Deacon Greg’s Homily 12-30-18
The Holy Family is so easy to honor, and yet so difficult to imitate. On the face of it, and with our sometimes flawed attempts and efforts, trying to be parents and children, like Jesus, Mary, and Joseph seems utterly just too unique to model. In fact, it’s difficult not to think of Jesus, Mary, and Joseph as living in a perfectly peaceful life, in holy isolation... But we forget two things. First, no family in first-century Palestine lived disconnected from their network of relatives, and second, that life was lived as part of the larger family of Israel's covenant life with God. Covenant as in Abraham, Sarah, and their decedents (as many as the stars in the sky.) The Israelite family life was considered an expression of covenant life. What does that mean? While a contact is an exchange of goods and services, a convent is an exchange of persons, where an oath is sworn, and the people are changed. Marriage is that kind of covenant relationship, and the community around