The Feast of Saint Joseph

As we began our Lenten journey, I reflected on the tenderness of God and how we might each express the tenderness of God in a different way in the Lenten season. This week, we celebrate the wonderful feast of perhaps one of the greatest examples of the tenderness of God, and that is Saint Joseph, the feast of Saint Joseph, patron of fathers, patron of the universal Church, patron of carpenters and workers.

Saint Joseph is a wonderful example of a human person who took on God's call, an extra call to care in a very special way. Of course, he was caring for the Christ child, but Joseph didn’t have the full knowledge and realization he had, though an understanding of God's will to love and to be tender.

What a great invitation for us to celebrate this wonderful saint! The saint who appears in each of the four Eucharistic prayers, who we call upon at the time of death, is the patron saint of death, as we know from his early death in the life of Christ. Sisters and brothers, we celebrate this week as a wonderful example to us of the tenderness of God. May we do the same.