God chose to enter into the world through a human family, entrusting his only Son to a young virgin named Mary, and Joseph, who was a carpenter and member of the House of David.
The Holy Family was formed when Mary and Joseph gave their consent to be the parents of the Son of God. They raised Jesus in the town of Nazareth, observing the faith, customs, and practices of the Jewish people.
Jesus’ humble obedience to his human parents sanctified the family and began his mission to reverse the disobedience of Adam and Eve.
Jesus, Mary, and Joseph are the image of what God intended a family to be, demonstrating the lifelong commitment and sacrificial love of husband and wife, the selfless devotion of parents, and the respectful submissiveness of children.
Although the Church dedicates major feast days to each individual member of the Holy Family, their life together is recognized as its own feast within the Octave of Christmas to highlight the connection with the Birth of Christ.
Catholics celebrate The Holy Family of Jesus, Mary, and Joseph on the Sunday between Christmas (December 25) and the Solemnity of Mary, the Mother of God (January 1) unless both of those feast days fall on Sunday.
Jesus was born into a human family:
God chose to be raised and to live in a family:
The Holy Family is real:
When the angels went away from them to Heaven, the shepherds said to one another, “Let us go, then, to Bethlehem to see this thing that has taken place, which the Lord has made known to us.” So they went in haste and found Mary and Joseph, and the infant lying in the manger.
Luke 2: 15-16
The family of Jesus deserves to be called holy:
A family that lived by God’s grace:
A model of Christian family virtues:
Christ chose to be born and grow up in the bosom of the Holy Family of Joseph and Mary. The Church is nothing other than “the family of God.” From the beginning, the core of the Church was often constituted by those who had become believers “together with all [their] household.” When they were converted, they desired that “their whole household” should also be saved. These families who became believers were islands of Christian life in an unbelieving world.
Catechism of the Catholic Church 1655
A holy family in spite of challenges:
A realistic example of the holiness of family life:
The family is the story from which we originate. Each of us has our own story. None of us was born magically, with a magic wand. Each of us has our own story and the family is the story from which we originate. The Gospel of today’s liturgy reminds us that Jesus too is the son of a family story. We see Him travelling to Jerusalem with Mary and Joseph for the Passover; then He makes his Mum and Dad worry when they cannot find Him; found again, He returns home with them. It is beautiful to see Jesus inserted into the fabric of familial affections, which were born and grew in the caresses and concerns of his parents. This is important for us as well: we come from a story that was woven with bonds of love, and the person we are today was born not so much out of the material goods that we enjoyed, but from the love that we received, from the love in the heart of the family. We may not have been born into an exceptional family without problems, but this is our story — everyone must think: this is my story — these are our roots: if we cut them off, life dries up! God did not create us to be lone rangers, but to walk together. Let us thank him and pray to him for our families. God thinks about us and wants us to be together: grateful, united, capable of preserving our roots. And we have to think about this, about our own story.
Pope Francis, Angelus Address, 26 December 2021
Celebrating the Holy Family where they lived:
The Truth, Goodness, and Beauty of the Catholic Church
The origninal Christian Church that Jesus started:
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