Saint Joseph, Our Friend and Protector

Today’s Feast of Saint Joseph, the Chaste Spouse of the Blessed Virgin Mary, is a time for Catholics to recall the just and quiet man of the House of David who took Our Lady as his chaste spouse to fulfill God’s holy will. Saint Joseph voluntarily renounced his own biological fatherhood so as to safeguard Our Lady’s perpetual virginity. He denied himself the joy of his own offspring so as to devote himself entirely to his foster-Child, Our Blessed Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. A man who lived his entire life in poverty enriched Our Blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ and Our Lady by the love he gave them from his pure heart, a heart that was itself enriched by being in the presence of the Immaculate Heart of Mary and the Sacred Heart of Jesus. 

Saint Joseph is the model for all husbands and fathers. He should be especially dear to men who are foster-fathers themselves, men who have voluntarily taken unto their own care children whom they did not beget. But dear Saint Joseph is the model for all husbands and fathers everywhere. He was obeyed as the head of that family by Our Blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, the Word made Flesh Himself, and Our Lady. Indeed, what a consummate sign of humility Our Blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ gave us simply by condescending to live in the midst of the Holy Family, subjecting Himself to the authority of His own creatures. Saint Joseph, the Patron of the Universal Church, was first the visible head of the Holy Family of Nazareth.

Saint Joseph was asked in a dream by Saint Gabriel the Archangel to have no fear to take Mary as his wife, that the Child she was carrying had been conceived by the power of the Third Person of the Blessed Trinity, God the Holy Ghost. He did Saint Gabriel had instructed him. He was the first man, therefore, to be directly affected by the Annunciation of Our Lord to Our Lady. The Word was made Flesh at the Annunciation–and very soon thereafter was entrusted to Saint Joseph’s care. Even though he was not in the garden when Saint Gabriel appeared to the Blessed Mother, he was to be apprised of what took place there rather swiftly after it took place.

Saint Joseph led the family that had been entrusted to his good care on the seventy mile journey from Nazareth to Bethlehem. It was Saint Joseph who found the place for His foster-Son to be born, surrounding Him with every care and affection, adoring Him as his God and Redeemer at the moment of His birth. He was present as the aged Simeon prophesied that a sword of sorrow would pierce his most chaste spouse’s Immaculate Heart. Do not think for a moment that his own heart was not wounded by this prophecy. It was. There was a union of the three hearts in the Holy Family, which is why we pray, “Jesus, Mary, and Joseph, we love you. Save souls. Jesus, Mary, and Joseph, pray for us now and in death’s agony.” The sorrows of Our Lady were the sorrows of Saint Joseph.

Saint Joseph responded promptly to the call of Saint Gabriel the Archangel, received in a dream, to take his virginal spouse and his foster-Son to Egypt to flee from the wicked schemes of Herod the Great. Saint Joseph had to make a living in a foreign land, waiting to be called out of Egypt so that his foster-Son, the new Moses, could retrace the steps of the one to whom He had entrusted the first Passover, which was to be superseded by the New and Eternal Passover for which He had came into the world to ratify with every single drop of His Most Precious Blood.

Our Blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ loved His foster-father, learning from him the intricate work of a skilled carpenter. While Our Blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ knew all things as God, He still had to learn how to do those things as man that He had ordained as God to be done by men. Our Blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ therefore submitted Himself to the tutelage of Saint Joseph to learn the trade by which He would earn a living for Himself and His Blessed Mother after Saint Joseph died. Saint Joseph was in the sublime position of teaching God, Who subjected Himself in humility to the teaching authority of His foster-father.

Imagine the daily joy and peace and serenity that surrounded the Holy Family. Saint Joseph and Our Lady were always in the Presence of God Himself. Although there are various private revelations about the nature of the Holy Family’s life, Sacred Scripture is as silent about the events of the Hidden Years in Nazareth as Saint Joseph himself. There is a reason for this silence: Our Blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ was teaching us that each of us will grow up in a family. Those of us who get married and are blessed with children are to replicate in our own lives the joy and peace and serenity of the Holy Family of Nazareth day in and day out, fulfilling the duties of our state-in-life without complaint and without delay. Husbands and fathers must see in Saint Joseph the perfect model of what it is to be the head of one’s household, intent on developing the manly Catholic virtues of patience and charity and courage and perseverance exhibited to their highest degree in the person of Saint Joseph.

