Epiphany of the Lord, we see Jesus manifested as healer.  “Lord, if you wish, you can make me clean.”  What a wonderful profession of faith!  Here is a man, full of leprosy, who has been in pain and ostracized for perhaps a good portion of his life.  He perhaps has heard about Jesus and was eager to see if he would do what no one has been able to do for him.  No one would even touch a leper, for fear of contracting the disease, or becoming ritually unclean, or both.  So he has been forced to live with it for all this time.  But Jesus isn’t going to be limited by anything, so he does it: he touches the man and says, “I do will it.”  Healing is the will of our Father, and Jesus came to do the Father’s work.  Responding to the man’s faith, Jesus is able to do in him what no one else could do, or even would do.

    So Jesus is manifested as a healer, but we know that despite our best efforts of prayer, it doesn’t always work out as it did for the leper.  But there are so many kinds of healing.  What God intends for us may be far different, perhaps far more important to our salvation, than the healing of a disease. 

    In any case, whether the disease goes away or not, the person of faith is always given what God intends for her or him.  And that person never walks through suffering alone, because we know that our Lord suffered greatly on that Cross.  So, joining our sufferings to Christ’s, we have him to help us with our own cross, whatever it may be.  Whether God intends our disease to go away or not, he always wills our salvation, which in the end is the essence of what he came to do.  Today Christ is manifested as healer.  Healer of our bodies, perhaps.  But healer of our souls to make them fit for heaven, for sure.

  • Thursday After Epiphany

    Thursday After Epiphany

    Today’s readings

    The feast of Epiphany is a celebration of the fact that Christian life looks like something.  Because Jesus has appeared on the earth and taken our own human form, because he has walked among us and lived our life and died our death, we know what the Christian Way looks like.  We know that the Christian life consists of embracing our humanity, with all its weaknesses and imperfections.  We know that it consists of living our own lives well, mindful of the needs of others, forgiving as we have been forgiven, and spreading the light of the Gospel wherever it is that God puts us.  The Galileans in the synagogue in today’s Gospel were amazed at Jesus’ speaking words of grace.  We too are called to do this so that all will recognize in us the presence of Christ.

    Because Christ is still manifest among us.  Every encounter with someone else is an opportunity for Epiphany.  It is an opportunity for us to look for the presence of Christ in that other person, and for them to see Christ at work in us.  How we do that depends on the situation, certainly, but it must always be our top priority if we are eager to be called Christians.  John’s words in the first reading are clear, and are words of indictment on those times we forget to be the Epiphany to others: “If anyone says, ‘I love God,’ but hates his brother, he is a liar; for whoever does not love a brother whom he has seen cannot love God whom he has not seen.”

    Christ is made manifest in all of us and among all of us.  In the ordinariness of our lives, we can find Christ’s grace abundantly blessing us, or we can reject it.  If we make it our priority to be Christ’s presence in the world in every encounter with a brother or sister, we may find that we are blessed with epiphany upon epiphany, constantly growing in God’s grace.  This is all part of our faith, of course, and it is this faith, as John tells us, that conquers the world.

  • The Epiphany of the Lord

    The Epiphany of the Lord

    Today’s readings

    It’s so simple: walk toward the light.

    This is good advice, I think, for us who walk around in what can be a very dark world. Today’s first reading speaks of that darkness: “See, darkness covers the earth, and thick clouds cover the peoples…” We’re not talking about some kind of simple darkness that is cured by simply turning on a lamp. This darkness is pervasive, not just physical darkness, but a darkness that has psychological effects, and even affects communities and nations. When Isaiah speaks of the thick clouds covering the peoples, that’s what he means: “peoples” means nations.

    And we don’t need to look too much farther than the newspaper or evening news to see that darkness. The year ahead of us might seem rather foreboding.  The latest variant of COVID-19 is spreading like wildfire, even affecting those who are fully vaccinated, boosted, or have even had COVID in the past.  We are about to enter year three of the pandemic, and we’re all weary.  And if that’s not enough, there is all the crime going on.  People are getting shot on expressways, shopping centers, schools, hotels, and well, just about everywhere.  Prices are skyrocketing for everything from food to fuel.  People don’t have informed discussions about anything anymore, just sound bytes and Twitter wars and siding with one extreme or the other.  There’s plenty of darkness to go around, and it may not seem like there’s enough light in all the universe to make it better, to illuminate that darkness, to help us to break free of it all.

