Fr. Maurice Meschler - The Truth about Saint Joseph: Encountering the Most Hidden of Saints

Maurice Meschler, S.J.

The Truth About
Saint Joseph

Encountering the
Most Hidden of Saints

Translated from the German by Andrew P. Ganss, S.J.

SOPHIA INSTITUTE PRESS
Manchester, New Hampshire

Copyright 2017 by John L. Barger

The Truth About Saint Joseph was originally published in 1932 by Herder Book Company, St. Louis, under the title Saint Joseph: In the Life of Christ and of the Church. This 2017 edition by Sophia Institute Press includes minor editorial revisions.

Printed in the United States of America. All rights reserved.

Cover design by Coronation Media.

On the cover: Jusepe de Ribera, Saint Joseph with the Flowering Rod , Brooklyn Museum; image courtesy of WikiArt.

No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form, or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except by a reviewer, who may quote brief passages in a review.

Imprimi potest : Samuel H. Horine, S.J., Praepositus Provinciae Missourianae
Nihil obstat : Joannes Rothensteiner, Censor Librorum
Imprimatur : Joannes J. Glennon, Archiepiscopus Sancti Ludovici
Sancti Ludovici, die 10 Decembris, 1931

Sophia Institute Press
Box 5284, Manchester, NH 03108
1-800-888-9344

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Meschler, Maurice, author. | Ganss, Andrew P., 1875-1930, translator.

Title: The truth about Saint Joseph : encountering the most hidden of saints

/ Maurice Meschler, S.J. ; translated from the German by Andrew P. Ganss,

S.J.

Other titles: Hl. Joseph in dem Leben Christi und der Kirche. English

Description: Manchester, New Hampshire : Sophia Institute Press, 2017. | The

Truth About Saint Joseph was originally published in 1932 by Herder Book

Company, St. Louis, under the title Saint Joseph: In the Life of Christ

and of the Church. This 2017 edition by Sophia Institute Press includes

minor editorial revisions. | Includes bibliographical references.

Identifiers: LCCN 2017020152 | ISBN 9781622824526 (pbk. : alk. paper) ePub ISBN 9781622824533

Subjects: LCSH: Joseph, Saint.

Classification: LCC BS2458 .M413 2017 | DDC 232.9/32 dc23 LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2017020152

Contents

Part 1

Part 2

Preface

Saints are like men and landscapes. Some people and scenes reveal their beauty and greatness in their exterior. It takes but a glance at them to compel our admiration, wonder, and love. This is not the case with the more modest of natures phenomena. They demand a closer consideration and study; only then do their worth, beauty, and glory dawn upon us. It may, in fact, happen that their peculiar greatness lies precisely in their unobtrusiveness and hiddenness. The same is true of the saints. For as star differs from star, so do the blessed differ in brightness and glory (see 1 Cor. 15:41). Those who appear most unpretending to us may in reality be very great, even greater than all others.

Among the latter we number Saint Joseph. Not without reason does one spiritual writer call him the most hidden of the saints. This is indisputably true in view of his exceptional position, on the one hand, and of his extraordinary holiness combined with his retired manner of life, on the other. For it was at a much later date than the other saints that he took his rise in the firmament of the Churchs devotion; and in spite of the ever-increasing public veneration shown him, he still remains among the number of the less diligently studied of the celestial inhabitants. Of a truth, his obscurity is in a certain sense his greatness.

Since his star began to rise in the Church of God, not a few of his learned and enthusiastic admirers, thanks to their keen insight and their tender and resourceful affection for him, have thought that they have discovered great things about the saint and have proclaimed them to the world. Such are: his sanctification in his mothers womb, the assumption of his body into Heaven, and a number of other remarkable favors. All this may be true. God certainly imparted to him whatever became his position and ineffably sublime office. Again, we do not deny this; neither do we need it for our purpose. We have a surer, a really prophetic word (2 Pet. 1:19): namely, Holy Scripture, which avails more than all the private revelations and pious opinions of men, be they ever so probable.

What Holy Scripture says concerning Saint Joseph must be inviolably true. It frequently expresses in a simple word something great and momentous. To fathom its content, however, we have to delve deeply. A mountain lake charms us not only by its mirrorlike surface, brightly reflecting the heavens, but also by its limpid waters, which allow the eye to penetrate to its marvelous undergrowth of plant life, out of which merely an occasional water lily finds its way upward and poises itself on its bosom. Similarly Holy Scripture: its truth and simplicity disclose glimpses of mysterious depths. We have but to unearth the lore of Saint Joseph, hidden in the Gospel, to bring it to light and to make use of it in his honor. More is not required to obtain a sublime and singularly lovable portrait of the saint.

Hence, this little book in honor of Saint Joseph is divided into two parts. The first part, following the guidance of the Gospel, tells of the life the saint led on earth in the most intimate companionship with Christ. It is the actual life of Saint Joseph and the basis of all that follows. This life, although sufficiently well known, is always beautiful, attractive, delightful, and edifying. The second part contains, as it were, the afterlife of Saint Joseph in the Church on behalf of her children. This afterlife consists in the faithfuls veneration of the saint and in the salutary effects that the various aspects of his life and virtues have exercised on the lives of the faithful. Something of the nave, pious style of an older period would seem eminently suitable in writing about one like Saint Joseph, the simple, retiring, and humble man of Nazareth.

May this little work increase the number of admirers of the dear foster father of Jesus, and may the good God grant it His grace to bring this about.

Part 1

Saint Joseph in the Life of Christ

Chapter 1

Saint Josephs Home, Family, and Personality

Saint Josephs home was in the Land of Promise, the Holy Land. The latter is divided lengthwise into halves by the River Jordan. Starting from the snowcapped elevation of Hermon in the north, and cradled between the Mediterranean Sea and the extensive Perean deserts, the Holy Land extends to the south in the shape of a charming peninsula of ever increasing variety and multiplicity of uplands and lowlands, of meadows and green valleys with their tributary ravines. Galilee, with its wonderful sea and its undulating, shadowy eminences, within whose keeping Nazareth lies sequestered, was the loveliest section of the land; Judea, on the other hand, because of its rocky soil and deep, yawning chasms, presents a more austere and sublime appearance. In its interior, however, on a high plateau, stood the venerable Temple, the ancient sanctuary of Gods indwelling and revelation and the center of the religious and political life of the nation; while not far away, on a windswept hillside, was poor but regal Bethlehem.

Palestine was, in truth, a place of habitation such as God alone could give His Chosen People in the midst of the nations of old, worthy to be His own special abode and the nursery of the divine humanity. Its three most hallowed spots, Nazareth, Jerusalem, and Bethlehem, were the fitting scenes in which Saint Josephs life played a prominent part.