Polymorphous Pervert #6

Love in Its Fullness

The holy family of Nazareth—Jesus, Mary, and joseph—was full of love. It had to be. At the heart of the family was Jesus, the Incarnate Word of God, a man who is “God from God, light from light, true God from true God”. He is the Holy One whom God sent to redeem us humans from all our sins. Mary, “full of grace” and immaculately conceived, was the wife and mother of this family. The “second Eve”, she is the one human person totally without sin—without envy, without greed, without lust. Then there was Joseph, attested by the Scripture as a “just man”—and the only sinner in the family. This was a family full of love, an icon of love, as it were, for us to contemplate. Here is a model of love for us to participate in.

Let us look at Joseph in particular. He was the one member of the family not free of original sin and therefore subject to the threefold concupiscence “the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes and the pride of life” (1 John 16) His wife Mary was prepared by God with unique gifts, but he was not. To be sure, he was not “on his own” because as a faithful Jew he received all the graces that God poured onto his Chosen People. Nevertheless, he was in a strange situation. Although his son Jesus was conceived not of him but of the Holy Spirit, it was his job to raise him—to teach him how to be a man, to train him in the carpenter’s trade, and to see that he learned Torah. Even if the world was created through the Second Person of the Trinity, it fell to Joseph to teach him how to be a good, religious Jew, as well as how to use a hammer without banging his own thumb and to wield chisel and saw without cutting himself. If the Eternal Word of God set the stars in marvelous array, Joseph had to show this Word how to plane and polish a table to look good in a customer’s home. Joseph had also to teach Jesus the practical implications of sin and evil. We cannot assume that every Galilean dealer in woods and tools was honest. We can trust that in Nazareth some customers were not above trying to short the workman’s pay. Jesus of Nazareth, destined as King to judge the nations (Matthew 25), had to learn how and when his family might be cheated and how to cope with the dishonesty we inevitably meet in our neighbors. Joseph had to teach him about this. He also had to teach Jesus about the fair and just prices to charge for his work. In other words, Joseph had to teach his son how to be wise in dealing with human sin. Luke’s Gospel tells us that Jesus was subject to both his earthly parents, Mary and Joseph.

Jesus is the son of God, conceived in Mary’s womb by the overshadowing of the Holy Spirit. This does not mean, however, that the baby Jesus or even six-year-old Jesus knew much about God. We ask how he could be God the Almighty and not know it, but none of us knows what it is like to be God. What we do know is that as children we were all ignorant of very fundamental truths about ourselves.

We also know that at age twelve Jesus went lost in Jerusalem and found after three days. There is much to learn from this episode. When “his parents” (Luke 2:43) finally found him and Mary said “your father and I” (Luke 2: 48) had been looking anxiously for him, he responded that he had to be in his Father’s house. Clearly at this point he had put together the fundamental truth about himself, that he was the son, not only of Joseph and Mary but of God himself. Then the learned scribes with whom he had been talking expressed amazement and this boy’s knowledge. Where did he get his knowledge? The answer has to do with his parents. Judaism is distinctly a religion of the home. There were sacrifices in Jerusalem on high feast days, of course, and teaching in the local synagogue on Sabbath. But the principal place of religious practice was the home, where mother prepared Sabbath dinner and its ritual, father led in recitation of the psalms, and where the entire family lived out the faith of the Law and the Prophets. Jesus learned his Jewish faith from his parents, from Mary and Joseph. (Let us stop and pity poor Joseph, the Galilean tradesman who was responsible for teaching the Incarnate Word of God how to be a good follower of God’s Law!) Reflecting prayerfully on his life and on the Scriptures to which his parent exposed him to daily and on his inner awareness of the Mystery of his own being, Jesus was able to grasp and articulate the truth about himself, that he was the Incarnate Son of God. And nevertheless he returned with his parents to Nazareth and was subject to them. He may have been God’s Son, but he obeyed Joseph.

Mary was Joseph’s wife and support, as well as the mother of Jesus. Our Christmas art shows baby Jesus aglow and peaceful in the manger. It does not show him crying because his diaper was soaking wet. We don’t see icons of Mary waking bleary-eyed at 2:00 AM to nurse the infant Jesus, who was not yet sleeping through the night. She was (and is) the very real mother of a very human son. She was also a very real wife to Joseph, giving him in every way but one the love that every wife gives to her husband. If he had once again been cheated by that certain disreputable client or supplier in the village, she was there to calm him and dissuade him from any steps to “teach that guy a lesson”. When she was sick, he tended to her while she recuperated, just as she took care of him when he had a cold or a workshop injury. We can be confident that they were affectionate and devoted to each other. If some other man in the village should notice how lovely Mary was—every visionary from Guadalupe to Lourdes to Medjugorje has remarked how beautiful she is—and should have attempted to ‘come on to’ the Blessed Virgin, Joseph would have firmly handled it. He was her protector. In every way but one Joseph and Mary acted as loving husband and wife.

The Holy Family of Nazareth was a family filled with love in every way. Each of them was completely for the other. They gave of themselves without reserve to each other’s well being, not only in earthly things but especially in relation to God. Even when conflicts arose, perhaps when Mary disagreed with Joseph about some playmate who had been mean to Jesus or when money was especially tight, the two of them—and when Jesus entered his teens, the three of them—worked through the situation frankly and in love. Mary and Joseph, together with their son, show us what love looks like in real life.

************* Our contemporary bugaboo *************

And this brings us to that nagging problem that so many of us in 21^st-century America cannot get past: the issue of sex. Mary was and in perpetually a virgin. If there was no sex, how can there have been true love? Presumably the marriage of Joseph and Mary was more or less arranged; that is what they did in those days. But today marriage starts with and is the culmination of “romantic love”, which is the kind of love that draws good looking and charming young people together into an emotional union of hearts and eventually of bodies. It is very unlikely that Mary and Joseph were romantically in love with each other. He may have noticed how pretty she was. She doubtless knew how strong and good and responsible he was—good husband material. But we have no indication that they were “in love”. They loved deeply and well, so deeply and well that God entrusted his Incarnate Word of God to them. Their love was deep, rich, and fulfilling.

And precisely here is our bugaboo. We believe in and hope for romantic love as the highest and best form of love, which rightly issues in and finds its fulfillment in marriage. This is the love between “soul mates” who are convinced they were made for each other. Any other kind of love in only second best, as it were, even if between husband and wife. When found, such a love supersedes all other forms of love and institutional forms, even lawful marriage. See the novel or the film Bridges of Madison County or the films Elvira Madigan and Like Water for Chocolate, where marriage is almost an obstacle to true love.

Romantic love is an illusion. It is sweet while it lasts, but also deceptive, because in time it fades and bitterly disappoints.

************ Back to the Holy Family ************

The holy family of Nazareth lived a life of constant love. We can say that their life, which was situated in the same busy and sinful world as our lives, was miraculous. After all, God himself was a member of that family. But we are invited into that love, to model our own families on that one in Nazareth. This is possible with God’s help. We can live lives of true love, generously giving ourselves to each other in marriage (even when we don’t feel like it) and sharing that love—teaching that love—with our children. Love is real. It’s not romantic, but it is good, rich, and fulfilling. And we can have it.