    There may be darkness in our own lives too. Maybe we have patterns of sin of which we cannot seem to break free, maybe there are family difficulties that cloud our day-to-day living, maybe there are old hurts among family or friends that prevent us from moving forward in grace. Even our own personal and spiritual lives can be such dark places at times.

    Today’s Liturgy acknowledges all the darkness and invites us: “Walk toward the light.”

    We do have light to scatter all that darkness, and it comes from God himself. Isaiah says again: “but upon you the LORD shines, and over you appears his glory.” A darkness as pervasive as the one that covers all peoples requires a very bright light to scatter it. Does this mean that all that darkness will go away immediately? Of course not. But it does mean that God has provided a way, lit up a path, for people of faith to take baby steps if necessary to walk toward that light. We see that light in the Church, through the Scriptures, in the Sacraments, in our celebration of the Eucharist, when we reach out to others in service, in our interaction with each other as people of faith. Those thick clouds may make it pretty hard to see at times, but ultimately they are no match for the bright light of the glory of the Lord, because that Light absolutely has won the day, the Word has taken flesh, and the darkness cannot overcome Light like that.

    Isaiah goes on to point out that all that light isn’t intended just for us. When we have approached the light, we need to share that light with others. “Nations shall walk by your light,” Isaiah says, “and kings by your shining radiance.” Having received the light of the glory of the Lord, we are meant to spread it over our corner of the world. We are meant to radiate that light as a beacon in a dark place, so that all peoples – all those peoples that were covered by those thick clouds of darkness – can see their way to the Lord too. We spread that light by changing our lives. We spread it by being people of integrity. We spread it by doing everything we can to reinvigorate our spiritual and devotional lives. We spread the light by paying it forward, by giving of ourselves, by having concern for those in our lives and those the Lord puts in our lives. We spread the light by reaching out to those in need.

    The glory of the Lord is never diminished by shining the light on others. In fact, when we share that light with others, we only receive more, so that our hearts are throbbing and overflowing, beholding all the riches that we could ever hope to find. We may find a talent we never knew we had, one that can reach others for Christ. We may find a new energy that comes to a spiritual life that was previously rather listless. We may find new challenges, new opportunities, and always new grace. The riches and wealth of our God are never exhausted.

    All we have to do is walk toward the light.

    An important way to light up your homes today is to bless them.  It’s no secret that the family is under attack by the evil one in these days.  One way to protect that is to bless them on the feast of the Epiphany.  We have a gift of blessed chalk, a prayer, and blessed Epiphany water for you to use at home.  Please take just one on your way out to bless your home today, and please gather as a family, take time to pray the prayer together, to mark the door of the house, and to sprinkle the Epiphany water around each room in the house.  The Epiphany water is blessed and exorcised, and it has the power to cast out evil.  Of course, you need to support this holy action by going to confession, receiving the Eucharist, and striving to lead a life that is led by the light.

    The light that we walk toward today is very-likely life-changing. The Magi came to seek the light in today’s Gospel reading. All we get from Matthew is a description of the encounter. But we have no idea what the encounter did in the lives of those wise astrologers. We don’t know how it changed them, what it cost them, where it ultimately led them. We see that the light was not intended just for the Jews, but also for all the nations: pagans and religious people alike. All could come to the light, all could be affected by the light, all could experience the true light of the world.

    And in just the same way, we have no idea how walking toward the light will affect us. We don’t know how it will change us, what it will cost us, where it ultimately will lead us. All we know is that, coming to the light, we will be changed, with the promise of grace upon grace. Just as the Magi were led to return by another way, we too might find ourselves taking another way in our lives. Epiphany is not the end of the story; it is just the beginning for us. May this coming year find us walking toward the light countless times and in countless ways, and open to the many riches of grace that the Lord has in store for us.

  • The Solemnity of Mary, the Holy Mother of God

    The Solemnity of Mary, the Holy Mother of God

    Today’s readings

    Today, on the octave day of Christmas, which we still celebrate as Christmas Day, we are blessed to remember the Blessed Virgin Mary, the Holy Mother of God. We do this because we all know that Mary’s faith made possible our own lives of faith and even more wonderfully made possible the salvation of the whole world and everyone ever to live in it. She was the one, chosen by God, to see the Gospel come to life before her very eyes. She intimately beheld the Word, she held our God in her faithful and loving hands, treasuring each moment in her heart.

