March 2d — St. Joseph’s Parentage and Birth.

2d Day. — St. Joseph’s Parentage and Birth.

1.  Though St. Joseph lived in poverty and contempt, he came of a noble ancestry.  The blood of kings and saints ran in his veins, and what is more, he inherited from them the virtues of each, but in a far higher degree than that which their original possessor had enjoyed.  How much that is good in me is an inheritance from my parents and forefathers!  Yet how ill I have employed the virtues I received from them!  Instead of being better than they, like St. Joseph, I am the degenerate child of parents far better than myself.

2.  St. Joseph, as the greatest of all the saints next to Our Lady, had all the privileges of other saints.  Hence we may piously believe that, like St. John, he was cleansed from sin in his mother’s womb.  He was to be Mary’s spouse, he was to occupy the first and foremost place in the family of Jesus, he was hereafter to be the Patron of the whole Church: it was therefore fitting that he should be endowed with this initial privilege of being from his birth a child of God, an heir of the kingdom of heaven.  Thank God for this privilege bestowed on him!

3.  St. Joseph was the connecting link between the Old and the New Dispensation, the first dawn that announces the coming day.  In his youth he belonged to the Old Law, in his later life to the New.  As the dawn brightens into the glorious day, so St. Joseph’s life, beautiful from the first, advanced in splendor continually.  Is this the history of my life?  Have I made steady progress in the love of God?

 


This article, March 2d — St. Joseph’s Parentage and Birth. is a post from The Bellarmine Forum.
https://bellarmineforum.org/devotional/the-catholic-daily/march-month-st-joseph/march-2d-st-josephs-parentage-birth/
Do not repost the entire article without written permission. Reasonable excerpts may be reposted so long as it is linked to this page.

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