2012 March 18

St. Joseph: Mary’s Husband, Jesus’s Stepdad

March 19 is the feast day of St. Joseph, husband of Mary and adoptive father of Jesus. In Italy, the feast is marked by celebrations and food—lots and lots of food!

But what do we know about this gentle man who was entrusted with the care of the Son of God?

Not much. We know a little about him from the Gospel of Matthew and that of Luke.

He was just, yet compassionate. When, during the period of his betrothal to Mary, he discovered her to be pregnant, he did not want her to face humiliation and even stoning; so he determined to quietly divorce her.

He was poor. When he went with Mary and the infant Jesus to the Temple, he offered a gift of turtle doves—the gift of a man who could not afford a lamb.

He was a carpenter, a working man. We know this because in the gospel of Matthew the Nazarenes, who refused to acknowledge Jesus’ leadership and authority, asked, “Is not this the carpenter’s son?”

He was a man of deep faith. When instructed by the angel to take Mary as his wife, he obeyed; he obeyed, too, when instructed to take Mary and Jesus and escape to Egypt.

Because he was not present with Mary at the Cross, we know that he had died earlier. Although scripture does not explain what happened to him, we imagine him dying with Mary and Jesus at his side. For this reason, he is the patron saint of the dying.

He is also the patron of the universal Church, fathers, carpenters, and social justice.

Traditional Novena Prayer to St. Joseph

Saint Joseph whose protection is so great, so strong, so prompt before the Throne of God, I place in you all my interests and desires.

Oh Saint Joseph, do assist me by your powerful intercession and obtain for me from your Divine Son, all spiritual blessings through Jesus Christ, Our Lord, so that having engaged here below your heavenly power, I may offer my thanksgiving and homage to the most loving of fathers.

Oh Saint Joseph, I never weary of contemplating you and Jesus asleep in your arms. I dare not approach while He reposes near your heart. Press Him in my name and kiss His fine head for me, and ask Him to return the kiss when I draw my dying breath.

Saint Joseph, Patron of the departing souls, pray for us. Amen.

Blogging Bishops: Faith in the Digital Areopagus

The Areopagus - on the hillside near Athens

In ancient Greece, the

“areopagus” was the meeting point, the arena where intellectuals and philosophers gathered for discussion and debate. The great high court of Athens, it was said that the god Ares was tried at the areopagus for the death of Poseidon’s son Alirrothios. Like the “town square” of colonial America, the areopagus was the place where announcements were made, where ideas were debated, where criminal and civil cases were decided.

The Apostle Paul spoke to the leaders in the areopagus in Acts 17:24, using as his prop the Athenian altar to the Unknown God. “Now what you worship as something unknown,” Paul preached, “I am going to proclaim to you. The God who made the world and everything in it is the Lord of heaven and earth and dos not live in temples built by hands.”

Today, the Catholic Church has increasingly turned to social media—and this has made possible the transmission of the gospel not only to practicing Catholics but also to people who are not in the pews, who never attend Sunday Mass. Increasingly, the Church has acknowledged the importance of this new means of communication.

Pope Benedict XVI has spoken of the new social media, encouraging Catholics to use it for good. In his message for the 45^th World Communications Day in 2011, the pope said: “I would like then to invite Christians, confidently and with an informed and responsible creativity, to join the network of relationships which the digital era has made possible.”

Last May the Pontifical Council for Culture and the Pontifical Council for Social Communications co-sponsored the first-ever Vatican Blogfest, bringing together in Rome 150 Catholic communicators from around the world.

On June 29, 2011—the 60^th anniversary of his ordination to the priesthood—Pope Benedict himself launched the Vatican’s new mega-website, www.news.va, with a tweet from his new iPad. His first tweet, the “tweet heard round the world,” was “Dear Friends, I just launched News.va Praised be our Lord Jesus Christ! With my prayers and blessings, Benedictus XVI.”

This month here in the United States, Cardinal Donald Wuerl, Archbishop of Washington, is the latest member of the hierarchy to embrace the new technology and to start his own blog, Seek First the Kingdom. “What I would like to do in this blog,” he explained in his inaugural post on February 26, “is to talk about our Catholic faith, what it teaches, why it is so important, certainly to me, and why, I hope, it would be important to you.” He hopes, through this medium, to share the contributions that the Catholic faith brings to the world around us.

Cardinal Wuerl is not the first of the American cardinals to embrace this new technology. Cardinal Sean’s Blog, the project of Boston archbishop Sean Cardinal O’Malley, O.F.M. Cap., began in 2006. Three years later Cardinal Roger Mahony, now-retired archbishop of Los Angeles, began his blog. And Cardinal Timothy Dolan, in his blog The Gospel in the Digital Age, has spoken clearly and consistently in defense of religious liberty, as the Obama Administration seeks to implement comprehensive health insurance regulations which mandate contraception coverage.

I wrote, at the time of the USCCB Fall General Assembly in 2011, about Bishop Christopher Coyne of Indianapolis—calling him the “Uber-Blogger.” In addition to publishing his own blog Let Us Walk Together and posting the daily readings and helpful spiritual messages each morning on Facebook and Twitter, Bishop Coyne live-tweeted from the floor of the USCCB assembly—keeping journalists and Twitter followers informed of the bishops’ discussion and votes, minute by minute.

Bishop Kevin Vann of Fort Worth has his own blog, as does Bishop Kevin Farrell of Dallas. Others, such as Cardinal Francis George and Archbishop Charles Chaput, encourage the faithful through weekly columns.

And for a gazillion other Catholic blogs published by Catholic clergy, including bishops, check out the Catholic Blog Directory.