On Thursday, 19 March the universal Church celebrated the feast of Saint Joseph. The figure of the putative father of Jesus is remarkable. He was responsible for the religious and human development of his child Jesus before the Mosaic law. This is precisely the meaning of the Matthean phrase which the angel says to Joseph in his dream: “You shall call his name Jesus” (Matt 1, 21). Under Joseph’s charge Jesus was to become the kind of Jew the law rigorously prescribed.

Like any human being, Joseph tried to resolve the awkward situation of having Mary pregnant before they went to live together, simply by finding a human solution. “And her husband Joseph, being a just man and unwilling to put her to shame, resolved to divorce her quietly” (Matt 1, 19). Fear drove him to opt for the easiest way out. But God is not content with what is reasonable and easy. He always goes for what is unreasonable and most difficult in order that his glory and splendour might be shown with great power.

Here is the unimaginable. “Joseph, son of David, do not fear to take Mary your wife, for that which is conceived in her is of the Holy Spirit” (Matt 1, 20). Unlike Zechariah who doubted, Joseph, like Mary and Elizabeth, believed. “When Joseph woke from sleep, he did as the angel of the Lord commanded him; he took his wife” (Matt 1, 24).

Thus, authentic faith implies obedience. Like Abraham, Joseph “in hope ... believed against hope” (Rom 4, 18). As Pope Benedict XVI rightly pointed out during the celebration of vespers at the Basilica of Mary Queen of the Apostles in Yaoundè, Cameroon: “To be a father means above all to be at the service of life and growth. St Joseph, in this sense, gave proof of great devotion. For the sake of Christ he experienced persecution, exile and the poverty which this entails. He had to settle far from his native town. His only reward was to be with Christ”.

But what a reward! The challenge for today’s fathers is in fact this: to be with Christ in every situation their families encounter. When facing the demon of fear the temptation is to have recourse to human reason. Nevertheless, experience has been teaching that human mind, unaided by faith, cannot go that far. Faith in the God of the impossible is desperately needed. An anonymous writer once wrote: “One night a father overheard his son pray: Dear God, Make me the kind of man my Daddy is. Later that night, the Father prayed, Dear God, Make me the kind of man my son wants me to be”. I am sure that this must have been Jesus’ and Joseph’s daily prayer to God. God the Father was the centre point which glued them together. As a father do you pray to the Lord to unite you with your children the way Jesus prayed to be united with Joseph and vice versa? Do you believe that your Father in Heaven is capable enough to make you an exemplary father as was Saint Joseph to Jesus?

Fr Mario Attard OFM Cap

San Gwann