December 28, 2025
Feast of the Holy Family of
Jesus, Mary and Joseph
Lectionary: 17
Reading
I
God sets a father
in honor over his children;
a mother’s authority he confirms over her sons.
Whoever honors his father atones for sins,
and preserves himself from them.
When he prays, he is heard;
he stores up riches who reveres his mother.
Whoever honors his father is gladdened by children,
and, when he prays, is heard.
Whoever reveres his father will live a long life;
he who obeys his father brings comfort to his mother.
My son, take care
of your father when he is old;
grieve him not as long as he lives.
Even if his mind fail, be considerate of him;
revile him not all the days of his life;
kindness to a father will not be forgotten,
firmly planted against the debt of your sins
—a house raised in justice to you.
Responsorial
Psalm
R. (cf. 1) Blessed
are those who fear the Lord and walk in his ways.
Blessed is everyone who fears the LORD,
who walks in his ways!
For you shall eat the fruit of your handiwork;
blessed shall you be, and favored.
R. Blessed are those who fear the Lord and walk in his ways.
Your wife shall be like a fruitful vine
in the recesses of your home;
your children like olive plants
around your table.
R. Blessed are those who fear the Lord and walk in his ways.
Behold, thus is the man blessed
who fears the LORD.
The LORD bless you from Zion:
may you see the prosperity of Jerusalem
all the days of your life.
R. Blessed are those who fear the Lord and walk in his ways.
Reading
II
Brothers and
sisters:
Put on, as God’s chosen ones, holy and beloved,
heartfelt compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness, and patience,
bearing with one another and forgiving one another,
if one has a grievance against another;
as the Lord has forgiven you, so must you also do.
And over all these put on love,
that is, the bond of perfection.
And let the peace of Christ control your hearts,
the peace into which you were also called in one body.
And be thankful.
Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly,
as in all wisdom you teach and admonish one another,
singing psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs
with gratitude in your hearts to God.
And whatever you do, in word or in deed,
do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus,
giving thanks to God the Father through him.
Wives, be
subordinate to your husbands,
as is proper in the Lord.
Husbands, love your wives,
and avoid any bitterness toward them.
Children, obey your parents in everything,
for this is pleasing to the Lord.
Fathers, do not provoke your children,
so they may not become discouraged.
OR:
Brothers and
sisters:
Put on, as God’s chosen ones, holy and beloved,
heartfelt compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness, and patience,
bearing with one another and forgiving one another,
if one has a grievance against another;
as the Lord has forgiven you, so must you also do.
And over all these put on love,
that is, the bond of perfection.
And let the peace of Christ control your hearts,
the peace into which you were also called in one body.
And be thankful.
Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly,
as in all wisdom you teach and admonish one another,
singing psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs
with gratitude in your hearts to God.
And whatever you do, in word or in deed,
do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus,
giving thanks to God the Father through him.
Alleluia
R. Alleluia,
alleluia.
Let the peace of Christ control your hearts;
Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly.
R. Alleluia, alleluia.
Gospel
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.”
Joseph rose and took the child and his mother by night
and departed for Egypt.
He stayed there until the death of Herod,
that what the Lord had said through the prophet might be fulfilled,
Out of Egypt I called my son.
When Herod had died, behold,
the angel of the Lord appeared in a dream
to Joseph in Egypt and said,
“Rise, take the child and his mother and go to the land of Israel,
for those who sought the child’s life are dead.”
He rose, took the child and his mother,
and went to the land of Israel.
But when he heard that Archelaus was ruling over Judea
in place of his father Herod,
he was afraid to go back there.
And because he had been warned in a dream,
he departed for the region of Galilee.
He went and dwelt in a town called Nazareth,
so that what had been spoken through the prophets
might be fulfilled,
He shall be called a Nazorean.
https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/122825.cfm
Commentary
on Sirach 3:2-6,12-14; Colossians 3:12-21; Matthew 2:13-15,19-23
After Christmas, we traditionally celebrate the feast of the
Holy Family. In some respects, it was very modern in being just a one-child
family. We may be inclined to think that, with three such good people, life
must have been very easy for them. But if we are to take the Incarnation
seriously, there is no reason to believe that this family—living the lifestyle
of a rural village in those times—did not have its share of hardships over the
years.
In addition, there is the record of the child being lost for
three days in a large and strange city. Imagine the anxiety of the parents in
such a situation. Later, the mother will see her son become famous and then the
object of great hostility. She will see him abused, arrested, tried, sentenced,
scourged, crowned with thorns and finally die like a common criminal with two
criminals before jeering crowds. Few mothers have to go through anything like
that kind of experience.
Families in trouble
Today, in celebrating the Holy Family, we ask God’s blessings on our own
families. It is cliché to say that family life today is in trouble. And it is a
self-perpetuating problem.
Sadly, children from dysfunctional families themselves may
be more likely to set up equally dysfunctional families. Never having
experienced good family life, how can they themselves establish a good family?
And it seems that very few couples go through any real formation process in
becoming husband and wife and parents. Yet the skills needed do not come
naturally—or easily.
