{"id":13481,"date":"2012-03-19T15:46:33","date_gmt":"2012-03-19T20:46:33","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.austincnm.com\/?p=13481"},"modified":"2012-03-20T12:44:39","modified_gmt":"2012-03-20T17:44:39","slug":"the-silence-of-st-joseph","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/atxcatholic.com\/index.php\/2012\/03\/the-silence-of-st-joseph\/","title":{"rendered":"The Silence of St. Joseph"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

I have a friend who does quite a bit of public speaking about marriage.\u00a0 Having heard him a number of times, I can usually anticipate his jokes long before he makes them.<\/p>\n

He pokes fun at the quirks that enter marital relationships and the way that our culture views marriages.\u00a0 \u201cI might be the one who is almost always wrong in my marriage,\u201d he says, \u201cbut at least I\u2019ve got it better than Joseph.\u201d\u00a0 \u201cJust imagine sharing a house with Mary and Jesus!\u00a0 He shared a house with two sinless people!\u00a0 You know that, if something was wrong, it was Joseph\u2019s fault!\u201d<\/p>\n

It\u2019s not a great joke but I laugh and the audience laughs and all is right with the world.<\/p>\n

I\u2019ll admit that, apart from this joke, I don\u2019t often give St. Joseph a whole lot of thought.\u00a0 He is the silent member of the Holy Family and, though we recognize him as a Saint, he\u2019s often and easily forgotten.\u00a0 But, on this, the feast of St. Joseph I stop to think about what, if anything, St. Joseph teaches me about being a husband, a father and a man of faith.<\/p>\n

We know so little about St. Joseph.\u00a0 We get three glimpses of him in the gospels: first responding to the call to take Mary as his wife, leading her to Bethlehem.\u00a0 Next, we get a glimpse of Joseph taking Mary to exile in Egypt.\u00a0 Then, finally, Joseph is seen on the road out of Jerusalem, having unwittingly left the tween Jesus back at the temple.<\/p>\n

To be honest, there isn\u2019t much there to go on.\u00a0 \u00a0But there\u2019s something there.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s true that Joseph lived with the savior of the world and the mother of God.\u00a0 And yes, it\u2019s true that, in terms of cosmic significance, his role doesn\u2019t seem very compelling.\u00a0 But, at no point in the gospel do we find account that Jesus spent his childhood hungry, unsheltered or uncared-for.\u00a0 We don\u2019t read stories about Mary working desperately to care for Jesus or feed him.\u00a0 No, the brilliance of the gospel\u2019s perspective in portraying the life of Joseph and his role in the holy family might just be in how little is said of him.\u00a0 He was just there, loving Mary and Jesus.<\/p>\n

Perhaps the only thing we need to know about Joseph is that he helped create an environment that fostered the love of God and devotion to vocation of those who lived under his roof.\u00a0 Oh that, at the end of my days, the same could be said about me as a father and husband.<\/p>\n

We all desire to live lives of significance, to leave a behind a legacy.\u00a0 For men especially, this seems to be what drives us.\u00a0 We work like crazy to prove ourselves in the world and to be told that we have something to offer others.<\/p>\n

But, to my knowledge, no wood-working of St. Joseph still exists.\u00a0 There is no gallery full of the fruits of his hands.\u00a0 He has nothing to show you and me today to attest to his skill as a carpenter.\u00a0 He has, I think, everything to attest to his role as a father and husband.\u00a0 Joseph was given the son of God to shelter, feed and bring into adulthood.\u00a0 He was the protector of Christ, a model of love for our Lord and, if his earthly fatherhood of Jesus looks anything like what I\u2019ve known, one of his \u201cson\u2019s\u201d best friends.<\/p>\n

For those of us who have been called to be husbands and fathers, St. Joseph stands as a silent reminder that the work we produce with our hands will pass away.\u00a0 Everything we produce will outlive its significance and usefulness.\u00a0 If we strive to fill our lives with the products of our own labor, we\u2019ll be left with nothing to leave behind.<\/p>\n

All Christian discipleship is about dying to oneself, to put the good of another before yourself and follow the way that Christ exhibited.\u00a0 Children and wives give fathers and husbands this chance to step aside, creating an environment of love and faith in which vocations take seed and from which disciples are grown.\u00a0 This is the call of St. Joseph.\u00a0 This is my vocation.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I have a friend who does quite a bit of public speaking about marriage.\u00a0 Having heard him a number of times, I can usually anticipate his jokes long before he makes them. He pokes fun at the quirks that enter marital relationships and the way that our culture views marriages.\u00a0 \u201cI might be the one… [Read More]<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_wpcom_ai_launchpad_first_post":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"{title}\n\n{excerpt}\n\n{url}","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"_wpas_customize_per_network":false,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[90,88],"tags":[677,193,676,74,303],"class_list":["post-13481","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","category-faith-blog","category-marriage-blog","tag-listen","tag-love","tag-patron","tag-prayer","tag-saint","entry","has-post-thumbnail"],"aioseo_notices":[],"aioseo_head":"\n\t\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t