Meditation for December 4, Mary and Joseph

The Gospels are silent about Mary and Joseph before the Incar­nation. God alone was concerned with them.

To be the object of God's especial notice! What a blessing!

What does Joseph do? He lives in a modest corner of a little village. Nothing in his person gives exterior evidence to the passerby of the noble blood that flows in his veins. He is an artisan; he works with his hands; he is at the service of the country folk; he makes their oxen yokes, plows, tables, and repairs their wagons. A good workman, but nothing more than a workman! "He is Joseph, Joseph the carpenter," the people say, as they will say later when Jesus begins to attract publicity by His preaching: "Is this not truly the son of Joseph, the carpenter; you know, the carpenter?"

And Mary, the flower of Jesse so long expected, in what sur­roundings do we discover her?

She is the flower of the field, and the lily of the valleys, a lily beautiful but unseen. She is poor, also, and modest as becomes her purity; oh, so modest that one would say she fears being noticed or drawn from her contemplation. Not that she is at all unsociable. Indeed not! She smiles sincerely upon the women who pass; at the fountain she hurries graciously to aid her neigh­bors in drawing water, helping them, too, to place their pitchers on their heads. While with her parents, she applied herself to home duties, putting all her energy into the tasks of her state; she put things in order, swept, prepared the meals, mended the clothing and wove the wool.

Mary and Joseph were the chosen ones of the Holy Spirit. God alone was their all; the world was nothing to them but to them it owes everything.

"Grant me, O Joseph and Mary, a participation in your hidden virtue, the source of so many graces for you; let me love to live hidden."

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Adapted from Meditations for Religious
by Father Raoul Plus, S.J. (© 1939, Frederick Pustet Co.)