CONTEMPLATING OUR OFFICIAL PAINTING

OF THE HOLY FAMILY.

1.- Contemplating the image, What to contemplate?

-First of all it is convenient to look at the whole painting and to be questioned by it as a whole.

The life, that is present in the whole painting, expresses the basic and primary experience of feeling that “God is” or “that I am in the hands of God.” God is in the life and the life is in God. The life of the man grows with God because He entered forever in the humanity of each one.

“In God we live, we move and we exist” we read in the book of the Acts of the Apostles.

Jesus is the center; this is other clear aspect of the whole painting. Everything is around Jesus. The whole Trinity: Father, Holy Spirit and Son are present. The Father is the reference during the whole life of Jesus. The Father is the criterion of all his behavior, of his prayer, of his sacrifice: to do His will is the only important thing.

Together with God-Father there is another father: Joseph. He tells, he guides, he announces, and he gives testimony of the Father but he is not the Father. He incarnates and accepts the Father's vocation, but he keeps silent, he works and he obeys.

Mary is the mother. Her womb be the “humus-the soil-the leaven”. She receives, welcomes the life and allows that Joseph “guides-directs-shows-reveals” Jesus to His true Father.

-Let us look at it after in two levels: the horizontal and the vertical.

A-. The horizontal level: the daily human life, the bonds and relationships, the opening to the others, the reality of the world.

B-. The vertical level: the opening to the mystery, the opening to God and the searching for meaning, the foundation of our daily fraternity.

2-. Contemplating the postures, the expressions of the people and the people themselves.

- Contemplating the feet: the feet indicate the movement, to go toward... it is the prayer and the mission; to go toward the Father and toward the others.

- Contemplating the hands: the hands are the activity, the creativity, the work... it is to be with the people, to be open.

- Contemplating the looks: it is the relationship with the others, it is to be united, to become close, to go inside the life, to love it, to promote it, to be in charge of it... it is Charity, love.

- Mary: She is the God-Father’s feminine face. She welcomes and receives the Word, the will of God. She listens and gives. She accepts and waits the action of God. She keeps in her heart what is happening. Mary reveals the presence of the Spirit through the fruit of her womb.

- Joseph: He is the paternal face of God-Father. He reveals the mysterious way of God’s acting. He trusts in God. He accepts His project that is beyond the human criteria and aims. He experiences the responsibility of the mysterious “will and action” of God that is much different from ours. He is silent, works, and obeys. He shows in his humanity our human end and vocation. He takes care and develops the project of God together with Mary.

- Jesus: He is the center of the looks, the action of the hands and the movement of the feet. God-Father and the Holy Spirit, through Mary and Joseph have put all their love in the beloved Son.

Jesus is the beginning and end of everything; he is the center of the life.

3-. Contemplating the implications of the painting in today’ world.

It is to paint the painting it in the heart, to take this project of Christian life, Nazareth, to every day reality:

-Being a layman in the world:  living every day human life situations with its happiness, sadness and hopes; being conscious that the project of God, the family of God, is built in the time and the space, in the history.

-Consecrated and oriented to the Father and the others for the Baptism, that makes us responsible for this world and our brothers. We are a gift of God to be given to the others and returned to the Father. We receive the Trinitarian life and we promote it in this world.

-Fraternal and solidary. Close to the others, among the others, with the others. Enriching ones each others. Creating bonds that are born from the same consecration to Our Lord Jesus Christ and that bring the same expressions of self-giving.

This is the Nazareth that we are invited to contemplate and to live in our world. 

Brotherhood (to be close like Jesus in the family of Nazareth) supposes the fatherhood of God, source of all paternity and fraternity. It supposes to recognize and to praise (PRAYER), commitment and sacrifice (WORK) and a living solidarity (LOVE).

“PRAYING, WORKING AND LOVING” it is a good summary of the mystery of Nazareth and of the meaning of the painting. In Nazareth: “PRAYER, WORK AND LOVE” summarizes the Christian lifestyle that the Holy Family Brothers have discovered in the Family of Nazareth and have expressed in the official painting. “PRAYING, WORKING AND LOVING: PEACE” summarizes the Christian life that we wanted to make present in the official painting.

 Br. Aurelio Arreba 
(Traducido H. Roberto Cabello)