As the model of patience and joy, Saint Joseph did not complain about anything. Indeed, Sacred Scripture records not one word ever uttered by Saint Joseph. He was the just and silent man of the House of David as he faithfully carried out God’s will for him each and every day, doing ordinary things extraordinarily well for the love of the Father in the presence of the Son Himself. He is the model of artisans and laborers, a man who pursued excellence as befits a child of God. He wanted nothing more than to use the talents he had been given for God’s greater glory, knowing that he had been chosen from all eternity to participate in events that would lead to the Redemption. He, a man who worked with wood, had the privilege of serving the One Who would use the wood of the Cross as the instrument of redeeming mankind.

Saint Joseph suffered along with Our Lady when the Child Jesus stayed behind in Jerusalem to answer questions being posed to him by the doctors of the law. The fright in his heart was palpable when he discovered that his foster-Son was not in their company. His relief was visible when his foster-Son was found. His acceptance of God’s will about this event was total. Not a word of complaint. He knew that his foster-Son had to be about His Heavenly Father’s business once he heard this from the mouth of the One to Whom he gave love, clothing, shelter and instruction. 

How fitting it is that Saint Joseph, who was the head of the Holy Family of Nazareth, is the Patron of the Universal Church. We need to invoke his intercession more faithfully for the needs of Holy Mother Church. For just as Saint Joseph protected the Infant Jesus and Our Lady during their flight to Egypt, so, too, has Our Blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ entrusted to His foster-father the protection of His Mystical Body, the Church, here on earth. So too does he watch over our priests, who called to imitate his virtue of chastity by denying themselves their biological fatherhood in order to be the spiritual father of others. Saint Joseph is very close to priests and wants them to keep their purity unstained by anything. He wants them to be lovers of Holy Poverty after his own holy heart. And he wants them to be steadfast in maintaining the Tradition that his foster-Son’s Apostles have handed down to them under the protection of the Holy Ghost.

Saint Joseph, among many other titles and privileges, is the Patron of the Dying. Rosalie Marie Levy discussed the glory of the death of Saint Joseph in Joseph the Just Man:

Glorious and happy as was the death of St. Joseph, the gates of Heaven remained closed to him. Angels conducted his soul to Limbo, where a multitude of just and holy spirits of the Old Law were patiently awaiting the arrival of their Redeemer after the completion of His work on Golgotha’s hill.

Faith teaches that the reward promised by God to those who serve Him faithfully is in proportion to the merits they acquired upon earth.

No one will imagine a grander, more sublime or meritorious position than that filled by St. Joseph. He cast protecting arms around Jesus, the God-Man, and his spouse, the Blessed Virgin Mary–the loveliest and holiest of creatures–when the life of the Child was endangered by the wicked King Herod and his soldiers. Thus he cooperated in the sublime work of our salvation. He endured sacrifices and privations of every kind. Many were the days of hard toil endured to provide for the needs of the Holy Family. As a carpenter St. Joseph glorified labor, since he was ever united with God and offered all in humble obedience to His Will.

Silently and humbly, patiently and lovingly he went about his daily tasks, never complaining; though his life could easily have been a monotonous and difficult one in the small workshop at Nazareth. As the foster-father of Jesus, it was his duty to teach the Child Jesus.

In the revelations of St. Bridget we have the Blessed Virgin saying: “My Son was so obedient that when Joseph said, ‘Do this or do that’, immediately He did it”.

Ven. Mary of Jesus of Agreda relates that when the Blessed Virgin understood that the final hour on earth of her faithful spouse was drawing near, she implored her Divine Son to assist him in the journey from life to eternity; and that she received more than she asked, namely a promise that He would not only assist St. Joseph but “would raise him to a rank so exalted that he would be the admiration of all the celestial hierarchy.”

In truth there must been great rejoicing in Heaven when Jesus forty days after His Resurrection ascended triumphantly into Heaven accompanied by all the just who had lived from the beginning of creation and had been redeemed through the promise of Mankind’s Savior. Foremost among these was His beloved foster-father St. Joseph, who, standing at the right hand of Jesus, was led by Him to occupy a place which, with the sole exception of that destined for Mary his holy spouse, was the highest in Heaven. He was enveloped in celestial joy at the vision of the Divine Essence, which no man can describe, as St. Paul wrote to the Corinthians (1 Cor. 2: 9): “Eye hath no seen, nor ear heard, neither hat it entered into the heart of man, what things God hath prepared for them that love him.”

