These quotes are extracted from our book 30 Day Consecration to St Joseph. Cover image: St Joseph in the Workshop with Jesus. © HolyRosary.Team
1. St Joseph shows us the holiness of an ordinary life
“Good St Joseph! Oh! How I love him! I can see him planing, then drying his forehead from time to time. Oh! How I pity him! It seems to me their life was simple…What does me a lot of good when I think of the Holy Family is to imagine a life that was very ordinary. It wasn’t everything that they have told us or imagined. For example, that the Child Jesus, after having formed some birds out of clay, breathed upon them and gave them life. Ah! No! Little Jesus didn’t perform useless miracles like that, even to please his Mother. Why weren’t they transported into Egypt by a miracle which would have been necessary and so easy for God. In the twinkling of an eye, they could have been brought there. No, everything in their life was done just as in our own.
How many troubles, disappointments! How many times did others make complaints to good St Joseph! How many times did they refuse to pay him for his work! Oh! How astonished we would be if we only knew how much they had to suffer!”
(St Thérèse of Lisieux)
2. St Joseph watchfully guarded Jesus the Living Bread
“Let us consider this man Joseph in connection with the Universal Church of Christ. Is he not that elect and chosen one, through whom, and under whom Christ is orderly and honestly brought into the world? If, then, the Holy Universal Church be under a debt to the Virgin Mother (because through her the Church has been made to receive Christ), next to Mary the Church owes thanks and reverence to Joseph. He verily is the key which unlocked the treasures of the Church of the Old Testament, for in his person all the excellence of Patriarchs and Prophets comes to the completion of achievement, seeing that he alone enjoyed in this life the full fruition of what God has been pleased to promise aforetime to them. It is therefore with good reason that we see a type of him in that Patriarch Joseph who stored up corn for the people. But the second Joseph has a more excellent dignity than the first, seeing that the first gave to the Egyptians bread only for the body, but the second was, on behalf of all the elect, the watchful guardian of that Living Bread which came down from heaven, of which whosoever eats will never die.”
(St Bernadine of Siena)
3. Among all people, St Joseph most closely resembled Our Lady
“Oh, how divine was the union between Our Lady and the glorious St Joseph, a union which caused the Supreme Good, the Good of all goods, our Lord Himself, to belong to Joseph even as he belonged to Our Lady not by nature but by grace; which made him a sharer in all the possessions of his dear Spouse, and made him continually increase in perfection by his continual communications with her who possessed all virtues in so exalted a degree that no other creature, however pure and spotless, can attain to them! Nevertheless, St Joseph was the one who made the nearest approach; and as a mirror when set before the rays of the sun reflects them perfectly, and another set before the first so vividly repeats them that it is scarcely possible to see which of the two immediately received them, even so Our Lady, like a most pure mirror, received the rays of the Sun of Justice, which conveyed into her soul all virtues and perfections; and St Joseph, like a second mirror, reflected them so perfectly, that he appeared to possess them in as sublime a degree as did the glorious Virgin herself.”
(St Francis de Sales)
4. St Joseph can help us obtain a happy death
“Since we all must die, we should cherish a special devotion to St Joseph, that he may obtain for us a happy death. All Christians regard him as the advocate of the dying who assists at the hour of death those who honoured him during their life, and they do so for three reasons:
First, because Jesus Christ loved him not only as a friend, but as a father, and on this account his mediation is far more efficacious than that of any other Saint.
Second, because St Joseph has obtained special power against the evil spirits, who tempt us with redoubled vigour at the hour of death.
Third, the assistance given St Joseph at his death by Jesus and Mary obtained for him the right to secure a holy and peaceful death for his servants. Hence, if they invoke him at the hour of death he will not only help them, but he will also obtain for them the assistance of Jesus and Mary.”