    So Mary’s faith is a model for us, a goal which we disciples must strive to attain.  God’s call will often take us into unknown territory, as it did for our Blessed Mother, but in faith we are called to say “yes” to his plan for us anyway.  God’s call will often call for sacrifice and even sorrow in the short term, as it did for our Blessed Mother, but we are still asked to give all that we have.  Mary did that without a second thought or a moment’s regret.  How willing are we?  Can we take a leap of faith, make a fiat, and cooperate with God’s work in our lives and in the world?  We have no way of knowing where that might lead us; just like Mary, that might lead to heartache and sorrow; but just like Mary, it may lead to redemption beyond belief, beyond anything we can imagine.

    Today the Church proclaims courageously that Mary is the Mother of God.  And let me tell you, this was a doctrine that came at great price.  People literally fought over whether a human woman could ever be the mother of God.  How would something like that even be possible? But the alternative, really, would be to insinuate that Jesus was not God.  We know that Jesus had two natures: human and divine.  Neither nature was subordinate to the other there was no separation or division or elevation of one nature at the expense of the other; they were both wrapped up intimately with one another, incapable of being divided in the person of Jesus Christ.  So, because we clearly know that Mary was his mother, we say that Mary is the Mother of God.  And as theologians teach us, Mary is the Mother of God the Word according to his human nature.  She didn’t give birth to his divine nature; that was begotten by God.  She is not the mother of the First or Third Persons of the Blessed Trinity; she is the mother of the Second Person, God the Word.  Sister Sarah made us memorize all this in seminary, and every once in a while, when I’m feeling particularly theologically courageous, I reflect on this doctrine and marvel at its beauty.

    So, Mary is the Mother of God, but Mary is also the Mother of the Church, leading its members to her son Jesus and to faith in God.  She is mother of priests, caring for us in a special way and interceding for the faithful work of our calling.  She is the mother of mothers, interceding for them and showing them how to nurture faith in their children.  She is the mother of the faithful, showing us how to cooperate fully with God’s plan.  She is mother of Scripture scholars and those who just love and study the Scriptures, having seen the Word unfold before her and treasuring it in her heart.  She is the mother of disciples, having been the first of the disciples and the most dedicated of them all.  And she is the Mother of Mercy, who gave birth to our Savior and birth to our eternity.  She is the Mother of God, and our mother, and we cannot sing our Christmas carols without singing our thanksgiving for her.  We honor her faith and example today, and we ask for her intercession for our lives, for our families, for our Church and for our world.

    Pray for us, O holy Mother of God, that we may be made worthy of the promises of Christ.

  • Thursday Within the Octave of Christmas

    Thursday Within the Octave of Christmas

    Today’s readings

    What did you get for Christmas?  Was it everything you’d hoped for?  Or are you at that stage of life where gifts are nice, but you really don’t need anything special?  A lot of my family has come to that point, because we’re at that point where the gifts aren’t so important as it is to be together at Christmas and enjoy one another.

    Today’s first reading is exhorting us to something similar.  While the rest of the world waits in line for hours to get whatever the coveted gift of the year may be, we have the consolation of knowing that nothing like that is ultimately important, or will ever make us ultimately happy.  The real gift that we can receive today, and every day, is the gift of Jesus, the Word made flesh, our Savior come to be one with us as Emmanuel.

    Saint John tells us quite clearly: “Do not love the world or the things of the world.  If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him.”  Because what we have is so much better than anything the world can give.  Anna the prophetess in the Gospel reading recognized the Gift.  She had been waiting for it, praying for it, every day of her life.  Heaven forbid that we should miss it! 

    The real gift this Christmas, and really every day, is the gift of eternal life.  And we have that gift because Jesus came to earth and chose to be one with us in our human nature.  That’s why the angels sang that night, and why we sing his praise every day of our lives.

  • The Holy Family of Jesus, Mary, and Joseph

    The Holy Family of Jesus, Mary, and Joseph

    Today’s readings

    One of the great snapshots of Christmas for me has always been the manger scene. These beautiful figurines give us a glimpse as to what God is doing at the Incarnation of Christ – an amazing moment in time!  But I am aware that the idyllic holiness, peace and love the crèche depicts is often quite foreign to the experience of many families, including many families in this assembly. I know there are families where communication is anything but good. There are families who may never have known the kind of love that is shared between Jesus, Mary and Joseph. There are families who struggle with abuse: physical, sexual, or emotional.