In conclusion, Ven. Mary of Jesus of Agreda recounts extraordinary privileges granted by God to devout clients of St. Joseph:

“First, those who invoke him, shall obtain from God, by his intercession, the gift of chastity, and shall not be conquered by the temptations of the senses; second, these shall receive particular graces to deliver them from sin; third, they shall obtain a true devotion to the Blessed Virgin; fourth, they shall have a happy death, and in that all-decisive moment  be defended against the assaults of Satan; fifth, they shall be delivered, if conducive to their salvation, from bodily sufferings, and shall find help in their afflictions; sixth, if married, they shall be blessed with off-spring; seventh, the demons shall have mortal dread of the invocation of the glorious name of St. Joseph.”

St. Bernard sums up the life of St. Joseph with the words: “He was a faithful and prudent servant, I say, whom the Lord gave as a consolation to His Mother, as the guardian of His own Body, and finally as the only and most faithful helper upon earth in the great plan of His Incarnation”. (Rosalie Mary Levy, Joseph the Just Man, St. Paul Editions, 1955, pp. 82-85.)

Rosalie Mary Levy provides the account of Our Lady’s apparition to Venerable Mary of Jesus of Agreda to explain the incomparable glory of her Most Chaste Spouse, the Just and Silent Man of the House of David:

“My daughter, although you have written that my spouse Joseph was one of the greatest saints and most noble princes of the celestial Jerusalem, you cannot now declare his eminent sanctity. Mortals can never know it until they enjoy the vision of God, in which they will with admiration discover the mystery, and they will praise the Lord for it. In the last day when all men will be judged, the unhappy damned will weep bitterly for not having known, because of their sins, this powerful and efficacious means for their salvation, and for not having availed themselves of it, as they could have done, to recover the grace of the just Judge. The world has been greatly ignorant of the magnitude of the prerogatives which the supreme Lord has accorded to my holy spouse, and how powerful is his intercession with His Divine Majesty; for be assured that he is one of the greatest favorites of God, and one of the most capable of appeasing His justice against sinners. I desire you to be most grateful to the goodness of the Lord for the favor which I have granted to you on this occasion, and that you will render Him continual thanks for the illumination that you have received touching this mystery. Endeavor also, in the future, to augment your devotion for my holy spouse, and bless the Lord for that He has favored him with so much liberality, and also for the consolation that I enjoyed in bearing him company and knowing his perfections.

“You must avail yourself of his intercession in all your necessities and so act as to multiply the numbers of his votaries. Recommend to your daughters to distinguish themselves in this devotion, since the Most High grants on earth that which my spouse requests in Heaven, and He will unite to these requests extraordinary favors for men, provided they do not render themselves unworthy to receive them.

“All these privileges respond to the perfection, the innocence, and to the eminent virtues of this admirable saint, because they have attracted the complaisance of the Lord, Who destines for him inconceivable largesse, and Who desires to show great mercy to those who will have recourse to his intercession.” (Rosalie Mary Levy, Joseph the Just Man, St. Paul Editions, 1955, pp. 150-152.)

Joseph the Just Man recounts Our Lady’s message to Saint Bridget of Sweden concerning the Patron of the Universal Church:

“St. Joseph was so reserved and careful in his speech, that not one word ever issued from his mouth that was not good and holy, nor did he ever indulge in unnecessary or less charitable conversation. He was most patient and diligent in bearing fatigue; he practiced extreme poverty; he was most meek in bearing injuries; he was strong and constant against my enemies; he was the faithful witness of the wonders of Heaven, being dead to the flesh and the world, living only for God and for heavenly goods, which were the only things he desired. He was perfectly conformed to the Divine Will and so resigned to the dispositions of Heaven, that he ever repeated: ‘May the Will of God ever done in me!’ He rarely spoke with men, but continually with God, Whose Will he desired to perform. Wherefore, he now enjoys great glory in Heaven.”Rosalie Mary Levy, Joseph the Just Man, St. Paul Editions, 1955, pp. 148-149.) 

Imagine what our ecclesiastical situation would look like if Catholics prayed to Saint Joseph for the restoration of the true Faith and the vanquishing once and for all of the counterfeit church of conciliarism and all of its novelties, including the Protestant and Masonic Novus Ordo service. Imagine what the world would look like if Catholics invoked the intercession of the just man, Saint Joseph, to restore the Social Reign of His Divine foster-Son and of His Virginal Spouse, Mary Immaculate, banishing forever the falsehoods of Modernity and Modernism. Imagine what each one of our lives would be like if we asked him for the graces to imitate his love and his joy for serving Our Blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ and Our Lady in humility and with patient endurance of trials and sufferings.

