The Holy Family Novena

The Holy Family novena is a nine-day prayer to Jesus, Mary, and Joseph — the household of Nazareth — asking their blessing on our own families and the grace to imitate their hidden life of faith, obedience, and charity. It is most fittingly prayed in the nine days before the Feast of the Holy Family, and again during February, the month traditionally consecrated to the Holy Family. Below we give the complete traditional text, the versions the faithful most often seek — for marriage, for peace in the home, for a specific intention — and the story of the devotion, so that this page holds the whole of what you came to pray. If you are new to this kind of prayer, see first our guide to what is a novena.

The Holy Family novena prayer (the full traditional text)

This is the traditional novena, said once on each of the nine days. It is built of five petitions to Jesus, Mary, and Joseph, each followed by an Our Father, Hail Mary, and Glory Be, then the naming of your particular request, and closing with the ancient collect of the feast. Make the Sign of the Cross to begin.

Jesus, Mary, and Joseph, bless us and grant us the grace of loving Holy Church as we are bound to do, above every earthly thing, and of ever showing forth our love by the witness of our deeds.

Our Father, Hail Mary, and Glory Be.

Jesus, Mary, and Joseph, bless us and grant us the grace of openly professing, as we are bound to do, with courage and without human respect, the faith that we received of Thy gift in Holy Baptism.

Our Father, Hail Mary, and Glory Be.

Jesus, Mary, and Joseph, bless us and grant us the grace of sharing, as we are bound to do, in the defense and propagation of the Faith, when duty calls, whether by word or by the sacrifice of our fortunes and our lives.

Our Father, Hail Mary, and Glory Be.

Jesus, Mary, and Joseph, bless us and grant us the grace of loving one another in mutual charity, as we are bound to do, and establish us in perfect harmony of thought, will, and action, under the rule and guidance of our holy Pastors.

Our Father, Hail Mary, and Glory Be.

Jesus, Mary, and Joseph, bless us and grant us the grace of conforming our lives fully, as we are bound to do, to the commandments of God's law and those of His Holy Church, so as to live always in that charity which they set forth.

Our Father, Hail Mary, and Glory Be.

Jesus, Mary, and Joseph, we ask in particular this special favour: (here name your request).

Let us pray. Lord Jesus Christ, who, being made subject to Mary and Joseph, didst consecrate domestic life by Thine ineffable virtues: grant that we, with the assistance of both, may be taught by the example of Thy holy Family and may attain to its everlasting fellowship. Who livest and reignest, world without end. Amen.

That closing prayer is the Collect of the Mass of the Holy Family itself, so that in praying the novena we join our petition to the Church's own liturgy of the feast.

The dedication of the family (the longer form)

Many devotional books expand the novena with a dedication of one's own household to the Holy Family, added after the five petitions. It is beautiful to pray on the last day, or each day, entrusting your family by name:

O Jesus, our most loving Redeemer, who, having come to enlighten the world with Thy teaching and example, didst will to pass the greater part of Thy life in humility and subjection to Mary and Joseph in the poor home of Nazareth, thus sanctifying the Family that was to be an example for all Christian families: graciously look upon my family. In Thy mercy preserve us from danger, give us help in time of need, and grant us the grace to persevere to the end in imitation of Thy holy Family; so that, having revered Thee and loved Thee faithfully on earth, we may praise Thee eternally in heaven.

Mary, dearest Mother, to thy intercession we have recourse, knowing that thy Divine Son will hear thy prayers. And thou, glorious patriarch Saint Joseph, help us by thy powerful prayers, and offer our petitions to Jesus through Mary's hands. Amen.

Both the short and the longer forms are entirely traditional; pray whichever your prayer-book carries. To honour the household of Nazareth still more fully you may add the Litany of St Joseph and a decade of the Rosary — for the mysteries of the hidden life belong to this devotion. If you would like to pray the Rosary well alongside it, see our guide on how to pray the Rosary.

The novena to the Holy Family for marriage

Among the requests most often carried to Nazareth is the good of a marriage — a husband and wife asking that their union be healed, deepened, or protected; the engaged asking a holy beginning; parents praying for a struggling son or daughter's home. The novena above serves this intention perfectly, for the fourth petition asks precisely for the grace "of loving one another in mutual charity" and "perfect harmony of thought, will, and action." When you name your special favour, name your marriage plainly: for reconciliation, for patience, for fidelity, for the return of love grown cold. The Holy Family is the pattern and refuge of every Christian marriage, and no home is closer to the ear of God than the one that first sheltered Him. The Novena to St Anne, grandmother of Our Lord, is a fitting companion prayer for the wider needs of a family.