    Even in the “best” of families, there is often hardship. I know there are families who struggle to keep up with all the activities that are expected of them. There are families who can’t find time to have a meal together, let alone take a trip together. Families often struggle to make ends meet. There are families who struggle with the changing needs of children as they grow older. Families may be separated by great distance, or may have suffered the sickness or death of one of the members. Other families may find themselves changing roles as a parent, the one who provided for his or her children, grows old and becomes ill and then becomes the one in need of care.

    Families can be and are the source of our greatest joys and our deepest anguish. Sometimes all in the same day. The truth is, and perhaps you find yourself thinking this as you sit there and listen to these readings today, none of our families is perfect. Few of us would rush to describe our families as well-functioning, let alone holy. And so we can sit there and look at the manger and find its serenity meaningless in the hectic anxiety of our day-to-day family lives.

    But maybe we need to look a little deeper or listen a little harder today. “Holy” and “perfect” are perhaps not the same thing. We don’t need to be perfect to be a family. That was true of Jesus, Mary and Joseph as well. Would a perfect family have lost their child on the way home from a trip? I don’t think so, but that’s exactly what happened, isn’t it? Mary says to Jesus when they find him that she and Joseph had been looking for him with “great anxiety.” Those of you who are parents can well imagine the anxiety and can totally identify with what Mary and Joseph had to have been feeling.  

    Not everything was perfect in that family, even from the beginning. Right at the beginning, they had to flee for their safety; they suffered from poverty and violent threats. Like many modern families in various places in the world, they suffered under political and military oppression, had to settle far from their original home and had to start a new life in a foreign place. Two thousand years may separate the modern family from the “Holy Family,” but there are so many similarities.

    So, what we are supposed to see in the Holy Family is something perhaps different from perfection.  I think it is faithfulness.  Faithfulness to God and faithfulness to one another: indeed, it is this faithfulness that leads them to the holiness we celebrate today.  Look at the way the situation in the Gospel reading today was resolved among them.  Even though they were panicked and anxious about the disappearance of their son; even though they did not understand what was going on with him, yet they strove to understand him and loved him beyond measure, and Mary kept all of these memories in her heart, kept them to be sorted out and understood and treasured later.  And even though Jesus was ready to grow into adulthood and ready to begin his mission, yet he understood the concerns of his parents and continued to be obedient to them as he continued to grow in human wisdom and grace. They were faithful to one another.

    I continue to be aware that even as I pull that theme of faithfulness out of today’s Scriptures, that can still seem insurmountable to many of you. Why should you be faithful when the hurts inflicted by other members of your family still linger? That’s a hard one to address, but the call to faithfulness is still there for all of us. And we’re not told to be faithful just when everyone else is faithful. Sometimes we are called to make an almost unilateral decision to love and respect the others in our families, and let God worry about the equity of it all. I know that’s easier to say than to do, but please know that this Church family supports you with prayer and love as you do that.

    Every single one of us is called to be holy, brothers and sisters. And every single one of our families is called to be holy. That doesn’t mean that we will be perfect. Some days we’ll be pretty far from it. But it does mean that we will be faithful in love and respect. It means that we will unite ourselves to God in prayer and worship. It means we will love when loving is hard to do. Mary loved Jesus all the way to the Cross and watched him die. What we see in the model of the Holy Family for us is not perfection, but faithfulness and holiness.

    That holiness will make demands of us. It did for Jesus, Mary and Joseph. Holiness demands that we seek it; it doesn’t just descend from above. If we want holy families, and we certainly should, we will have to make decisions and even sacrifices to pursue it. We will have to make an honest priority of worship; attending Mass every Sunday and Holy Day of Obligation as a minimum without fail. We will have to surround our families in prayer, praying at meals, teaching and reviewing prayers, praying together at night, reciting the rosary together, reading the Scriptures together. Holy families are not going to be perfect in these things, but they will not fail to pursue that holiness every single day. It takes a daily decision to do that; but that is the vocation of the family in the world.

    Jesus, emerging from childhood to adulthood, reminds us that in his name, we must be ready to live faithful and holy lives, regardless of whether others are doing the same, and no matter what the personal cost. Because the cost of rejecting holiness in our lives is just too great, and the loss of an earthly family is nothing compared to losing our place in the family of God.