+ The principal feast of St Joseph is celebrated on March 19, but this second feast of Joseph [as] the Worker was inaugurated
by Pope Pius XII in 1955 to counteract a Communist holiday on May 1. The new
feast replaced that of the Patronage of St Joseph, later called the Solemnity
of Joseph (another secondary feast). The appropriateness of this new feast is
grounded in the fact that Joseph was a carpenter by trade, and trained his son
Jesus as a carpenter as well.
Joseph indeed was the
worker-carpenter at Nazareth who provided for the needs of Jesus and Mary; and
he initiated the Son of God into human work. Therefore, on the day when a
holiday in honor of workers is celebrated in many countries, Christian workers
venerate him as their exemplar and protector.
There is a God-given right to
work, coming from the command of God to Adam to subdue the earth and take care of it - how else could this be
accomplished other than by work. Therefore, the feeling of completion that one
gets from work ought not be denied or downplayed – it is very much a “sacred
sweat”!
In our day and age, in the
circumstances in our own country, and in so many other countries of the world,
the rights and dignity of workers needs to be honored and protected – by
providing jobs in the first place for all who want them, and seeing to it that
they have safe work environments and policies set in place to ensure their
employment rights.
St. Joseph quietly and
faithfully trusted God to provide what he needed as a worker/provider – and
then he worked his whole life to repay God for his trust in him to accomplish
certain specific tasks; may we embrace our God-given tasks and assignments
today – whether we are technically employed by an agency or not: for we are
always in God’s employ “subduing with love” “the earth and its creatures” that
he has given us to care for – all the days of our life!
St.
Joseph, the Worker – pray for us!
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