Tyranny of time
Sir 3:2-6, 12-14; Ps 128:1-2, 3, 4-5; Col 3:12-21 or 3:12-17; Mt 2:13-15, 19-23
Time can be a tyrant or a friend. But what it can never be is contained. It inexorably unfolds and marches on, regardless of how we experience its pace.
This Sunday we will hear: “My son, take care of your father when he is old; grieve him not as long as he lives. Even if his mind fails, be considerate of him; revile him not all the days of his life” (Sir 3:12-13).
There are not many Scripture passages from the Sunday Mass readings that I can honestly say I remember from my early childhood, when my dad would pile me and my siblings into the car and cart us off to church. These verses are among those few.
I remember how we would mercilessly tease him then — in the prime of life and strong — about how we would have to push him around in his wheelchair one day, so he’d better be nice to us. As we grew older and matured, the teasing stopped.
Year after year, these words seemed to hit just a little bit differently, until he was diagnosed with dementia. Then they hit like jackhammers on my heart, and the Feast of the Holy Family became a day that I dreaded.
While everyone else in the church seemed to be fondly pondering Mary, Joseph and Jesus in their domestic bliss, I was wrestling with a complex knot of emotions marked by grief, anger and sadness, even as I stood at the altar looking out over the congregation at Mass.
My father has been gone many years. And now as the gray hairs keep multiplying on my own head, I find these words hitting differently yet again.
Surely Sirach himself cycled through this same range of thoughts and emotions over the course of his lifetime. How else could he have written so poignantly?
Falling as it does near the threshold of New Year’s Day, this feast invites us to spiritually reflect on the intimate connection between our perception of time and our perception of family.
Time is perhaps never so clearly on our horizon than when we are contemplating our families: how life used to be for us; who has changed the most since our last gathering; how we imagine our own futures, as compared to older siblings or parents, etc. Within this context, time can be perceived as a gift, providing precious space for growth and development within a nurturing home.
The Holy Family reminds us that Jesus was prepared for his public ministry during 30 long years with Mary and Joseph.
But we would be naive to think that time is always perceived this way. It can feel like a cruel tyrant, robbing us of freedom and opportunities. Families can be broken and rife with abusive or manipulative relationships, which render “family time” into periods of dread that seem to drag on interminably.
Similarly, serious illness or periods of unemployment can keep an entire family’s attention fixed on an uncertain future that always seems just out of reach. In such instances, a spiritual lie that can creep into our minds and hearts is that God is somehow not present to us during those times of our lives that seem most out of our control.
A powerful way to combat that lie is to follow the lead of Mary and Joseph as they lived through all the uncertainty that we commemorate during the Advent season. Without full understanding of what was unfolding between them, or how their own families and community would accept or reject them, they remained patiently in the moment, doubtless communicating with each other and with God, in prayer. I think that’s what Mary’s “pondering” actually looked like.
This is how we conquer the tyranny of time, whether it seeks to freeze us in the past or have us grasping frantically for the future. Fears should be voiced and shared, not hidden. Joy and gratitude should be celebrated in the moment, not suppressed as if to ward off false optimism. Time should be the arena in which we encounter Christ’s presence at every moment, not a train schedule making us feel as if we’ve arrived confidently early or regrettably late to God’s station.