Saint Holy Family

The Holy Family consists of the Child Jesus, the Blessed Virgin Mary and Saint Joseph. The subject became popular in Christian art from the 1490s on, but veneration of the Holy Family was formally begun in the 17th century by Saint François de Laval, the first bishop of New France, who founded a confraternity. The Gospels speak little of the life of the Holy Family in the years before Jesus' public ministry. Matthew and Luke narrate the episodes from this period of Christ's life, namely his circumcision and later Presentation, the flight to Egypt, the return to Nazareth, and the Finding in the Temple. Joseph and Mary were apparently observant Jews, as Luke narrates that they brought Jesus with them on the annual pilgrimage to Jerusalem with other Jewish families. The Feast of the Holy Family is a liturgical celebration in the Catholic Church, as well as in many Lutheran and Anglican churches, in honour of Jesus of Nazareth, his mother, the Blessed Virgin Mary, and his foster father, Saint Joseph, as a family. The primary purpose of this feast is to present the Holy Family as a model for Christian families. From the 17th century, the feast has been celebrated at a local and regional level and at that level was promoted by Pope Leo XIII, who authorised the establishment of the feast of the Holy Family shortly after the Epiphany in any diocese which chose to request it. In 1921, Pope Benedict XV made it part of the General Roman Calendar and set it on the Sunday within the Octave of the Epiphany (cf. Epiphanytide), that is to say, on the Sunday between January 7 and January 13, all inclusive (see General Roman Calendar of 1954).