Saint Joseph has appeared with his virginal spouse in Knock, Ireland, and in Fatima, Portugal. Jacinta and Francisco Marto and Lucia dos Santos saw Saint Joseph bless the crowd three times as the Miracle of the Sun took place on October 13, 1917. Our Blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ has seen to it that his foster-father, the just and quiet man of the House of David, is honored by us for the role he played in our redemption and the role he plays in helping us to get to Heaven. Along with all of the other angels and saints, including Our Lady, Saint Joseph is present at every Mass.

Dom Prosper Gueranger’s prayer to Saint Joseph, found in his The Liturgical Year, is worth calling to mind:

We praise and glorify thee, O happy saint! We hail thee as the spouse of the Queen of heaven, and foster-father of our Redeemer. These titles, which would seem too grand for any human being to enjoy, are thine; and they are but the expression of the dignities conferred on thee by God. The Church of heaven admires the sublime favours thou hast received; the Church on earth joyfully celebrates thy glories, and blesses thee for the favours thou art so unceasingly bestowing upon her.

Though born of the kingly race of David, thou was the humblest of men; thy spirit led thee to seek obscurity, and a hidden life was thine ambition: but God chose thee to be an instrument in the sublimest of all His works. A noble Virgin of the same family of David, the object of heaven’s admiration, and the glory and hope of the world, is to be thy bride. The Holy Ghost is to dwell within her as in a most pure tabernacle; it is to thee, the just and chaste, that He entrusts her as an inestimable treasure. Espouse, then, to thyself her whose beauty the King of heaven so greatly desires.

The Son of God comes down to this earth, that He may live the life of man; He comes that He may sanctify the ties and affections of kindred. He calls thee father; He obeys thy orders. What strange emotions must have filled thy heart, O Joseph! when, knowing the prerogatives of thy bride and the divinity of they adopted Son, thou hadst to be the head of this family, which united heaven and earth into one! What respectful and tender love for Mary, thy blessed bride! What gratitude and profound worship of Jesus, Who obeyed thee as they Child! Oh mysteries of Nazareth! a God dwells among men, and permits Himself to be called the Son of Joseph!

O sublime minister of the greatest of blessings, intercede for us with God made Man. Ask Him to bestow humility upon us, that holy virtue which raised thee to such exalted dignity, and which must be the basis of our conversation. It is pride that led us into sin, and made us prefer our own will to that of God: yet will He pardon us if we offer Him the sacrifice of a contrite and humble heart. Get us this virtue, without which there can be no true penance. Pray also for us, O Joseph, that we may be chaste. Without purity of mind and body we cannot come nigh the God of all sanctity, who suffers nothing defiled to approach Him. He wills to make our bodies, by His grace, the temples of His holy Spirit: do thou, great saint, help us to maintain ourselves in so exalted a dignity, or to recover it if we have lost it.

And lastly, O faithful spouse of Mary! recommend us to our Mother. If she cast a look of pity upon us during these days of reconciliation, we shall be saved: for she is the Queen of mercy, and Jesus, her Son, will pardon us and change our hearts, if she intercede for us, O Joseph! Remind her of Bethlehem, Egypt, and Nazareth, in all of which she received from thee such marks of they devotedness. Tell her that we, also, love and honour thee; and Mary will reward us for  our devotion to him who has given her by heaven as her protector and support. (Dom Prosper Gueranger, O.S.B., The Liturgical Year.)

Pope Leo XIII issued an encyclical letter, Quamquam Pluries, August 15, 1889, to promote devotion to Saint Joseph. Noting his own connection to Joseph, the son of the patriarch Jacob, Pope Leo went on to explain that persons of all social ranks, especially those who are poor and have little in the way of the resources of this world, have in Saint Joseph a special model and patron:

