Sacred Scripture says very little about the foster father of Jesus Christ, Joseph. Betrothed to Mary and finding her pregnant, Matthew declares that he is “an upright man unwilling to expose her to the law, decided to divorce her quietly.” (Mt. 1:19) The law would have condemned Mary to death. Emeritus Pope Benedict XVI comments on the meaning of his being “an upright man.” He finds in it is a succinct summary of the Old Testament, “life lived according to sacred Scripture…[and the phrase] aligns him with the great figures of the Old Covenant—beginning with Abraham.”[1] Soon after Joseph is instructed to take “Mary as your wife. It is by the Holy Spirit that she has conceived this child. She is to have a son and you are to name him Jesus because he will save his people from their sins.” (Mt. 1:21-22)
After the birth of Jesus and the visit of the astrologers, “…the angel of the Lord suddenly appeared in a dream to Joseph with the command: “Get up, take the child and his mother, and flee to Egypt. Stay there until I tell you otherwise. Herod is searching for the child to destroy him.” Joseph got up and took the child and his mother and left that night for Egypt.” (Mt. 2: 13-14) Joseph serves as a model for faith, for faith is an obedience and receiving the word of the Lord without having evidences. Joseph is obviously linked to the famous Old Testament Joseph who interprets dreams and both goes and returns from Egypt.
The protection and provisions that St. Joseph gives to both Mary and Jesus is related to his action for the church. This has to be understood not literally but in an analogous fashion. Jesus’s body is created in the power of the Holy Spirit. St. Paul tells us that when undergo baptism we are, in a spiritual way, fashioned by the Holy Spirit to be grafted into the Body of Christ, the Church. We ‘put on Christ’ as it were. “All of you who have been baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with him.” (Gal. 3:27) Mary too is analogously understood as a type of Church: both virgin and Mother, Mary like a tabernacle or ark has a special relationship and role to making the body of Christ present and possible in the power of the Holy Spirit.
This does not mean the church will not undergo persecutions, hardships, suffering, and trials. It does mean that the church receives both created and uncreated assistances. Uncreated assistances are from God. Created assistances are from persons like St. Joseph. Pius XI declared Joseph patron of the universal church. Leo XIII dedicated an encyclical to St. Joseph saying that the link between Joseph and his role as protector of the church is because of his special God-given role in protecting both Jesus and Mary. John Paul II in a 100th anniversary letter on Pope Leo’s teaching concludes with this prayer,
“Most beloved father, dispel the evil of falsehood and sin…graciously assist us from heaven in our struggle with the powers of darkness…and just as once you saved the Child Jesus from mortal danger, so now defend God’s holy Church from the snares of her enemies and from all adversity.”
–(John Paul II, Guardian of the Redeemer)[2]
The church commemorates St. Joseph every year on March 19.
[1] Benedict XVI, Jesus of Nazareth The Infancy Narratives (Ignatius 2012) p. 19.
[2] http://www.vatican.va/content/john-paul-ii/en/apost_exhortations/documents/hf_jp-ii_exh_15081989_redemptoris-custos.html