Family and church
Jesus said that:
…where two or three are gathered in my name, I am there
among them. (Matt 18:20)
This should be true of every Christian family. The Catholic
family is the basic Christian community, through which Christ is present and
reveals himself in this world. It has been called the domestic church.
Christian families not only belong to the Church, but their
lifestyle is also a living out of the Christian vision: the vision of unconditional
love in a truly sharing community.
Family life is not meant to be lived in isolation. The world
around it is not just there for its benefit. It should be united with,
supporting and supported by the other families in the parish community and with
the wider Church.
The mission of the family is identical to that of the whole
Church: to give tangible witness to the vision of Christ for the world.
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https://livingspace.sacredspace.ie/a-holyfamily/
Sunday,
December 28, 2025
Feast of the
Holy Family
LECTIO
Opening Prayer:
God, our Creator and
Father, You decreed that Your Son, generated before the dawn of the world,
should be like us in all things through His incarnation in the womb of the
Virgin Mary by the working of the Holy Spirit. Send that same lifegiving Spirit
upon us, so that we may become ever more docile to Your sanctifying action,
allowing ourselves to be gently transformed by the same Spirit into the image
and likeness of Jesus Christ Your Son, our brother, savior and redeemer.
Gospel Reading – Matthew 2: 13-15, 19-23
13 After they had left, suddenly
the angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream and said, 'Get up, take the
child and His mother with you, and escape into Egypt, and stay there until I
tell you, because Herod intends to search for the child and do away with Him.'
14 So Joseph got up and, taking the child and His mother with him, left that
night for Egypt, 15 where he stayed until Herod was dead. This was to fulfill
what the Lord had spoken through the prophet: I called my son out of Egypt. 16
Herod was furious on realizing that he had been fooled by the wise men, and in
Bethlehem and its surrounding district he had all the male children killed who
were two years old or less, reckoning by the date he had been careful to ask
the wise men. 17 Then were fulfilled the words spoken through the prophet
Jeremiah: 18 A voice is heard in Ramah, lamenting and weeping bitterly: it is
Rachel weeping for her children, refusing to be comforted because they are no
more. 19 After Herod's death, suddenly the angel of the Lord appeared in a
dream to Joseph in Egypt 20 and said, 'Get up, take the child and His mother
with you and go back to the land of Israel, for those who wanted to kill the
child are dead.' 21 So Joseph got up and, taking the child and His mother with
him, went back to the land of Israel. 22 But when he learned that Archelaus had
succeeded his father Herod as ruler of Judaea he was afraid to go there, and
being warned in a dream he withdrew to the region of Galilee. 23 There he
settled in a town called Nazareth. In this way the words spoken through the
prophets were to be fulfilled: He will be called a Nazarene.
A Moment of Silence:
so that the
Word of God may penetrated into our hearts and enlighten our life
MEDITATIO
A Key to the Reading:
Matthew’s Gospel has been called “the
Gospel of the Kingdom.” Matthew invites us to reflect on the coming of the
kingdom of heaven. Some have seen in the structure of his Gospel narration a
drama in seven acts that deal with the coming of this Kingdom. The drama begins
with the preparation for the coming of the Kingdom in the person of the boy
Messiah and ends with the coming of the Kingdom in the suffering and triumph of
the passion, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ, Son of God.
The Gospel passage presented to us
for reflection is part of the so-called first act where Matthew introduces to
us the person of Jesus as the fulfillment of the Scriptures. Matthew’s is the
Gospel that often quotes the Old Testament to show that in Christ the law and
the prophets are fulfilled. Jesus, the fulfillment and perfection of the
Scriptures, came into the world to re-establish the kingdom of heaven already
proclaimed in the covenant made by God with His people. With the coming of
Christ, this covenant is no longer reserved for the Jewish people alone but is
extended to all peoples. Matthew addresses himself to a community of Christian
Jews, persecuted by the synagogue, and invites it to be open to the gentiles.
He is the wise scribe who knows how to draw from his treasury that which is old
and new. His Gospel was first written in Aramaic and then translated into
Greek.
Matthew 2: 13-23 is part of the section
that deals with the birth and childhood of “Jesus Christ son of David, son of
Abraham” (Mt 1: 1). Jesus is the son of His people, but He is also son of the
whole of humanity. In His genealogy we find foreign influences (Mt 1: 3-6).
After Mary His mother, the first called to pay homage to the newborn Messiah
are the Magi (Mt 2: 11). With His light, the Messiah draws the wise to Himself
and offers them salvation (Mt 2: 1-12). The Magi receive this salvation, unlike
Herod and the troubled citizens of Jerusalem (Mt 2: 3).
From the very time of His birth,
Jesus relives the painful experience of His people in exile, humbled again and
again. The Gospel shows us this by telling us of the flight into Egypt and the
murder of the innocents. The drama of these events unfolds before us in the
following details:
• The
angel who appears in a dream to Joseph after the Magi leave, and the flight
into Egypt (Mt 2: 13-15).
• Herod
who becomes aware of the deceit of the Magi and kills all the male children in
Bethlehem (Mt 2: 16-18).
