St. Joseph: Father, Worker, Rebel
He was a skilled carpenter.
He wed a woman who was pregnant and not with his child.
He travelled with his wife to Bethlehem, and there he witnessed awake what he had only experienced in dreams.
He quieted his mind and heart so as to always listen to God and his messengers.
He fled to Egypt to protect his family so that the Lord could fulfill His promise. (Hosea 11:1)
He had dismissive disdain for secular powers.
He fades into the background after the return to Nazareth.
What a beautiful, magnificent background. There we see what is increasingly absent today. He decreased so that his Son increased. He was chaste. He labored and never counted the cost on himself. He was patient and kind and joyful. He was the model father and as such, a shining light to a dying breed of men.
As such, he is the patron saint of so many people and causes. Go to the Oratoire St-Joseph in Montreal to see all of that. There is one altar not dedicated to him there that most epitomizes Joseph of Nazareth: the Altar Dedicated to the Forgotten Man.
William Graham Sumner wrote best about them:
As soon as A observes something which seems to him wrong, from which X is suffering, A talks it over with B, and A and B then propose to get a law passed to remedy the evil and help X. Their law always proposes to determine what C shall do for X, or, in better case, what A, B, and C shall do for X… What I want to do is to look up C. I want to show you what manner of man he is. I call him the Forgotten Man. perhaps the appellation is not strictly correct. he is the man who never is thought of… He works, he votes, generally he prays—but he always pays…”
He lived in freedom in an unfree world. He died a happy death in the arms of Jesus and Mary. He reigns in glory in heaven.
There, he is never forgotten.
