His parents were overcome when they saw him, and his mother said to him: “My child, why have you done this to us? See how your father and I have been worried, looking for you.” Luke 2: 41-52
Every parent who has or has had a child move toward or through adolescence can recall times when their offspring gave them cause for concern. As they grow and mature, young people, at some time or other, start to flex their muscles, claim their independence, mark out their own, personal territory and establish their separateness from those who live with them under the same roof. Why are we inclined to think that Jesus would have been different? From our earliest experiences of religious education, we have been given the impression that Jesus was the perfect child and that the family in which he grew up was almost totally free of concern and upset triggered by their son.
Almost all of us have grown up in families, none of which is or has been without psychological and/or behavioural warts and wrinkles. Most of us know that we came to adopt many of the values and attitudes of our parents almost by osmosis. We have even picked up their mannerisms, manners and political preferences, only daring to question, analyse and criticise in rare moments of rebellion.
Today’s gospel-reading gives us the story from the life of the twelve-year-old Jesus that gave Mary and Joseph a considerable dose of angst and worry. We have all heard the expression that “it takes a village to rear a child.” While that might more appropriately be applied to cultures and societies across the continent of Africa, we have all experienced things like outings, parties and camping trips with friends and neighbours, confident that the adults will keep a watchful eye on all the youngsters. Modern-day parents are accustomed to hosting “sleep-overs” for their children’s friends and allowing their children to participate in such in the homes of friends they have come to know and trust. In the incident described in today’s gospel-reading, it would seem that Jesus succeeded in slipping away from the group without any of the adults noticing that he was missing.
The modern-day equivalent of those with whom Joseph, Mary and Jesus journeyed for the Passover celebration in Jerusalem would probably be similar to the “family groups” that have been developed in Catholic parishes in different parts of the world. The precocious Jesus had ventured into the Temple of Jerusalem and set about impressing the Temple leaders with the advances he had made in his religious knowledge. Moreover, when his worried-sick parents relocated him, he seemed puzzled by Mary’s reprimand, assuming that she should have known that he had another set of responsibilities on which he was required to deliver. He was seemingly oblivious to the fact that his disappearance had scared the life out of her and Joseph. While there was nothing malicious about his wandering off and in his response to Mary’s worry, it demonstrated a lack of sensitivity often typical of youngsters intent on expressing their independence in every age and place. Or is that reading too much into this exchange between Mary and Jesus?
There is something incomplete about what Jesus said to his Mother. The words that Luke attributed to the boy Jesus do not make sense because there is something missing. What Luke reported Jesus as saying was: “I have to be in the _ of my Father.” Translators have inserted various words to fill the gap, notably “business” and “affairs”. The remainder of this detailed Gospel demonstrates that Luke was no sloppy writer. Scholars have generally concluded that Luke deliberately left the gap for his readers to fill in after reflecting on what might meaningfully complete what Jesus wanted to say. Others have suggested that Jesus himself was so shaken up emotionally that he couldn’t find the word he wanted. Perhaps, then, even at the age of twelve when he was getting close to the age when he would be expected by the cultural demands of Jewish society to start taking on adult responsibilities, Jesus was struggling to combine village responsibilities with those required by the role and mission in life that he had already begun to feel drawn to.
This exchange between Jesus and his mother might also have been a wake-up call to Mary in that it was a hint to her that her Son was struggling with his identity, with who he was and with what his vocation in life was to be. What had led her Son to go off to the Temple might have led to a premonition that she would soon lose him to go his own independent way.
That’s something that every parent has to face as their children grow to the point when they leave home to take on tertiary education and the career and state of life of their choice.
We all struggle with decisions about who we are, what we want to become and how we continue to relate wholesomely to the parents who brought us into the world, as we try to independently shape our own lives and live the vocation we choose to pursue. That takes us into a lifetime of discernment, struggle and decision-making made manageable only with the guidance of God’s Spirit.
We know that in responding to God’s messenger, Gabriel, with the words of acceptance: “Be it done to me just as you say” Mary committed herself to an unknown future that would unfold in harmony with the assurance she had received from God. She and Joseph with their baby son had already endured life as refugees in a foreign land. What her growing-up son said to her when she and Joseph eventually found him in the Jerusalem Temple was another of life’s jolts which she would have to ponder. We, too, must learn the practice of pondering if we are to discover God present in the jolts of life that come our way.
