TODAY’S GOSPEL presents us with a story that is quietly dramatic but deeply revealing.
It is not only the story of a child in danger. It is the story of two families—two ways of being family, two ways of shaping the future.
On the one hand, there is Herod’s family—a powerful dynasty, obsessed with control, fearful of losing power, violent toward anyone perceived as a threat. History tells us that Herod did not hesitate to kill his own brothers, his own wife, even his own children, once suspicion took over. A family that clings to power eventually turns against itself.
On the other hand, there is Joseph’s family—fragile, displaced, homeless, forced to migrate to survive. No palace. No army. No ambition to build a kingdom. Just a carpenter, a young mother, and a child entrusted to them by God.
The Gospel today is not just about the Holy Family.
It is about which kind of family becomes the seed of hope for the world.
And as we close the Jubilee of Hope—within the grace-filled days of Christmas—we are invited to ask: Which family story are we choosing to live and pass on?
In the Gospel, Joseph is warned in a dream: “Rise, take the child and his mother, flee to Egypt.”
Joseph does not argue. He does not calculate political advantage. He does not try to reclaim his royal lineage as a descendant of David. He simply protects life.
Later, when Herod dies, Joseph is told to return—but not to Bethlehem, the city of kings, the city too close to Jerusalem and its dangerous politics. Instead, he goes to Nazareth, an obscure town, far from the centers of power.
This is a crucial detail.
Joseph had no interest in rebuilding David’s throne.
He had embraced a different vocation: to help God build a family, not an empire.
God’s plan was not unfolding in palaces, but in kitchens; not in royal courts, but in ordinary homes; not in imperial Jerusalem, but in quiet Nazareth.
And from that small, unnoticed family would grow a new humanity, embodied in Christ—one who would later say, “Whoever does the will of my Father is my brother and sister and mother.”
Sirach, in the first reading, grounds this vision in everyday relationships: honoring parents, caring for the elderly, holding the family together not through force, but through fidelity and gratitude.
And Saint Paul, in the second reading, describes what it actually means to belong to God’s family. He does not speak of power, control, or dominance. He speaks instead of the virtues that make family life possible: “Heartfelt compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness, patience, bearing with one another and forgiving one another.” (Col 3:12-13)
These are not abstract ideals.
They are daily disciplines of love.
They are what keep families alive.
This contrast between Herod’s family and Joseph’s family speaks powerfully to us as Filipinos. We are known to be family-oriented—and rightly so.
But we also know that family can be lived in two very different ways.
There are families that turn politics into business and pass it on as an inheritance, families that turn power into entitlement, and public office into private property. Political dynasties, too, are families. They protect their turf. They keep power within the clan. And like Herod’s household, they often collapse from within—siblings against siblings, parents against children, spouses against spouses—once fear and insecurity take over.
That kind of family is not life-giving. It is self-destructive.
And when it dominates a nation, it slowly destroys the nation as well.
But there is another kind of Filipino family.
Quiet families. Families that survive calamities, floods, fires, and earthquakes. Families that endure economic hardship, migration, separation, war, and political uncertainty. Families that pray together, stay together, and journey together.
Families that widen their tents.
Families that welcome relatives, friends, neighbors, even strangers. Families that choose compassion over resentment, forgiveness over revenge.
These are the families of Bethlehem that become families in Egypt. These are the families of Egypt that grow roots again in Nazareth. They do not make headlines. But they carry the future.
I recently shared a photo of my own family—just our immediate family of thirteen children—12 got married, one became a priest; 11 of those who married now have children and grandchildren. In the photo, there were more than sixty of us, not counting those absent now living abroad, and some not feeling well, gathering at Bale Pinaud in memory of our parents. We grew into a family of many families. Extended relations, friends, associates. Imperfect, yes. Fragile, yes. But still choosing to gather, to remember, to remain connected.
That is how a nation survives—when families, not dynasties, become its backbone. As we formally close the Jubilee of Hope, the Church does not send us back to grand strategies or political blueprints. She sends us back to our homes.
Hope begins there.
Hope grows when families choose the way of Joseph rather than the way of Herod.
When we protect life rather than power. When we seek survival and solidarity rather than dominance. When we raise children not to inherit privilege, but to inherit compassion.
God did not save the world through an empire. He saved it through a family.
Not a perfect family, but a faithful one. Not a powerful family, but a trusting one. Not a family that built a kingdom, but one that allowed God to build his family on earth.
May our families—Filipino families—become that kind of hope. And may the Holy Family of Nazareth teach us, quietly but firmly, how to belong to one another as God’s beloved family.
(Homily for the Feast of the Holy Family and Closing of the Jubilee of Hope within the Octave of Christmas, 28 Dec 2025, Sir. 3:2–6, 12–14; Col. 3:12–21; Mat. 2:13–15, 19–23)