• The
death of Herod and the “clandestine” return of the Holy Family, not to
Bethlehem but to Galilee (Mt 2: 19-23).
The theme of kings killing those
whom they fear is common in the history of every royal dynasty. Apart from this
scene of Herod seeking out the child Jesus to kill Him, in Bible literature in
the Old Testament we find similar stories. In the first book of Samuel, Saul
who has been rejected by the Lord feared David and sought to kill him (1 Sam
15; 18; 19; 20). Michal and Jonathan help David to flee (1 Sam 19; 20). Again
in the first book of Kings, King Solomon in his old age, unfaithful to the God
of his fathers and with a perverted heart, commits what is evil in the sight of
the Lord (1 Kings 11:3- 13). For this, the Lord raises up an adversary against
Solomon (1 Kings 11: 14), Hadad the Edomite, who during David’s reign flees and
takes refuge in Egypt (1 Kings 11: 17). Another of Solomon’s adversaries is
Jeroboam who takes refuge in Egypt to get away from the king who wanted to kill
him (1 Kings 11: 40). Such were the dangers of a degenerate kingdom. In the
second book of Kings, this time in the context of the siege of Jerusalem, “In
the ninth year of his [Nebuchadnezzar’s] reign, in the tenth month, on the
tenth day of the month” (2 Kings 25: 1) of the year 589, we read of the sacking
of Jerusalem and of the second deportation of the people in the year 587 (2
Kings 25: 8- 21). The people who “remained in the land of Judah” (2
Kings 25: 22) submit to Gedaliah who was appointed governor by
Nebuchadnezzar. “Ishmael […] and ten men with him […]
murdered Gedaliah, as well as the Judeans and the Chaldeans who were with him.”
Then from fear of the Chaldeans, they fled into Egypt (2 Kings 25-26). In the
book of the prophet Jeremiah, we also find the story of Uriah “another man,
too, who used to prophesy in the name of Yahweh” (Jer 26: 20). Uriah flees into
Egypt because king Jehoiakim sought to kill him. The king in fact did find him
in Egypt and killed him (Jer 25: 20-24).
With these events as background
to the flight of the Holy Family into Egypt, Matthew shows us Jesus, from His
very childhood, as partaking of the fate of His people. Egypt, for Jesus,
becomes the place of refuge, as it was for the patriarchs:
• Abraham
who “went down into Egypt to stay there for the time, since the land was hard
pressed by the famine” (Gen 12: 10).
• Joseph
was threatened by his brothers who sought to kill him out of envy and was then
sold to merchants who led him into Egypt and sold him to Potiphar (Gen 37:
12-36).
• Israel
(Jacob) who goes to Egypt called by his son Joseph (Gen 46: 1-7).
• The
family of Israel (Jacob) that goes to Egypt to establish themselves there (Gen
46– 50; Ex 1: 1-6).
Matthew turns the citation from
Hosea 11:1 upside down: “I called my son out of
Egypt,” and interprets it as if
God called his son Jesus to flee into Egypt (Mt 2: 15).
The original meaning of Hosea was that
the Lord called his son Israel to leave Egypt in order to start a nation.
Jesus’ flight into Egypt and the killing of the innocents of Bethlehem remind
us of the oppression of Israel in Egypt and the killing of all the new-born
males (Ex 1: 8-22).
The prophecy applied to the murder of
the innocents is taken from the book of consolation made up of chapters 30 and
31 of the book of Jeremiah. The lamentation is connected to the promise of the
Lord who consoles Rachel, Jacob’s (Israel’s) spouse, mother of Joseph, who
according to tradition was buried close to Bethlehem, and promises her that she
will be rewarded for her sorrow, her children who are no longer will come back
(Jer 31: 15–18).
When they come back from Egypt after the
death of Herod, Joseph decides to live in Galilee in a city called Nazareth.
Jesus will be called the Nazarene. Later also, His disciples will be known as
Nazarenes (Acts 24: 5). Apart from indicating the name of a city, this name may
also refer to the “shoot”, that is the «neçer» of Isaiah 11: 1. Or it may refer
to the rest of Israel, the «naçur» (see Isa 42: 6). Questions for Personal Reflection:
•
What strikes you most in this passage from
Matthew?
•
What does the kingdom of heaven mean for you?
•
How does the kingdom of heaven differ from
earthly kingdoms?
•
Matthew introduces us to the person of Jesus as
one who becomes one with the fate of His people. Read the passages cited in the
key to the reading so as to reflect and pray on the events of the people of
God, with which Jesus identified Himself. What are similar situations in our
world? Ask yourself what you can do to better the conditions where you live and
work, especially if they are at variance with the kingdom of heaven.
ORATIO
Personal Prayer in Silence.
Conclude the lectio divina with this prayer:
Merciful Father, grant that we
may follow the examples of the Holy Family of Jesus, Mary and Joseph, so that
we may always be strong in the trials of life until the day when we may share
in Your glory in heaven. We ask this through Christ our Lord.
CONTEMPLATIO
May the peace of Christ
reign in your hearts. (Col 3: 15)
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