Second Sunday after Epiphany

Thoughts for the Week - Fr. R. Taouk 
19th January 2014

Dear Friends,

It seems that all too often we see suffering as a thing to be escaped, we view it as an enemy, and as a result we are perpetually trying to run from it.  This makes our lives often agitated and anxious. Suffering however is a great teacher of self-knowledge.  It opens up our egoism.  And self-knowledge is absolutely essential in the spiritual life, otherwise we live in illusion. For this reason Our Lord requires us to suffer with Him so as to be able to be glorified with Him. If we are patient we learn. Rather than anxiously attempt to escape we should learn what it means "to take up one's cross."

If we look at the Catholic family, we must say that suffering is central to the father of the family, for upon him is set the greatest responsibility in a family. How does he react to the difficulties which normally arise in life? St. Joseph here, set for us a clear standard for men to imitate in the manner that he accepted his responsibilities and sufferings due to his union with the Blessed Virgin Mary:

1.  He was profoundly humbled by the Divine Presence of the Child conceived by Mary his wife; he accepted his responsibility in spite of the sense of unworthiness and he named the Child as his own.

2.  He adapted himself to the hardships surrounding the birth of the Divine Child in Bethlehem.

3.  He immediately responded to the order from the angel to take the Child and His Mother into Egypt, there he found life as an exile difficult; and finally he once again moved his family back to Judea when ordered by the angel to return after the death of Herod.

4.  Established in Galilee, he lived his life in simplicity and poverty for the honour and glory of God.

5.  His days were spent in this sublimely simple manner, and his life was crowned by a holy death in the arms of his foster Son, God Incarnate, and at the side of his charitable and immaculate wife.

The glory of St. Joseph is that he lived as a father should: he embraced the suffering necessary for the good of his family and thus served as its source of unity and religious practice. This is the model which all Catholic men must imitate. They must embrace the suffering necessary for the wellbeing and spiritual life of their families.

'O Glorious Patriarch St. Joseph - grant us many holy families'