After the Blessed Virgin Mary, St. Joseph is the one who loved most Our Lord Jesus Christ. He took care of Him, cuddled Him, kissed Him, taught Him…as the best father in the world could do to his son.
Ite ad Ioseph! Go to Joseph! The phrase comes from the Book of Genesis 41:55–57;42:5–7a,17–24a in which “the people cried to Pharaoh for bread, Pharaoh directed all the Egyptians to go to Joseph and do whatever he told them. When the famine had spread throughout the land, Joseph opened all the cities that had grain and rationed it to the Egyptians, since the famine had gripped the land of Egypt. In fact, all the world came to Joseph to obtain rations of grain, for famine had gripped the whole world.”
F. Fernández-Carvajal, in his Catholic best-seller, In Conversation with God, vol. 4, n. 15, wrote:
“Many Christians, conscious of the exceptional mission of Saint Joseph in the life of Jesus and Mary, since the Old Testament is the forerunner of the New Testament, have tried throughout the centuries to find in the history of the Hebrew people deeds and images that prefigure the man who was to be the virginal spouse of Mary. Many Fathers of the Church have seen in the person of the same name, Joseph, son of Jacob the Patriarch, a prophetic announcement. When Pope Pius IX proclaimed Saint Joseph patron of the universal Church he gathered together those ancient insights. The Liturgy also gives witness to this same parallelism. Not only did these two men share the same name, but there are also to be found in their lives, interwoven in both cases with trials and joys, certain virtues and attitudes which are similar and coincide in many instances.
Joseph the son of Jacob and Joseph the virginal spouse of Mary both went to Egypt as the result of whole series of providential circumstances. The first Joseph went there because he was pursued by his brothers and handed over to strangers out of envy, circumstances that prefigure the betrayal that Christ would have to undergo. The second Joseph went to Egypt having fled from Herod in order to save the Child who was to bring salvation to the world (cf M. Gasnier, The Silences of Joseph)… Joseph the son of Jacob received from God the gift of being able to interpret Pharaoh’s dreams, and was thus himself forewarned as to what would happen later. The other and greater Joseph also received God’s messages in dreams. Saint Bernard observes that the former was given to understand the mysteries of dreams; the latter deserved to know and to share in the most supreme mysteries (cf St Bernard, Homily on the Virgin Mother, 2).
The first Joseph won the confidence and the favour of Pharaoh and became the overseer of the granaries of Egypt. When famine ravaged the lands of neighbouring peoples and they came to Pharaoh to beg for wheat in order to stay alive, he said to them: Go to Joseph; and what he says to you, do (First Reading, Year I: Gen 41:55). When the whole of those regions were famished, Joseph opened all the storehouses, and sold to all corner from Egypt’s empire… Moreover, all the earth came to Egypt to Joseph to buy grain, because the famine was severe over all the earth. Now too the entire world is ravaged by hunger, a hunger for doctrine, for piety and love. The Church bids us: Go to Joseph. In the face of all the necessities that we personally suffer, she says to us: Go to the Holy Patriarch of Nazareth.
There are moments of great indecision in our lives, moments of uncertainty and urgent need. Go to Joseph, Jesus says to us. He who during his life was entrusted with the great mission of caring for Me and my Mother in our bodily needs, he who guarded our very lives at so many times of crisis, will continue to care for Me in my members, who are all those who suffer and are in any kind of want. Go to Joseph; he will give you whatever you need.
It is very pleasing to Jesus that we should get to know Joseph and ask for his help. He is the one Jesus loved so much whilst he was on earth and loves so much now in Heaven. He is the one from whom He learned so much and to whom He talked from the moment He could lisp his first words.
Joseph governed the house of Nazareth with a father’s authority. The Holy Family was not only a symbol of the Church, but in a certain way contained the Church within itself as a seed contains the tree, and a spring contains the river. The holy house of Nazareth contained the foundations of the nascent Church. This is why the holy Patriarch
considers specially entrusted to him the crowds of Christians who go to make up the Church, that is to say, this immense family spread throughout the earth, over which -because he is Spouse of Mary and Father of Jesus Christ -he possesses, so to speak a father’s authority. Thus is it something natural and most worthy of the blessed Joseph, that, as once he succoured all the needs of the family of Nazareth and surrounded it in a holy fashion with his protection, so now he should encompass the Church of Jesus Christ with his heavenly protection and defence (Leo XIII, Quamquam pluries, 15 August 1889).
This patronage of the holy Patriarch over the universal Church is principally of a spiritual order; but it also extends to the temporal order, as did that of the other Joseph, son of Jacob, who was called by the king of Egypt saviour of the world.
Saints and good Christians of all centuries have had recourse to him. Saint Teresa tells of the great devotion she had to Saint Joseph, and of her own experience of his patronage:
I do not remember even now that I have ever asked anything of him which he has failed to grant. I am astonished at the great favours God has bestowed on me through this blessed saint, and at the perils from which he has freed me, both in body and in soul. To other saints the Lord seems to have given grace to succour us in some of our necessities, but of this glorious saint my experience is that he succours us in them all, and that the Lord wishes to teach us that as He was himself subject to him on earth, (for, being his guardian and being called his father, he could command him) just so in Heaven He still does all that he asks… If I were a person writing with authority, I would gladly describe at length and in the minutest detail, the favours which this glorious saint has grunted to me and to other… I only beg, for the love of God, that anyone who does not believe me will put what I say to the test, and he will see by experience what great advantages come from his commending himself to this glorious patriarch and having devotion to him. Those who practise prayer should have a special affection for him always. I do not know how anyone can think of the Queen of the Angels, daring the time she suffered so much with the Child Jesus, without giving thanks to Saint Joseph for the way he helped them (St Teresa, Life, 6).
We must turn to Saint Joseph and ask him to guard and protect the Church, since he is her defender and protector. We must ask him to help our families in their necessities, and to help us in our own spiritual and material needs:Sancte Joseph, ora pro eis, ora pro me… Pray for them, pray for me.
For the men and women of today, just as for those of any other age, Saint Joseph represents a dearly loved and venerable figure, whose vocation and dignity we all admire, and for whose faithfulness in the service of Jesus and Mary we thank him. Through Saint Joseph we go straight to Mary, and through Mary, to the source of all holiness, Jesus Christ(Benedict XV, Bonum sane et salutare, 25 July 1920).
He teaches us to speak to Jesus with piety, respect and love: Joseph, blessed and happy man, we say to him in the words of an ancient prayer of the Church, who was permitted to see and hear the God whom many kings wished in vain to see and hear, and not only to see and hear him, but to carry him in your arms, kiss him, clothe him and care for him…, teach us to receive him with love and reverence in Holy Communion; give us a greater sensitivity and finesse of soul.
Saint Joseph, our Father and Lord: most chaste, most pure … You were found worthy to carry the Child Jesus in your arms, to wash him, to embrace him. Teach us to get to know God, and to be pure, to be worthy of being other Christs. And help us to do and to teach, as Christ did. Help us to open up the divine paths of the earth, which are both hid den and bright; and help us to show them to mankind, telling our fellow men that their lives on earth can be of an extraordinary and continual supernatural effectiveness (J. Escrivá, The Forge, 553).”
From St. Joseph we could learn a lot in dealing with Our Lord Jesus Christ. Let us go to Him and ask Him, the Master of Interior Life ,as St. Josemaria put it, to help us be men and women of prayer, with interior life, in love with Jesus, not only with words but with deeds.
St. Joseph, pray for us!
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