The novena for peace in the home

Where a household is torn by quarrel, anxiety, or discord, the Holy Family novena is prayed for peace in the home — the "true peace and concord in Christian love" that reigned at Nazareth. Some join to it a prayer to the Holy Ghost, the Spirit of peace and unity, begging Him to still the strife under one roof. A time-honoured way to secure this peace lastingly is the Enthronement of the Sacred Heart in the family, by which a home is consecrated to the love of Jesus; you will find the fuller devotion in our novena to the Sacred Heart. Pray the Holy Family novena for the softening of hard hearts, and leave the manner of the peace to God.

The novena for a specific intention

The novena is not limited to family concerns; it may be prayed for any worthy intention — health, work, a safe childbirth, a wayward soul's return, a grave decision. The fixed petitions ask always for the great graces of faith and charity, and then the devotion leaves an open place — "we ask in particular this special favour" — for the one thing on your heart. Name it there, each of the nine days, with confidence and with resignation to God's will. As with every novena, we ask boldly but add always, in the heart, Thy will be done.

When does the Holy Family novena start? (start date and feast day)

A novena means nine days, so it begins nine days before the feast it prepares for — but which date depends on which calendar you keep.

• In the traditional 1962 calendar, the Feast of the Holy Family falls on the First Sunday after the Epiphany — that is, the Sunday between 7 and 13 January. Begin the novena nine days before, so that its ninth day is the eve of that Sunday.
• In the calendar of 1969 and after, the feast was moved to the Sunday within the Octave of Christmas (between Christmas Day and New Year). Those who follow it commonly begin the novena around 19–20 December, counting nine days to the feast; 28 December is often used as the reference date.

Because the feast is a movable Sunday, the exact start shifts a little each year; simply count back nine days from the Sunday you keep. The novena is also perfectly suited to February, the month the Church has long dedicated to the Holy Family, and it may in truth be prayed at any time of year, since the graces it asks are always in season.

How to pray the Holy Family novena

A novena is a matter of perseverance, not of length. Keep these few things:

1. Choose your nine days. Either the nine days before the feast you keep (see above), or any nine consecutive days when your need is pressing.
2. Pray at a set hour, all nine days. Say the full prayer once each day — ideally before an image of the Holy Family, or with the family gathered together, that the home itself may pray.
3. Name one intention and hold to it. Bring the same special favour through all nine days.
4. Add the sacraments where you can. A novena crowned by Confession, Holy Mass, and Communion is the surest of all. Join a decade of the Rosary if you are able.
5. End in the disposition of Nazareth — humility, obedience, trust — asking to imitate the virtues you invoke.

If it helps you, copy the full prayer above to keep beside you for the nine days; that is the "PDF" the searches ask for, and it is the whole devotion in one place.

The story of the Holy Family and its devotion

The Holy Family is the household of Jesus, Mary, and Joseph at Nazareth, whom the Church honours together as the model of every Christian home. The Gospels give us its outline: the Angel's word to Joseph, "the husband of Mary" and "a just man" (Matthew 1:19); the birth at Bethlehem where "there was no room for them in the inn" (Luke 2:7); the flight into Egypt to escape Herod (Matthew 2:14); the return to Nazareth; and the finding of the twelve-year-old Jesus in the Temple, after which "He went down with them, and came to Nazareth, and was subject to them" (Luke 2:51). In that one line the whole of the hidden life is contained — nearly thirty years in which God Incarnate lived in obedience, poverty, and honest labour, sanctifying the ordinary duties of family life. This is why the Holy Family is invoked: it is not a distant ideal but the pattern God Himself chose to live.

As a devotion to the three together — rather than to each saint apart — veneration of the Holy Family arose chiefly from the seventeenth century onward, spread notably in New France by Bishop François de Laval of Quebec, who founded a confraternity in its honour. Pope Leo XIII gave it the Church's full encouragement: in 1892, in the Letter Neminem fugit, he commended and enriched the Association of the Holy Family, and set forth the household of Nazareth as the remedy for the wounds of Christian family life. After the devastation of the First World War, which left so many homes broken, Pope Benedict XV in 1921 extended the Feast of the Holy Family to the universal Church and fixed it, in the traditional calendar, on the Sunday after the Epiphany — near the Christmas mysteries in which the Family is first shown to us.

