God’s Family

Privileged to be part of God’s Family

Today, Sunday in the Octave of Christmas, marks the Feast of the Holy Family. In India, the Lectionary offers Readings for the Years A, B and C, as follows:

However, in Years B and C, there is an option to use the Readings of Year A instead.

For reflections on the Readings of Year A, see https://www.oscardenoronha.com/2023/12/31/gazing-admiringly-at-nazareth/; and for Year B, see https://www.oscardenoronha.com/2023/01/01/under-two-holy-names/

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Proceeding to the Readings assigned for Year C, we must note their aptness and correlation.

In the First Reading (1 Sam 1: 20-22, 24-28), Hannah[1] is one of two wives of Elkanah. Hannah was childless, whereas his second wife Peninnah bore him children; yet he had a soft spot for Hannah. Her status as first wife and her barrenness are reminiscent of Sarah (Gen 17) and Rebecca (Gen 25).

One day Hannah went up to the Tabernacle[2] and wept as she prayed. She asked God for a son and vowed to give him back for the service of God. She knew that being childless implied that one did not enjoy God’s favour; and bearing a male child would set her up in the community.

Finally, Hannah conceived and bore a son, whom she named Samuel (meaning, ‘Heard by God’). She raised him until he was weaned and brought him to the temple along with a sacrifice. There she made him over to the Lord for the whole of his life – something that will prompt moderns to question her wisdom. The fact is that, as a prophetess in her own right, she had discerned God’s will. Samuel was happy and fulfilled where he was planted – ‘How lovely is your dwelling place, Lord, God of hosts,’ says the Psalm today, doesn’t it? He became a priest and a man of great faith, Israel's last judge and first of the later prophets.

Hannah has a prayer of thanksgiving to God for the birth of Samuel; it’s called the Song of Hannah. It found an echo in the Magnificat that the Blessed Virgin Mary sang upon visiting her cousin Elizabeth. Hannah, Mary, and Elizabeth became pregnant in miraculous ways and dedicated their sons (Samuel, Jesus, and John the Baptist) to God’s service. And for those who may wonder how Hannah could be so self-sacrificing, the fact is God pays us back a thousandfold. Accordingly, Eli announced another blessing on Hannah, and she conceived three more sons and two daughters.

On this Feast of the Holy Family, the Gospel too could perplex the modern mind. When the parents of Jesus were returning from Jerusalem after the feast of the Passover, Jesus stayed behind in the temple. His parents did not know it; they then searched for Him in the city and found Him after three days. On hearing of how anxious they had been, Jesus retorted: ‘Did you not know that I must be in my Father’s house?’ Yes, seated among the teachers, He had amazed them with his knowledge and insightful answers.

Parents today suffer from greater anxiety than Jesus' parents did. Yet, their anxiety is only about how their children will fare in this world, not in the next. In stark contrast, even while Jesus displayed independence of mind, the parents of Jesus were satisfied with their Son’s answer – because His concern was with being in His Father’s house, where He truly belonged. It was not stubbornness. He had made His point, and was now obedient and submissive to His earthly parents. What a fine balance! Then, there comes, what is to me, one of the most beautiful passages in the Scriptures: ‘Jesus increased in wisdom and in stature, and in favour with God and men’, while His mother ‘kept all these things in her heart.’

Between the First and the Third Readings, we clearly have a preannouncement and its fulfilment, a forerunner and the actual Messiah. And what place do you and I have in the divine economy? In the Second Reading (1 Jn 3: 1-2, 21-24), St John[3] states, ‘We are called God’s children, and that is what we are.’ Indeed, by our baptism we have become God’s children, unlike others who, though also loved by God, are His creatures.

Noblesse oblige: privilege entails responsibility. Hence, our life as children of God ought to be radically different from that of unbelievers. We must live in a way that pleases our Father in Heaven; we must live a life of selfless love. If we ‘think of the love that the Father has lavished on us, by letting us be called God’s children’, we will never be discouraged when the world rejects us. The world rejects us as once they rejected Jesus. What a privilege to be in His company!

At the same time, we are not to rest on our laurels; ‘what we are to be in the future has not yet been revealed; all we know is that when it is revealed we shall be like Him because we shall see Him as He really is.’ So, we must pray for blessings and graces and earn our place in Heaven. And to ensure that this happens, we must keep the Father’s Commandments and live the kind of life that He wants us to live. His commandments are simple: that we believe in the name of His Son, Jesus Christ, and that we love one another as He has loved us. This will set an example to our immediate human families. Fortunately, we have the Holy Family of Nazareth for our model of family life, human relations and community life – all of which lets us partake of God’s family.

[1] She finds mention only in the first two chapters of the first Book of Samuel.

[2] In Jewish history, the Tabernacle (meaning, ‘dwelling’) refers to the portable sanctuary constructed by Moses as a place of worship for the Hebrew tribes during the period of wandering that preceded their arrival in the Promised Land. The Tabernacle became redundant after the construction of Solomon's Temple in Jerusalem in 950 BC.

[3] St John is the author of the Gospel of John and four other books of the New Testament – the three Epistles of John and the Book of Revelation.

by Oscar de Noronha