The special motives for which St. Joseph has been proclaimed Patron of the Church, and from which the Church looks for singular benefit from his patronage and protection, are that Joseph was the spouse of Mary and that he was reputed the Father of Jesus Christ. From these sources have sprung his dignity, his holiness, his glory. In truth, the dignity of the Mother of God is so lofty that naught created can rank above it. But as Joseph has been united to the Blessed Virgin by the ties of marriage, it may not be doubted that he approached nearer than any to the eminent dignity by which the Mother of God surpasses so nobly all created natures. For marriage is the most intimate of all unions which from its essence imparts a community of gifts between those that by it are joined together. Thus in giving Joseph the Blessed Virgin as spouse, God appointed him to be not only her life’s companion, the witness of her maidenhood, the protector of her honor, but also, by virtue of the conjugal tie, a participator in her sublime dignity. And Joseph shines among all mankind by the most august dignity, since by divine will, he was the guardian of the Son of God and reputed as His father among men. Hence it came about that the Word of God was humbly subject to Joseph, that He obeyed him, and that He rendered to him all those offices that children are bound to render to their parents. From this two-fold dignity flowed the obligation which nature lays upon the head of families, so that Joseph became the guardian, the administrator, and the legal defender of the divine house whose chief he was. And during the whole course of his life he fulfilled those charges and those duties. He set himself to protect with a mighty love and a daily solicitude his spouse and the Divine Infant; regularly by his work he earned what was necessary for the one and the other for nourishment and clothing; he guarded from death the Child threatened by a monarch’s jealousy, and found for Him a refuge; in the miseries of the journey and in the bitternesses of exile he was ever the companion, the assistance, and the upholder of the Virgin and of Jesus. Now the divine house which Joseph ruled with the authority of a father, contained within its limits the scarce-born Church. From the same fact that the most holy Virgin is the mother of Jesus Christ is she the mother of all Christians whom she bore on Mount Calvary amid the supreme throes of the Redemption; Jesus Christ is, in a manner, the firstborn of Christians, who by the adoption and Redemption are his brothers. And for such reasons the Blessed Patriarch looks upon the multitude of Christians who make up the Church as confided specially to his trust — this limitless family spread over the earth, over which, because he is the spouse of Mary and the Father of Jesus Christ he holds, as it were, a paternal authority. It is, then, natural and worthy that as the Blessed Joseph ministered to all the needs of the family at Nazareth and girt it about with his protection, he should now cover with the cloak of his heavenly patronage and defend the Church of Jesus Christ.

You well understand, Venerable Brethren that these considerations are confirmed by the opinion held by a large number of the Fathers, to which the sacred liturgy gives its sanction, that the Joseph of ancient times, son of the patriarch Jacob, was the type of St. Joseph, and the former by his glory prefigured the greatness of the future guardian of the Holy Family. And in truth, beyond the fact that the same name—a point the significance of which has never been denied—was given to each, you well know the points of likeness that exist between them; namely, that the first Joseph won the favor and especial goodwill of his master, and that through Joseph’s administration his household came to prosperity and wealth; that (still more important) he presided over the kingdom with great power, and, in a time when the harvests failed, he provided for all the needs of the Egyptians with so much wisdom that the King decreed to him the title “Savior of the world.” Thus it is that We may prefigure the new in the old patriarch. And as the first caused the prosperity of his master’s domestic interests and at the same time rendered great services to the whole kingdom, so the second, destined to be the guardian of the Christian religion, should be regarded as the protector and defender of the Church, which is truly the house of the Lord and the kingdom of God on earth. These are the reasons why men of every rank and country should fly to the trust and guard of the blessed Joseph. Fathers of families find in Joseph the best personification of paternal solicitude and vigilance; spouses a perfect example of love, of peace, and of conjugal fidelity; virgins at the same time find in him the model and protector of virginal integrity. The noble of birth will earn of Joseph how to guard their dignity even in misfortune; the rich will understand, by his lessons, what are the goods most to be desired and won at the price of their labor. As to workmen, artisans, and persons of lesser degree, their recourse to Joseph is a special right, and his example is for their particular imitation. For Joseph, of royal blood, united by marriage to the greatest and holiest of women, reputed the father of the Son of God, passed his life in labor, and won by the toil of the artisan the needful support of his family. It is, then, true that the condition of the lowly has nothing shameful in it, and the work of the laborer is not only not dishonoring, but can, if virtue be joined to it, be singularly ennobled. Joseph, content with his slight possessions, bore the trials consequent on a fortune so slender, with greatness of soul, in imitation of his Son, who having put on the form of a slave, being the Lord of life, subjected himself of his own free-will to the spoliation and loss of everything.

