The mystery of Saint Joseph (3)

The late Bernard Orchard OSB, a distinguished biblical scholar, gave an interesting meditation on this topic to the Ecumenical Society of the Blessed Virgin Mary in 2001. He argued that Joseph and Mary approached their marriage just like any other devout Jewish couple, with no intention of celibacy. This is suggested by Mary's surprised response to the angel's message, which Orchard suggests must have taken place very near the end of the normal (one-year) period of betrothal "out of delicate consideration to ensure that no one might suspect that the conception of Jesus had predated the concluding nuptials." Hearing that she was to give birth to the Son of God (he would have to be divine in nature because "his kingship will have no end") she asked, "How shall this be, since I am not knowing a man?" This was not an expression of doubt, and the angel did not take it as such (compare the account of the annunciation of John to Zechariah!), but rather a request for further information. Nor was it, according to Dom Bernard, an indication that Mary and Joseph had already decided to live together as virgins. It referred only to the present moment, being in the present tense,

The mystery of Saint Joseph (2)

"As Son of God, [Jesus] has a Father but no Mother; as Son of Man he has a mother but no father."

In St Joseph in Early Christianity (St Joseph's University Press, 1999), from which this quotation is taken, Joseph T. Lienhard describes the development of two distinct traditions concerning St Joseph. One was that of the Eastern and Orthodox Church, which followed the apocryphal stories about Joseph, designed to make the perpetual virginity of Mary seem more credible, according to which he was an old man, perhaps in his 90s and a grandfather, when he married Mary to be her protector rather than her husband. The Latin tradition followed SS

The mystery of St Joseph (1)

Just as a scientist can, by using a microscope on some small piece of matter, discover great truths, so the mind of the Church is able to discover great truths in even the tiniest fragment of Scripture (for example, the doctrines of the Holy Trinity and of the Immaculate Conception, which are implied but not directly stated in Scripture). What can we tell from the few precious lines we possess about St Joseph? These few lines tell us he was a "just man", that he at first doubted his role vis a vis Mary and her Child, but that he successfully protected them both, taking instruction from angels in his dreams. On 18 March 2009, Pope Benedict spoke of him in a homily: