PrayTheRosary Apostolate

The month of February is dedicated to the Holy Family, the perfect example of family life for all Christians. Let us meditate on the example of the Holy Family throughout the month and ask the Holy Family to intercede on behalf of our families.

Invocation to the Holy Family
It's a good practice to memorize short prayers to recite throughout the day, to keep our thoughts focused on our life as Christians. This short invocation is appropriate at any time, but especially at night, before we go to bed:

Jesus, Mary, and Joseph most kind,
Bless us now and in death's agony.

A devotion to the Holy Family of Jesus, Mary, and Joseph is encouraged for all Christian families. The lives of the Holy Family on earth serve as models for both the individual and the family. God offers His grace through the Holy Family of Nazareth to encourage a devotion and reflection on their lives. We are challenged to make their way of life, our way of life. They are a source of virtue, they enlighten our minds, and they show us how to love through sacrifice.

thanks to: msf-america.org

Devotion to the Holy Family is a recent development, but one that naturally grows out of a love for Jesus and his family. The cult of the Holy Family grew in popularity in the 17th century, and several religious congregations have been founded under this title. The Holy Family also became portrayed in popular art of the period.

On October 26, 1921 the Congregation of Rites (under Pope Benedict XV) inserted the Feast of the Holy Family into the Latin Rite general calendar. Until then it had been celebrated regionally (see History below). Popes before and including Benedict XV (especially Leo XIII) promoted the feast as a way to counter the breakdown of the family unit.

Today the Church celebrates the Feast on the Sunday between Christmas and New Year's Day (Known as the Feast of Mary Mother of God in the Catholic Church). If both Christmas and New Year's Day fall on Sundays, no Sunday exists between the two dates, so the Church celebrates the Holy Family Feast on December 30th. If the feast falls on the 30th, attendance is not obligatory. Up until 1969, the Holy Family feast was kept on the first Sunday after the Epiphany. It was transferred to its current date in 1969.

Aspirations to the Holy Family

Each aspiration carries a partial indulgence.

Jesus, Mary and Joseph, I offer Thee my heart and my soul.

Jesus, Mary and Joseph, assist me in my last agony.

Jesus, Mary and Joseph, may I breathe forth my soul in peace with Thee.

Jesus, Mary and Joseph, enlighten us, help us, and save us. Amen.

"Why did Christ come into the world as a member of the Holy Family? "

"Or (if we) drop the word Holy, why become a member of a family? It could be anything else but a Holy Family if He was a member but why a family? Why, then, the Holy Family?

When God came into the world as man He was born into a family in order to redeem not only human individuals but human families. Ah, again, every one of these sentences, I mean it, deserves at least an hour lecture. God as God we know is not an individual being. Say that again – God is not an individual being. God, God is a society. God is the society of three infinite individuals, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit and, consequently, when we speak of God becoming man, sure, only one person, the Second Person of the Holy Trinity became man but behind the incarnation were all three Persons.

All three Persons are the cause, as we say, of the incarnation. That’s why Mother Mary, as you know, is given three names: as the daughter of God the Father, as the mother of God the Son, and as the spouse of God the Holy Spirit. God became man to redeem not just individuals but families, and the two go together. Individuals will be only as redeemed as the families are redeemed and vice-a-versa. The family of the human race needed redemption. With Christ’s coming, the family as we have known it for almost twenty centuries is a result of the Holy Family..... It is with the Holy Family that the redemption of the human family began."

-Fr. John A. Hardon, S.J.
realpresence.org