Luke 2:41-52.
Each year Jesus' parents went to Jerusalem for the feast of Passover, and when he was twelve years old, they went up according to festival custom. After they had completed its days, as they were returning, the boy Jesus remained behind in Jerusalem, but his parents did not know it. Thinking that he was in the caravan, they journeyed for a day and looked for him among their relatives and acquaintances, but not finding him, they returned to Jerusalem to look for him. After three days they found him in the temple, sitting in the midst of the teachers, listening to them and asking them questions, and all who heard him were astounded at his understanding and his answers. When his parents saw him, they were astonished and his mother said to him, "Son, why have you done this to us? Your father and I have been looking for you with great anxiety." And he said to them, "Why were you looking for me? Did you not know that I must be in my Father's house?" But they did not understand what he said to them. He went down with them and came to Nazareth, and was obedient to them and his mother kept all these things in her heart. And Jesus advanced in wisdom and age and favor before God and man.
The Gospel of the Lord.
The family is the privileged setting where every person learns to give and to receive love.
The family is the intermediate institution between individuals and society.
The family is a great and lifelong treasure for couples.
The family is a school.
The Holy Family is a model for the family.
- Pope Benedict XVI.
A gospel of Luke. Dear and Glorious Physician, the title of the book on the life of Luke by Taylor Caldwell. At the cross, Jesus committed the care of his mother to the apostle John, the apostle that Jesus loved, and said to Mary, "Woman, behold your son" and to John, "Behold your mother." And John immediately took Mary into his home.
At the end of their days, John and Mary lived in Ephesus, then a commercial metropolis on a harbor of the Mediterranean, over time the entrance to the harbor silted up, and Ephesus was abandoned. Now, ancient Ephesus is a valley leading down to the Sea, some two miles away, and the sides of the valley have been dug away revealing houses along both sides of the valley. The floor of the valley is a stream with a bed made of marble, and street lights with the reflecting surfaces made of sheets of marble. There is a Library and an ancient toilet facility. The recovery effort is perhaps half completed. The tradition is that Luke would visit Mary where she was living with John and that Mary told Luke stories of the childhood of Jesus. This gospel is one of those stories. Also, Luke drew a portrait of Mary, which we call the Signpost; the original was destroyed but a copy remains which is the picture we know and distribute here in our parish as prayer cards with the picture of Our Lady of Perpetual Help.
When we read this gospel, it says that Jesus was 12 years old. Every year a faithful Jew must travel to the Temple to worship. Jesus and his family were on that pilgrimage and his parents lost him, and went back looking for him. "They found him in the temple, sitting in the midst of the teachers, listening to them and asking them questions, and all who heard him were astounded at his understanding and his answers." So Jesus was 12 in the midst of the the teachers "listening to them and asking them questions, and all who heard him were astounded at his understanding and his answers." We can compute his IQ from these facts. IQ or Intelligence Quotient is your score on a test at a given age as compared with the average score of a person who is 16. If you score the same as a person of 16, you IQ is 100, if your score 50% higher your IQ is 150. 150 is the score of very intelligent persons; 200 is the theoretical top score. If we assume that the IQ of the teachers in the temple were 150, then their mental ages were 16 plus 50% of 16 or 24. Then if the if the understanding and answers of the child Jesus at 12 "astounded" the teachers, he at 12 was at a higher level than them; if their IQ's were 150, or a mental age of 24, then the mental age of the 12 year old Jesus was higher than 24, so that his IQ was higher than 200.
When his parents saw him, they were astonished and his mother said to him, "Son, why have you done this to us? Your father and I have been looking for you with great anxiety." And he said to them, "Why were you looking for me? Did you not know that I must be in my Father's house?" We have two uses of the term, "Father" one by Mary, "Son, why have you done this to us? Your father and I have been looking for you with great anxiety." That "father' being Joseph. and the second by Jesus, "Why were you looking for me? Did you not know that I must be in my Father's house?" Or in other words, Why did you find it so hard to locate me, did you not know that I must be in my Father's house? That "Father" being God, the temple where they found Jesus being the house of God.
And they (Jesus and Mary) did not understand "and his mother kept all these things in her heart."
He went down with them and came to Nazareth, and was obedient to them. And Jesus lived with his parents until He was 30 years of age and began his public life.
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