St Joseph as a model for Lent

loving, obedient, accepting, creatively courageous, hard-working, humble 

These are some of the words that Pope Francis uses in Patris Corde to describe St Joseph. They are a reminder that Joseph is an appropriate companion and guide through the season of Lent.

Patris Corde is the Apostolic Letter that Pope Francis published for the Year of St. Joseph (08 Dec. 2020, to 08 Dec. 2021). This year honours the 150th anniversary of the saint’s proclamation as patron of the Universal Church.

The Parramatta Diocese has produced an reflective animation celebrating St Joseph.

Those in positions of leadership can draw on Pope Francis comments on St Joseph’s exercise of fatherhood/guardianship:

Joseph found happiness not in mere self-sacrifice but in self-gift. In him, we never see frustration but only trust. His patient silence was the prelude to concrete expressions of trust. Our world today needs fathers. It has no use for tyrants who would domineer others as a means of compensating for their own needs. It rejects those who confuse authority with authoritarianism, service with servility, discussion with oppression, charity with a welfare mentality, power with destruction. Every true vocation is born of the gift of oneself, which is the fruit of mature sacrifice.

 

Reference: Apostolic Letter. Patris Corde: On The 150^th Anniversary of the Proclamation of Saint Joseph as Patron of the Universal Church

Feature picture: Morgan Weistling’s painting “Walking with God”.