In honor of the great Saint Joseph, I want to direct you to the posts wherein I talk about him. The articles may be found here, here, here, here and here and indirectly here.
Most of us do not realize the grandeur of Saint Joseph and the intensity of his faith and trust in God. If my theory is correct and God originally planned that we conceived children virginally as Mary and Joseph did, and if the test of virginity was the test of our first parents, then Joseph is more than the foster father of Jesus. If God had originally planned that parenthood was to be obtained via a deep union with Him and a profound trust in His provision, then Joseph would be a true father of Jesus. We usually don't say Joseph was the true father of Jesus because that implies, in the common way we use that word 'true,' that Jesus was conceived in the normal manner. Mary conceived from the power of the Holy Spirit overshadowing her, not from the generative powers of Joseph.
Fatherhood is more than physical generation. There are plenty of men walking around today that have physically generated children who have little or no resemblance to being a father. And on the other side of that reality, there are a great number of wonderful men and women who could not have children, and yet they sacrificed and brought children into their life through adoption; they are mothers and fathers in the full sense of the word. Parenthood has more to do with the care of children than with their generation.
In their trial of faith, Mary and Joseph trusted in God immensely; they desired children more than anyone has, and yet God asked them to remain virgins forever. That doesn't make sense, and yet they trusted in God's unintelligible request. The reward for crucifying their greatest earthly desire? They are entrusted with the Son of God as their very own child. In addition to that unimaginable gift, Mary is the mother of us all, and Joseph as the patron of the universal Church is the father of all. Trusting in God, they let the seed of children fall into the ground to die, and it has become the greatest of all plants bearing overabundant fruit. Their sacrifice has become their reward.
With all that being said, I think it can be said that in the true and full sense of fatherhood, Joseph is the human father of Jesus. Since Jesus was conceived through Mary and Joseph's unity as spouses and their unity to God in their trust of Him, they passed the original test of our first parents. They did what Adam and Eve did not, and as such, they did what God had originally intended man to do to become a parent. Fatherhood has to do with caring for children in that unique fatherly way together with union with God, and in that regard, no one has been more a father than Joseph was to Jesus.
On a side note, this is partly why priests are called father. They are united to God and have passed the test of virginity as Joseph did, and they care for God's flock, the children of God. Priests truly are fathers who daily lay down their life for the protection and care of their children. Priests also participate in the spiritual birth to the children of God when they baptize, and they cooperate in bringing the dead children back to life through the sacrament of Confession. It is commonly said that priests take the Church as their spouse, and some saints have said that they take Mary as their spouse. I think that is true. To priests: take Mary as your spouse and give your whole self to her as Saint Joseph did so that together in your complete trust in God you may bear abundant fruit, giving birth to Christ Himself once again and bearing Him to the world.
Thanks for reading and your prayers.
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3.15.2008
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3 comments:
After reading only this particular post, I have greatly questioned what you have extracted about Joseph and Mary.
How do you explain the fact that Joseph wasn't living with Mary as a husband when she conceived, that there had been no known dialogue between them about "uniting in virginity," and that later he must have thought she had slept with someone else and become pregnant? How do you explain that he was going to divorce her because of this puzzle, so that they would be free of each other (making her free then to go marry this other man)?
The story of Joseph and Mary at the outset just isn't so purely harmonious as you have made out. They got through this great ordeal because of their great Faith in God, however, and because of their purity in general, not just sexual purity.
There is no proof that Joseph thought he was going to live without sexual relations, either, until certain revelation from God brought him to this knowledge. And his thoughts in this regard would not have been sinful if he was expecting sexual relations in marriage.
Also, how do you explain the fact that God the Father has only ONE DIVINE SON who ALWAYS WAS, and that is Jesus Christ, the Incarnate son of Mary? We couldn't all have Jesus. God's plan was established after the Fall with specifics in mind, with His only Son in mind. He is Jesus' true Father, and that is Church teaching.
Our depictions of the Faith need to line up with the what has actually been revealed. They need to extract as accurately as possible to gain knowledge of Truth. Just because something can't be explained, the truth of what's there isn't then diminished or obliterated.
Hello Mary Anne,
From my understanding, there are a host of Fathers of the Church who considered Mary's response to Archangel Gabriel to indicate that she and Joseph had already arranged to remain perpetual virgins. When Mary says, "How can this be, since I have no husband/do not know man," she is asking, "How will I conceive since I have taken a vow to God of perpetual virginity?" When she finds out that she will conceive via the Holy Spirit, she responds saying, "Behold, I am the handmaid of the Lord; let it be to me according to your word." This part of my theory comes from the Church Fathers, and surely that is good company.
Joseph assumed Mary had broken her vow of virginity since how else does one get pregnant? What else is Joseph supposed to suspect? They had no idea that God would reward their faithfulness with a child given by the Holy Spirit Himself.
Mary and Joseph were not living together under the same roof yet, but they were already betrothed. Betrothal was essentially what we would call marriage, and it was normal that the betrothed would get pregnant. Notice that Mary never gets in trouble for being pregnant; she was only temporarily in trouble because Joseph knew he hadn't had relations with her.
There is no mention of the angel telling Joseph not to have relations with Mary; all the angel says is: "Joseph, son of David, do not fear to take Mary your wife, for that which is conceived in her is of the Holy Spirit; she will bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins." Notice that the angel calls her "Mary your wife" and not Mary your betrothed. For all practical purposes, they were married, and that is why Joseph would have to divorce her if he wanted to separate from her.
When I talk about God's original plan, I do not thereby say that the Second Person of the Trinity would be the child given by God for passing the test. I don't know what would have happened if Adam and Eve did not fall, but there is no necessity that Jesus would have been born of them. God could have provided some other person as their child, and I don't think he would have been Cain.
Thanks Mary Anne for taking the time to comment; I hope I have at least addressed your concerns if I have not actually answered them.
Well, maybe I missed some things when I read it the first time around, because there seems to be some explanations in there when reading it the second time that I didn't notice the first time.
Have a meaningful Holy Week.
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