A note for those attached to the older books: the Holy Family is, of course, as ancient as the Gospel, and each of its members — Our Lady, St Joseph, the Child Jesus — has been venerated from the first ages. What is more recent is the feast and the grouped devotion, established in their present form only in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. We give the novena here as fully traditional, for it stands within the 1962 calendar and books; we note the history only so that no one mistakes a devotion of the last centuries for one of the first.

The Holy Family intercedes with a singular authority, because it is the family in which the Son of God was content to be a child, to obey, and to work. It is the patron of home life, of married couples, of parents and children, of exiles and refugees (for they fled to Egypt), and of all who labour for their daily bread. To bring it our own family is to set our household under the same roof that sheltered God.

Frequently Asked Questions

When does the Holy Family novena start?

Count back nine days from the feast you keep. In the traditional 1962 calendar the Feast of the Holy Family is the First Sunday after the Epiphany (a Sunday between 7 and 13 January), so the novena begins nine days before that Sunday. In the newer calendar the feast is the Sunday within the Octave of Christmas, and the novena is commonly begun about 19–20 December, with 28 December used as a reference date. It may also be prayed in February, the month of the Holy Family, or at any time of need.

What is the Holy Family novena prayed for?

For the good of families above all — for peace and charity in the home, for marriages, for parents and children, for the conversion or return of a family member. Its five fixed petitions ask for love of the Church, courage in the Faith, and harmony under God's law; then it leaves an open place for your own particular request, which may be any worthy intention at all.

Who are the members of the Holy Family?

Jesus, Mary, and Joseph — the Child Jesus, His Mother the Blessed Virgin Mary, and His foster-father St Joseph — who lived together at Nazareth. They are honoured together as the Holy Family of Nazareth, the model and protector of every Christian household. For more on the guardian of that home, see St Joseph and the novena to St Joseph.

Is the Holy Family novena the same as the traditional Latin one?

Yes. The prayer given above, with its five petitions and the collect "Lord Jesus Christ, who, being made subject to Mary and Joseph," is the traditional form found in the older prayer-books; the closing collect is drawn from the Latin Mass of the feast itself. The oldest books print the petitions in the singular ("bless me, grant me"), as the Raccolta gives them for private use; when a household prays together they are naturally said in the plural ("bless us, grant us"), as above. Both are faithful to the same devotion, and some editions add a dedication of the family.

When is the Feast of the Holy Family?

In the traditional calendar it is kept on the First Sunday after the Epiphany (between 7 and 13 January). In the calendar of 1969 and after it falls on the Sunday within the Octave of Christmas. The feast was extended to the whole Church by Pope Benedict XV in 1921. February is also observed as the month of the Holy Family.

Can I pray the Holy Family novena for my marriage?

Certainly. Many pray it precisely for the healing, protection, or deepening of a marriage, naming that intention in the place left for a special favour. The fourth petition, asking the grace to love "in mutual charity" and to live "in perfect harmony of thought, will, and action," makes the novena especially apt for husbands and wives, and for the engaged preparing a holy home.

How long is the Holy Family novena?

Nine days — the meaning of the word novena, from the Latin for "nine." You say the full prayer once each day for nine consecutive days, holding to a single intention throughout. For the wider tradition and history of these nine-day prayers, see our explanation of what is a novena.

The Iter Fidei app carries the Holy Family novena — with the Litany of St Joseph, the Rosary, and the prayers of the home — in Latin and your own language, with audio and day-by-day reminders so you never lose the thread of the nine days. Download it here.

Sources. Holy Scripture (Matthew 1:19; 2:13–14; Luke 2:7, 2:51); the traditional Novena to the Holy Family and the Collect of the Mass of the Holy Family (Domine Jesu Christe, qui Mariae et Joseph subditus) as carried in the traditional prayer-books; the Consecration of the Family to the Holy Family; Pope Leo XIII, Apostolic Letter Neminem fugit (1892) on the Association of the Holy Family; the extension of the Feast of the Holy Family to the universal Church by Pope Benedict XV (1921); the General Roman Calendar of 1962 (Feast of the Holy Family, First Sunday after the Epiphany).