When the magi had departed, behold, the angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream and said: “Rise, take the child and his mother, flee to Egypt, and stay there until I tell you. Herod is going to search for the child to destroy him. Matthew 2, 13-15, 19-23
Very early in his Gospel, Matthew underlined the fact that, from the very first days of his life, Jesus was a figure of division. King Herod was so disturbed by news of the arrival of three strangers from afar who were searching for the new-born king of the Jews that he was hatching a plan to have the child murdered. After the Magi had located and visited the new-born Jesus, Joseph had a second dream encounter with an angel who warned him of Herod’s threat and directed him to take refuge in Egypt with Mary and the Child Jesus. It is highly probable that they did not travel alone but rather in the company of other families who would have been alerted by Joseph to Herod’s intention. The story of the slaughter of the “Holy Innocents” confirms the brutality of a king who would stop at nothing in order to preserve his own status. Our world has been desecrated and defiled by bloodthirsty potentates who are, in effect, clones of Herod. Some of us have seen them in action, perpetrating the horrors of the Holocaust during World War II and more recently in the genocide of the Rohingya people in Myanmar and in the brutality of Isis forces who have murdered children because they might grow into adults and become soldiers to fight against them.
It is in that context, that I share with you an extract from a book entitled All Rivers Run to the Sea written by the Jewish author Elie Wiesel who, with his family was imprisoned in the notorious, German concentration camp located in Birkenau. Elie’s family had employed a housekeeper, by the name of Maria, who was a Christian. She had worked for the Wiesel family since before Elie was born, and left the family only when non-Jews in Hungary were forbidden to work for Jews. Maria returned, at considerable risk to her own safety, to plead with the family to escape with her to a secret hiding place in the mountains, before it was too late: “There’s nothing to fear there…You’ll be safe…There are no Germans there and no bastards hiding them.” Elie Wiesel continues: “We gathered at the kitchen table and held a last family meeting. Should we follow Maria or stay? We surely would have accepted her offer had we known that ‘destination unknown’ meant Birkenau…All we knew was what we had been told: that the convoys were headed for the interior. ‘Well-informed’ Jewish notables in Budapest had given us clear assurances on this point. In light of that, the general view was that we should tell Maria no. “But Why?” she implored us, her voice breaking. “Because”, my father replied, ‘a Jew must never be separated from his community. What happens to everyone else will happen to us as well.’
“My father was right. We wanted to stay together, like everyone else. Family unity is one of our important traditions, as the enemy well knew. And he now used that knowledge, spreading the rumour in the ghetto that the Jewish population would be transferred to a Jewish labour camp where – and this was the essential thing – families would remain together. And we believed it. So it was that the strength of the family tie, which had contributed to the survival of our people for centuries, became a tool in its exterminators’ hands.”
“Dear Maria. If other Christians had acted like her, the trains rolling toward the unknown would have been less crowded. If priests and pastors had raised their voices, if the Vatican had broken its silence, the enemy’s hands would not have been so free. But most of our compatriots thought only of themselves. Barely was a Jewish home emptied of its inhabitants than they descended like vultures on the abandoned possessions…For them it was a party, a treasure hunt. They were not like our Maria”
“I think of Maria often, with affection and gratitude. This simple, uneducated woman stood taller than the city’s intellectuals, dignitaries and clergy. My father had many acquaintances and even friends in the Christian community, but not one of them showed the strength of character of this peasant woman. Of what value was their faith, their education, their social standing, if it aroused neither conscience nor compassion?
It was a simple, devout Christian woman who saved her town’s honour”. (Elie Wiesel, All Rivers Run to the Sea, p. 69-70, 1994, Knopf, N.Y)
While we may not agree fully with what Elie Wiesel wrote above, there are times when families and individuals have to find the courage to step away from cultural expectations and traditions that can stifle freedom and smother wisdom. Challenges to us to change and choose life can come from people as simple, uneducated and ordinary as the Maria in Elie Wiesel’s story..
In that context, we may need to stop and realise that today’s first two readings from Sirach and St Paul’s Letter to the Colossians reflect cultures that subscribed to very patriarchal views of family. The reading from Sirach stresses the responsibility that falls to sons of caring for their aged fathers, especially when the health of those fathers begins to fail. The reading is totally silent about care due to mothers in their senior years.
While the reading from Colossians stresses the fact that God loves and treasures every one of us, it moves into describing a patriarchal model for family. One gets the clear impression that the principal role of women in a family is to bear children and be subservient to their husbands. The language used by Paul in the latter part of this reading where he calls his community of believers to do everything in the name of the Lord is also patriarchal in tone.
In the gospel-reading, we learn how Joseph, in two dreams, received two sets of divine instructions for keeping Mary and Jesus safe from harm. Note, however, that it was Joseph who had the dreams rather than Mary, simply because he was head of the household. Of interest, however, is the fact that today’s feast is labelled as a celebration of “The Holy Family”. Yet, because Joseph only had the role of “stepfather” he is somewhat marginalised by the Gospel writer and distanced from the Child Jesus. Expressions like “the child and his mother” underline the marginalisation of Joseph. It is clear that prevailing cultural attitudes have influenced the portrait of the Holy Family that has been handed down to us.
Finally, let’s not rush to conclude that “the Holy Family” is a synonym for “the Perfect Family”. While Paul, in his letter to the Colossians proposed to children that they “be obedient to their parents”, it would seem that Jesus may have unwittingly strayed from that. When he lagged behind in the Temple engaging in theological discussion with the elders, he brought grief and anxiety to his parents. Let’s not pretend that the Holy Family was always totally harmonious. The challenge for us is to always respect the dignity of every member of the family to which we belong.