(St Alphonsus)
5. St Joseph reminds us of the importance of submitting to God’s will
“Joseph was caught up at every moment by the mystery of the Incarnation. Not only physically, but in his heart as well, Joseph reveals to us the secret of a humanity which dwells in the presence of mystery and is open to that mystery at every moment of everyday life. In Joseph, faith is not separated from action. His faith had a decisive effect on his actions. Paradoxically, it was by acting, by carrying out his responsibilities, that he stepped aside and left God free to act, placing no obstacles in his way. Joseph is a “just man” (Mt 1:19) because his existence is “ad-justed” to the word of God.
The life of St Joseph, lived in obedience to God’s word, is an eloquent sign for all the disciples of Jesus who seek the unity of the Church. His example helps us to understand that it is only by complete submission to the will of God that we become effective workers in the service of his plan to gather together all mankind into one family, one assembly, one “ecclesia”.”
(Pope Benedict XVI)
6. St Joseph can help us to increase in virtue
“Oh, what a saint is the glorious St Joseph! He is not only a Patriarch, but the most distinguished among the Patriarchs. He is not merely a confessor, but far more than a confessor, for in him are included the dignity of the Bishop, the generosity of the martyr, the excellence of the other saints. St Joseph will obtain for us, if we repose confidence in him, an increase in every kind of virtue, but particularly in those which he possessed in a pre-eminent degree. These are a perfect purity of body and mind, humility, constancy, fortitude, and perseverance: virtues which will render us victorious over our enemies in this life, and enable us to obtain the grace of enjoying in the life to come those rewards which are prepared for the imitators of St Joseph.”
(St Francis de Sales)
7. St Joseph inspires us to be humble
“Joseph understood that Jesus was superior to him even as he submitted to him, and, knowing the superiority of his charge, he commanded him with respect and moderation. Everyone should reflect on this: frequently a lesser man is placed over people who are greater, and it happens at times that an inferior is more worthy than the one who appears to be set above him. If a person of greater dignity understands this, then he will not be puffed up with pride because of his higher rank; he will know that his inferior may well be superior to him, even as Jesus was subject to Joseph.”
(Origen)
8. St Joseph reminds us to listen for God’s voice
“St Joseph’s silence does not express an inner emptiness but, on the contrary, the fullness of the faith he bears in his heart and which guides his every thought and action.
It is a silence thanks to which Joseph, in unison with Mary, watches over the Word of God, known through the Sacred Scriptures, continuously comparing it with the events of the life of Jesus; a silence woven of constant prayer, a prayer of blessing of the Lord, of the adoration of his holy will and of unreserved entrustment to his providence.
It is no exaggeration to think that it was precisely from his “father” Joseph that Jesus learned – at the human level – that steadfast interiority which is a presupposition of authentic justice, the “superior justice” which he was one day to teach his disciples (cf. Mt 5:20).
Let us allow ourselves to be “filled” with St Joseph’s silence! In a world that is often too noisy, that encourages neither recollection nor listening to God’s voice, we are in such deep need of it.”
(Pope Benedict XVI)
9. He is a powerful intercessor
“Some Saints are privileged to extend to us theirbpatronage with particular efficacy in certain needs, but not in others; but our holy patron St Joseph has the power to assist us in all cases, in every necessity, in every undertaking.”
(St Thomas Aquinas)
10. St Joseph protects the whole Church
“If Joseph was so engaged, heart and soul, in protecting and providing for that little family at Nazareth, do you not think that now in heaven he is the same loving father and guardian of the whole Church, of all its members, as he was of its Head on earth?”
(Venerable Pope Pius XII)
Cover image: St Joseph in the Workshop with Jesus. © HolyRosary.Team
Consecrate Yourself to St Joseph
St Joseph shows us a very special example of holiness. The titles given to him by the Church tell us he is the most just, chaste, prudent, strong, obedient and faithful. He is named the Pillar of Families, Solace of the Wretched, Hope of the Sick, Patron of the Dying, Protector of the Church and Terror of Demons.
In this beautiful book of consecration, Fr Gerard Skinner provides the prayers and meditations to bring our hearts and our needs to Jesus through the powerful intercession of his foster father, St Joseph.