"Not Forfeited by Original Sin"
December 31, 2006

Readings for the Solemnity of the Holy Family of Jesus, Mary, and Joseph

Reading 1: Sir. 3:2–7, 12–14 or 1 Sam. 1:20–22, 24–28

Responsorial Psalm: Ps. 128:1–2, 3, 4–5

Reading 2: Col. 3:12–21 or 3:12–17 or 1 Jn. 3:1–2, 21–24

Gospel: Lk. 2:41–52

Link to Readings

By Father David Poecking

Family life is awesome and beautiful. The union of a man and woman in marriage, leading naturally to children, is the most exalted of all earthly experiences. The nuptial blessing from the Rite of Marriage expresses the mind of the Church that married life is “the one blessing not forfeited by original sin.”

“Not forfeited by original sin.” What a place the Garden of Eden must have been! All earthly blessings and pleasures, except marriage, are merely the residue of original righteousness, a few leftovers from the feast of joy God provided for man and woman before sin. Only in a happy marriage and good family life do we catch a glimpse of the sublime joy God intended for creation.

It’s no wonder we are tempted to idolize sex or romance or children! These blessings shine brightly against the drab backdrop of other worldly pleasures—so brightly it’s tempting to think of them as gods, as ultimate sources of life’s meaning. Marriage and family life are joyful mysteries.

Marriage and family life can also be painful. Precisely because we place such high hopes on family, any loss or corruption of family life hurts us deeply. Most of us can handle other disappointments or setbacks, but when something goes wrong with romance or children, then we suffer heartache, then we are tempted to despair.

Perhaps the pain is the drama of unrequited love that begins with puberty, or the high-stakes gamble of courting one’s fiancé(e), or the shock of betrayal by a spouse, or the disappointment and failure of a divorce. Perhaps it is the tragedy of an infant’s death, or the anxiety over raising a troubled child, or the dismay one feels as one sees adult children wander down the wrong path in life. Whatever it is, most of us know the potential torment of marriage and children. Family life may be beautiful, but its beauty may conceal sharp and painful thorns.

Yet family life is our eternal destiny. At Christmas, God is revealed as a kind of family, a family of three Persons—Father, Son, and Spirit—three distinct Persons nevertheless sharing one common life as one being. If our destiny in eternity is life with God, then our destiny is life in this divine family.

And if family life is our destiny, it is fitting we rehearse for it in our earthly life and our earthly families. After all, even the Lord Jesus did not hold Himself aloof from family life. He reveals not only the mystery of the Trinity, the divine Family, but also the mystery of human family life. God did not take on human life by descending out of the sky, a solitary figure untouched by human affairs. No, God came as an infant, a baby boy dependent on the love of parents, who were chosen for each other through the love that comes to man and woman—a love no less beautiful because Mary’s sexuality was virginal.

Mary and Joseph, mother and adoptive father, enjoy the awesome beauty of marriage and the wonder of childrearing; they endure great anxiety for the well-being of their boy, anxiety that He should be protected from the evils of the world. Joseph and Mary know both the joy and pain of family life. God comes to us as a man, Jesus—a single man, but in the context of romance and family.

We’re all in the same context, romance and family: All of us come from family, and all of us again give ourselves away to family. Some do so by acquiring earthly families; all do so by life in the Church. The joy of family life, and even the pain, these are the means by which we come to know God, the beauty of the life of the Trinity and the self-emptying love of the Son for the Father.

Life in our families, life in the Church—earthly family life is our rehearsal for divine family life, our preparation for eternity. Jesus, Mary, and Joseph, together in the romance and heartache of family life, grow in wisdom, age, and favor before God and man. May we learn from their example the perfection of earthly family life, that we might also be well-prepared for the glory of divine life with Father, Son, and Spirit.

Father David Poecking is a priest of the Diocese of Pittsburgh.

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