by Fr. Brian Wirth,
Director of Rural Life
February has been a month of extremes. From the frigid cold and the first measurable snow in over a year for some, to a heat wave drawing us toward spring, we have seen a lot. For those who work with livestock, my prayers have been with you: “Frost and chill, bless the Lord; Fire and heat, bless the Lord.”
But while weather in the Good Life and worldly matters constantly keep us on our toes, for better or for worse, there is one reality that strives to remain consistent in all: The unwavering love of the family.
Each year, the Church dedicates February to the Most Holy Family. This devotion dates back to the 17th century, beginning in France and Canada. Following its rapid growth, Pope Leo XIII officially declared a liturgical feast under this title in 1893.
Since I can remember, I have had a profound love for the Holy Family. Growing up on the farm and being surrounded by my own family, the beauty of the rural landscape, and the dignity of work, all while rooted within the rich soil of the Catholic faith, so many times in the rural setting I have personally experienced a singular unity with Jesus, Mary, and Joseph and their most virtuous hearts as they lived within the intimacy of the hidden life in Nazareth.
Still today, as a priest and as director of Catholic Rural Life for the diocese, my devotion to the Holy Family fundamentally guides me in my loving pastoral care for you, and always will.
In a 1996 papal audience, Pope St. John Paul II reaffirmed the power of the Holy Family: “The message that comes from the Holy Family is first of all a message of faith: the family of Nazareth is a home which truly centers on God. For Mary and Joseph, this choice of faith becomes concrete in their service to the Son of God entrusted to their care, but it is also expressed in their mutual love, rich in spiritual tenderness and fidelity.”
Apart from their proper feast day on the Sunday after Christmas, Feb. 2 the Holy Family is celebrated on the Feast of the Presentation.
Though Jesus is true God and true man and like us in all things but sin, as righteous Jews, “for their purification according to the law of Moses, they brought him up to Jerusalem to present him to the Lord and to offer sacrifice according to what is said in the law of the Lord.” (Lk. 2:22-24)
Following the Presentation and later, the finding of Jesus in the Temple, in both events, Luke records that Jesus, in total obedience to Mary and Joseph “returned into Galilee, to their own city, Nazareth. And the child grew and became strong, filled with wisdom and the favor of God was upon him.” (Lk. 2:39-40; 51-52)
Although Jesus grew, became strong, and was filled with wisdom working as a carpenter with Joseph growing up in Nazareth, the Holy Family had an intimate knowledge of rural life and agriculture and its joys and challenges. Living near the fertile Jezreel Valley, the people of Nazareth (and many Galilean villages) were primarily subsistence farmers and agricultural workers and still are today.
In every norm and extremity, the Holy Family knows our familial joys and sufferings on the farm better than anyone. In wisdom and fortitude, they have labored lovingly with us in solidarity via the Cross, and now in Heaven via the Resurrection, they intercede for us unceasingly so that we may reap every domestic virtue.
As Pope Leo XIII states: “Nothing truly can be more salutary or efficacious for Christian families to meditate upon than the example of this Holy Family, which embraces the perfection and completeness of all domestic virtues.”
As verdant trees planted near running water (Ps. 1), the Holy Family empowers us to constantly turn to Christ via the intimacy of prayer, sacrifice and work, so that we may remain fruitful trees in the midst of the Cross and not become barren bushes due to lack of faith. Truly, success in life comes from an absorption in the revealed will of God.
My favorite depiction of the Holy Family is “The Heavenly and Earthly Trinities” by the Spanish Baroque painter Bartolomé Murillo. Undeniably, the Holy Family is a precious treasure, an icon by which all families are called to model their family as a “domestic church” upon the virtuous hearts of Jesus, Mary, and Joseph in our physical and spiritual lives.
By Bartolomé Esteban Murillo - https://www.nationalgallery.org.uk/paintings/bartolome-esteban-murillo-the-heavenly-and-earthly-trinities, Public Domain
Thus, living in the world of our Divine Creator, may the graced humanity of the Holy Family draw our diocese ever deeper into the blessed hidden life of the Most Holy Trinity forever.
In the meantime, Lord, this spring, humbly may we physically and spiritually receive your grace-filled moisture in abundance.
“Dew and rain, bless the Lord.”
