The Holy Father has called for a year of St Joseph Dec 2020- Dec 2021. As we prepare also for the Feast of St Francis de Sales on January 24, we will post excerpts of his thoughts on St Joseph from his Spiritual Conferences, Chapter 19, on the Virtues of St. Joseph.
Day 1:
Oh, what a saint is the glorious St.Joseph ! He is not only a patriarch, but the chief of all patriarchs ; he is not simply a confessor, but more than a confessor; for in his confession is contained the dignity of bishops, the generosity of martyrs, and of all the other saints. It is then with good reason that he is compared to the palm-tree, the king of trees, which has the property of virginity, that of humility, and that of constancy and valour, three virtues in which the glorious St. Joseph greatly excelled; and if one dared to make comparisons, many persons would maintain that he surpasses all other saints in these three virtues.
Day 2:
Oh, what a divine union between our Lady and the glorious St. Joseph ! a union which made that Good of eternal goods, which is our Lord, belong to St Joseph, as He belonged to our Lady, (not by the nature that He had taken in the womb of our glorious Mistress, a nature that had been formed by the Holy Spirit of the most pure blood of our Lady), but according to grace, which made him a partaker of all the goods of his dear Spouse, and which made him go on growing wonderfully in perfection; and this was by his continual communication with our Lady, who possessed all virtues in so high a degree that no other pure creature can attain to it.
Day 3
There is no doubt, my dear sisters, that St. Joseph
was more valiant than David, and wiser than Solomon ;
jet who could have thought so, without being en-
lightened by heavenly light, seeing him reduced to
exercise the trade of a carpenter? so completely did he
keep hidden all the signal gifts that God had bestowed
upon him. But what amount of wisdom did he not
possess, since God gave in charge to him His most glo- rious Son, and chose him to be His guardian
Day 4
St.
‘ Joseph was endowed with all the graces and all the
gifts that were required for the care which the Eternal
Father willed to give him of the temporal and domestic
economy of our Lord, and of the guidance of His family.
This was composed of only three persons, who represent
to us the mystery of the most holy and most adorable
Trinity ; not that there is any comparison except with
regard to our Lord, who is one of the Persons of the
most Holy Trinity, for the others are creatures. But
yet we may say that it is a Trinity on earth, which in a
manner represents to us the most Holy Trinity : Mary,
Jesus and Joseph ; Joseph, Jesus and Mary ; a Trinity marvellously estimable and worthy of being honoured.
Day 5
It is certainly with very good
reason that St. Joseph is said to resemble the palm-tree,
for he was always very valiant, constant, and per-
severing.
Day 6
That St Joseph was always, on all occasions, per-
fectly submissive to the Divine Will, none can doubt ;
and do not you see it? Look how the Angel turns
him in every direction ; he tells him that he must go
into Egypt; he goes there; he commands him to return,
and he returns. God wills that he should be poor,
which is one of the greatest trials He can give us ; he
submits to it lovingly, and not for a time, but for his
whole life. And what was his poverty? A poverty
despised, rejected, and necessitous. The voluntary
poverty which religious profess, is very amiable, inas-
much as it does not prevent their receiving and taking
those things that are necessary for them; forbidding
and depriving them of superfluities only. But the
poverty of St. Joseph, of our Lord and of our Lady,
was not such ; for though it was voluntary, because he
loved it dearly, it was nevertheless abject, rejected, and
despised. For every one held this great Saint to be a
poor carpenter, who, doubtless, could not prevent his
little family from being in want of many necessaries,
though he laboured with unequalled affection for their
support ; after which he submitted very humbly to the
will of God, in the continuation of his poverty and
abjection, not letting himself be in the least overcome
or cast down by the interior distress, which no doubt
made many attacks upon him ; but he remained always
constant in his submission, which, like all his other virtues, went on always increasing and perfecting itself.
Day 7
But what valour and what strength does he not show
in the victory that he gained over the two great enemies of man, the devil and the world !
Day 8
Virtues so perfectly reverberated on St.Joseph, that he almost seemed to be as perfect, and tohave virtues in as high a degree as the glorious Virgin our Lady.
Day 9
He will obtain for us, if we have confidence in him, a holy growth in all
sorts of virtues, but especially in those we have found that he possessed in a higher degree than any others