Homily for December 28, 2008

Feast of the Holy Family
I don't have any deep or earth shattering thoughts today. I want to invite your own reflection on your family rituals and customs, whether you're an old family with well established rituals or -- I see a couple of you here whom this fits -- you will just be beginning families.   Rituals are very important.
To the writer of Luke's Gospel that we just read, it was very important that we know that Joseph and Mary fulfilled all the rituals of the law. In the Jewish heritage, which is also ours, rituals are very important. There are rituals that mark the beginning of the day, the end of the day, midday; rituals for coming and going, for eating, for purifying ourselves; rituals to remind us that God is between us when we meet to study Torah. The danger of rituals is that they can become absent-minded, things that we do externally our heart is far from them. So religious people kind of have a love hate relationship with rituals. Sometimes we want to be free from them; and sometimes we need to return to them.
A few weeks ago I felt this strongly. I was at the women's prison for Mass. The chaplain wasn't there, so I was all by myself with the women. I couldn't get into the room where my vestments were, so I said Mass in my street clothes.
Now, I think you all know me well enough to know that I'm not scrupulous and uptight about things like that. But you know, it didn't feel right. I know it's the Mass whether I wear the vestments or not but putting on the vestments puts me in a frame of mind, and it makes me realize that what I'm about to do is something different.
I had Mass there on Christmas Day and the Missionaries of Charity, Mother Theresa's order, joined me for Mass. I hope this doesn’t get quoted, but I found that I was uptight, because they're so much more conservative in their style, and it crimped our style. So Mass wasn't the same as it normally is when we're there.
I think those of you who come to Holy Cross all the time know that we have our own quirky style here. We do some things that would raise people's eyes. Even if I didn't like them, some of them I know are so sacred that I wouldn't touch them, because they mean a lot to us. The way we walk, the way we carry ourselves, the way we act, all of these things do have meaning for us, don't they?
Last year we started bringing up the collection instead of passing the collection basket. I love to see the little kids come up and drop money in the basket. I hope it means something to them. I'm always reminded when I see them, though, of Erma Bombeck's story of the little kid who had the envelope to drop in the basket, and he wouldn't do it. They had had a discussion beforehand about why he wasn't old enough to go to communion. When he wouldn’t drop the envelope in the collection, they nudged him and he blurted out, "If I can't eat, I won't pay."
It’s not only in church, but in our families that rituals are important. Do you have rituals in your family that you recognize? Would anybody like to share any of those rituals?

John: Years ago  it's been 25 plus years  we started going to dinner at Christmastime, before Christmas, with some friends of ours. And what's interesting is  and again, we always go to Hollyhock Hill, and we always have the exact same thing to eat -- but it's interesting because it became a tradition for us, and we realized we kind of created our own and it would not seem like Christmas without that kind of marking point.
And no matter what the schedule is, we always make sure we get it in. And it's just been part of us. We always take a picture every year, so we see the kids grow. It's just been a nice part of the Christmas season for us.

And without those rituals, something is missing.
Somebody was telling me recently that they have family rituals around Christmas of a play that the children do. The children are teenagers now. They still do the play. Family tradition is very important to them.
Any other?

Audrey: As a child, we were rather poor. And so at Christmastime Santa Claus would bring us each one of our favorite foods that we couldn't afford to buy otherwise. And they were strange things that we got, like my brother got pickled pigs' feet; my other brother got peanut butter; I got prunes, things like that. And we've carried through that tradition with our children and with our grandchildren.
I'm not sure that they really understand it, but they would be really upset if they woke up Christmas morning and Santa had not brought them their favorite food.

Any other rituals?

Shirley: When I was a child we had certain rituals, and one of them was that we could close off our living room, and my parents would decorate the tree while we were sleeping. And then on Christmas Eve all the presents would be there.
And I think that we've continued that, and with my grandchildren, especially. We close off our living room, and we go downstairs and do a play. And then we come up and they wait to hear Santa Claus walking in the living room. And then they all run up and we open up the doors.
The grandchildren range in age from three to 16, and they still all want to do it this way.

I have a nephew whose birthday is December 23rd. I remember once when we were at a summer birthday party for one of the kids, he looked sad and perplexed, and he said, with all seriousness, "How come I never have a birthday?" The birthday rituals for him got absorbed into the Christmas rituals. Those rituals were very important, because they mark our place in the family.
I know in my own personal life, I have my morning rituals involving prayer and work and all of those things, and when I'm rushed in the morning and I don't complete those rituals, the day doesn't seem the same.
I have on my doorpost at home a Jewish symbol, the mezuzah, that has a scroll on which is written the commandment to love God with your whole heart and soul and mind, and I try to notice it when I leave or when I come into my apartment, because that makes my going and my coming special.
Rituals mark transitions in our life, they mark our place in the community, they mark the coming and going of days and times and seasons, and all of these are very important. They're what make one day, one moment, different from another day and another moment.
I just wanted to offer that reflection but encourage you today to continue reflecting. Maybe think about the rituals in your own life, the rituals in your family, and become, not absent minded about them, but become very intentional about doing them. There is a great deal of power in being very conscious and very intentional about what we do and about our actions. Our minds and our hearts follow what our body is doing.