The Holy Family

It is no secret that ABC’s comedy series, “Modern Family” has met with great critical success. “Modern Family” went on to win an Emmy, specifically in the category of “Outstanding Comedy Series” in its first three seasons: 2009, 2010, and 2011. Christopher Lloyd and Steven Levitan, the creators of the show, conceived the series while sharing stories of their own ‘modern families’, realizing their complicated webs could make for good television. Despite the serious origins for the show, Lloyd and Levitan chose a mockumentary style for the show’s format. Mockumentaries are a type of film/television show in which fictional events are presented in a documentary style to create a parody or drama-- in this case a parody. While this format might have seemed a natural choice to bring levity to a complex topic (the family), interestingly, Lloyd and Levitan a few years after the show’s creation redacted their statement that the show was a true ‘mockumentary’. They tried to spin their original premise by saying the presentation was “a family show [...] done in a documentary-style”. Why this rhetorical change? Possibly because they realized that it was impolite to make fun of many people’s current familial realities. Or, possibly, Lloyd and Levitan realized many people accepted the show’s view of the family already, wanting to downplay the satirical echo that parody often invokes, making them harbingers of a new familial order in America. Regardless, Lloyd and Levitan realized the packaging of the show needed explanation because the series had struck a deep chord within America’s current social fabric.

During these days of the Christmas Octave, the Church offers an alternative outlook on the family with today’s feast: The Feast of the Holy Family. Sadly, I think, modern man “yawns” at today’s manger scenes because they see a traditional family structure in a humble cave on the outskirts of Bethlehem gravely out-of-touch with our world’s propositions for family life.

However, perhaps providentially, God has prepared with great foresight, Jesus, Mary, and Joseph in regards to the many questions and opinions today’s man and woman have about what family life is. Surprisingly, Jesus, Mary, and Joseph know what it is like to live all of these modern experiences of family life: teen pregnancy, unwed mother, foster parent, widow, death of an only child, are just a few descriptions we don’t immediately think of regarding the Holy Family.

I think if we stop and meditate closely on the Holy Family in this Christmastide we’ll find great comfort for our imperfect family structures, sometimes truly dysfunctional, and even irreparably broken. We must hear today the Holy Family whispering, no pleading, with us in front of our own manger scenes at home: I know what it is like to be an unwed, teenager with a child! I know what it feels like to be a foster parent, whose child doesn’t look like me! I know what it is like to be a foster child, who has to figure out the true origins of my father, who is Divine in origin! I know what it is like to lose my husband too early! I know what it is like to lose my only child long before I’ve left this earth!

And yet, not only did they live the life of a modern family, they lived it in a saintly, or Godly-way (in the case of Jesus). Yes, the Holy Family is a modern family in every regard, and the most perfect one that has ever existed on earth. In fact, that simple, mundane cave in Bethlehem was a surprisingly progressive place (to use a modern-day term). It was a family unit that was progressing all of mankind to that final family that we’re all apart of and belong to: the family of all the saints and angels in Heaven.

Today, we make a resolution from this time of reflection and meditation, offering up this time of prayer for all the brokenness, pain, anger, and woundedness within our own families and extended families, asking the Lord to heal us and bring us the peace of the noble Family of Nazareth. For it is with the Holy Family that we’ll always find a sympathetic ear.

Author: Adam Hauser, English Department and Campus Ministry Team