Have you ever lost your home? 

Some people lose their homes in a fire or flood. Other people lose their homes because of financial ruin. And some people lose their homes because the people they love pass away. 

Romaric lost his home in a brutal way when he was young. His parents were both murdered by Queen Brunhilda and Romaric was forced to wander the world, homeless. But that wandering didn’t last forever. Eventually he found his home again by joining a monastery (and then founding one of his own). He set his sights on his true home in heaven.

We all long for a sense of belonging, a sense of being home. But sometimes following Jesus means that it’s hard for us to feel “at home” in this life. When he was on Earth, Jesus didn’t always have a home: “Foxes have holes, and birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay his head,” (Luke 9:58).

It began, of course, with his radical entry into this world: a tiny ovum in the womb of an unmarried woman. Then there was the manger. He didn’t have a reservation. The King of Kings and the Lord of Lords was born in a stable. 

Throughout his entire public life, there is no record of Jesus going home. We read of him visiting the region where he was from, but there is nothing about him going back to his family home and

certainly no record that he had a home of his own.

Have you ever been away from home for any period of time? There are a thousand things you take for granted at home—the feel of your own bed, the firmness of your pillows, the temperature and ability to control it, your preferred food and beverages in the refrigerator, and all your things.

When you are away from home, you don’t have any of this. Life on the road can make you feel unsettled, disoriented, unmoored. When you have been away, whether for a few days or for many months, it is a wonderful feeling to come home.

We yearn for home. Why does this yearning matter? The people of every nation and culture universally celebrate the feeling of arriving home because it is a foreshadowing of our final journey home to be with God in heaven for eternity.



Feast Day: December 8 (Feast of the Immaculate Conception)

Feast Day Shared By: Saint Eutychius

Canonized: December 3, 1049

Canonized By: Pope Leo IX