Fr. Mike's Gospel Reflection for - Sunday, December 28, 2025

On this Feast of the Holy Family, we reflect on the Fourth Commandment – “Honor your father and your mother.” This instruction appears in Exodus, Deuteronomy, Proverbs, Matthew, Ephesians, and in this weekend’s reading from Sirach. The Book of Sirach teaches us to live according to God’s plan – to walk in the way of wisdom. In this passage, the author instructs us to honor and respect our parents—not just while we are children, but our whole lives long.

While disrespect for parents may be common in our culture, God “sets a father in honor over his children.” In a practical sense, honoring our parents involves four key components: appreciating them, accepting their authority, treating them with respect, and, particularly as they grow older, providing for them. It is not blind compliance, but a due deference and respect, a love that shows itself in obedience. A child’s obedience to his father is different than an adult son’s honor for his. “Respecting” an elderly, infirm parent is different than “respecting” a young, healthy parent.

This attitude of deference is a way to break down the inner workings of pride in our hearts. We can’t get very far along the path of wisdom without giving up our “own way.” Pride, or having our own way, is the toughest of sinful habits to break. That is why one of the three vows that religious brothers and sisters take, is obedience (the other two are poverty and chastity). A vow of obedience is the perfect antidote to pride. Sirach encourages us to embrace the way of obedience, the way of humility, so that we may obtain wisdom not by seeking our own path of self-realization, but by humbly submitting ourselves to our fathers and mothers. Wisdom and obedience go hand-in-hand. True wisdom enables us to defer to another and let go of our pride.

The respect that sons and daughters should have for their fathers and mothers is something the Lord set up to orient us toward Him. If we honor our parents, our hearts will be in a great place to honor God. If we honor our parents, then we too can obtain by grace the “long life in the land which the Lord our God is giving us.” That land, of course, is heaven.

Fr. Mike