God gave Joseph to us as well as Mary
2 min • Digitized on January 31, 2022
From The Life and Glories of St. Joseph, in file "The Life and Glories of St. Joseph", page 426
By Edward Healy Thompson, M.A.
CHAPTER XLVII.
THE PATRONAGE OF JOSEPH.
God never caused the virtues and singular merit of Joseph to shine with greater splendour than when He said to him by the mouth of the angel, “Take the Child and His mother”; [St. Matthew ii. 13, 20.] for in them He committed to him His most precious treasures, giving him thus the preference over all the blessed spirits of Heaven; and Joseph received these two sacred persons into his care, to be their protector, their guardian, and defender.
If, then, Heaven made Joseph the protector of Jesus and Mary, we may rest assured that he was at the same time made the protector and patron of all men. When Jesus Christ hanging on the Cross said to the Blessed Virgin, indicating St. John, “Woman, behold thy son,” [St. John xix. 27.] we believe that we were all entrusted to His Mother in the person of the beloved disciple.
So also when the Eternal Father confided the Incarnate Word and His Mother to Joseph, He confided us all to this great saint; for the Incarnate Word had us all in His adorable Heart, and the Blessed Virgin, the new Eve, was to conceive us all in her heart of sorrows when she stood beneath the Cross on Calvary. We were to be the children of her pain, as was to Rachel her second-born son, Benoni. [Gen. xxxv. 18.]
To be devout to Joseph, therefore, is not merely our interest in the highest sense, neither is it to be considered, on the other hand, as a mere pious practice to be cultivated or not at pleasure, but it is our duty; since that which is the desire of Jesus and Mary comes to us with the force of an obligation, which we cannot disregard without irreverence to them as well as great spiritual detriment to ourselves.
Add to which, that the Church’s example powerfully attracts us to this devotion, and the example of this loving mother is meant as a guidance to us, which no faithful child of hers can refuse to follow. But first we will speak only of the desire of Jesus and Mary that we should honour Joseph very greatly.