17/12/2021
About The Holy Family
The Holy Family is the name given to the family unit of Jesus, His mother Mary and His foster-father Joseph. The main purpose of the Feast is to use the Holy Family as a model for all families.
Our homes and families become the “domestic Church” as we live the life of the Church within our homes. We can make Christ and the Church the center of family life by praying together, reading Scripture, attending Mass and trying to imitate the lives of the Holy Family.
Saint John Chrysostom suggested that all Christians homes be a “family church”. Devotion to the Holy Family of Jesus, Mary, and Joseph began largely in the seventeenth century with Pope Pius IX and Pope Leo XIII.
They approved general confraternities to help promote the devotion and in 1893, Pope Leo approved the feast and wrote part of the Office.
The feast was welcomed by future Popes as a means of bringing to homes the example of the Holy Family of Nazareth and helping Christian families to survive and prosper. Pope Leo XIII stated, “Nothing truly can be more salutary or efficacious for Christian families to mediate upon than the example of this Holy family, which embraces the perfection and completeness of all domestic virtues.”