Through these considerations, the poor and those who live by the labor of their hands should be of good heart and learn to be just. If they win the right of emerging from poverty and obtaining a better rank by lawful means, reason and justice uphold them in changing the order established, in the first instance, for them by the Providence of God. But recourse to force and struggles by seditious paths to obtain such ends are madnesses which only aggravate the evil which they aim to suppress. Let the poor, then, if they would be wise, trust not to the promises of seditious men, but rather to the example and patronage of the Blessed Joseph, and to the maternal charity of the Church, which each day takes an increasing compassion on their lot.  (Pope Leo XIII, Quamquam Pluries, August 15, 1889.)

The readings for Matins in today’s Divine Office contain a few passages from a reflection on the life of Saint Joseph given in a sermon by Saint Bernard of Clairvaux:

What and what manner of man the blessed Joseph was, we may gather from that title wherewith, albeit only as a deputy, God deemed him fit to be honoured he was both called, and supposed to be the Father of God. We may gather it from his very name, which, being interpreted, signifieth Increase. Remember likewise that great Patriarch who was sold into Egypt, and know that the Husband of Mary not only received his name, but inherited his purity, and was likened to him in innocence and grace.

If then, that Joseph that was sold by his brethren through envy, and was brought down to Egypt, was a type of Christ sold by a disciple, and handed over to the Gentiles, the other Joseph flying from the envy of Herod carried Christ into Egypt. That first Joseph kept loyal to his master, and would not carnally know his master's wife; that second Joseph knew that the Lady, the Mother of his Lord, was a virgin, and he himself remained faithfully virgin toward her. To that first Joseph it was given to know dark things in interpreting of dreams; to the second Joseph it was given in sleep to know the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven.

The first Joseph laid by bread, not for himself, but for all people; the second Joseph received into his keeping that Living Bread Which came down from heaven, not for him only, but for the whole world. We cannot doubt but that that Joseph was good and faithful to whom was espoused the Mother of the Saviour. Yea, I say, he was a faithful and wise servant, whom the Lord appointed to be the comfort of His own Mother, the keeper of His own Body, and the only and trusty helper in the Eternal Counsels. (Matins, Divine Office, Feast of Saint Joseph.)

Saint Joseph is our helper in time of need. After Our Lady herself, we should call upon Saint Joseph to help us at every turn as we endeavor to fulfill our daily duties and as we seek to labor hard at saving our souls as members of the Catholic Church, which is blessed to have him as her Universal Patron. We can have every confidence in the prayers and petitions we offer to our Protector and our friend, the lover of Holy Poverty and the Patron of a Happy, Holy Death, Saint Joseph of Nazareth.

Good Saint Joseph, just man of the House of David, pray for us to imitate your virtues. Pray for us to persevere in the graces won for us by the shedding of your foster-Child’s Most Precious Blood on the wood of the Holy Cross and that flow into our hearts and souls through the loving hands of thy Virginal Spouse, the Mediatrix of All Graces. Pray for us to be meek and humble of heart, consecrated as we must be to the Sacred Heart of Jesus through the Immaculate Heart of Mary.

Jesus, Mary, and Joseph, pray for us now and in death’s agony.

Jesus, Mary, and Joseph, we love you, save souls.

Our Lady, ever virginal spouse of Saint Joseph, pray for us.

The Litany of Saint Joseph

 O Saint Joseph, whose protection is so great, so strong, so prompt before the throne of God, I place in thee all my interests and desires. O thou Saint Joseph, do assist me by thy powerful intercession, and obtain for me from thy divine Son all spiritual blessings, through Jesus Christ, Our Blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ; so that, having engaged here below thy heavenly power, I may offer my thanksgiving and homage to the most loving of fathers. O Saint Joseph, I never weary contemplating thee, and Jesus asleep in thy arms; I dare not approach while He reposes near thy heart. Press Him in my name and kiss His fine head for me, and ask Him to return the kiss when I draw my dying breath. Saint Joseph, Patron of departing souls, pray for me. Amen!

Saint Joseph Altar, Christ the King Church Parish Hall, Lafayette, Lousiana, Laetare Sunday, March 18, 2007

Viva Cristo Rey!

Our Lady of Fatima, pray for us!

Saint Joseph, Patron of Departing Souls, pray for us.

Saints Peter and Paul, pray for us.

Saint John the Baptist, pray for us.

Saint John the Evangelist, pray for us.

Saint Michael the Archangel, pray for us.

Saint Gabriel the Archangel, pray for us.

Saint Raphael the Archangel, pray for us.

Saints Joachim and Anne, pray for us.

Saints Caspar, Melchior, and Balthasar, pray for us.