The faithful foster-father and guardian

Today, March 19, as our Church celebrates the Solemnity of Joseph, Husband of Mary, we are first invited to read and reflect on a passage from the letter to the Hebrews (11:1-6) entitled "The faith of the ancients." Our treasure, which follows, is from a sermon by Saint Bernardine of Siena, priest.   The Bible pays Joseph the highest compliment: he was a "just" man. The quality meant a lot more than faithfulness in paying debts. When the Bible speaks of God "justifying" someone, it means that God, the all- holy or "righteous" one, so transforms a person that the individual shares somehow in God's own holiness, and hence it is "right" for God to love him or her. In other words, God is not playing games, acting as if we were lovable when We are not.   By saying Joseph was "just," the Bible means that he was one who was completely open to all that God wanted to do for him. He became holy by opening himself totally to God. The rest we can easily surmise. Think of the kind of love with which he wooed and won Mary, and the depth of the love they shared during their marriage.   It is no contradiction to Joseph's manly holiness that he decided to divorce Mary when she was found to be with child. The important words of the Bible are that he planned to do this "quietly" because he was "a righteous man, yet unwilling to expose her to shame".   Saint Bernadine lived from 1380 until 1444. Most of the saints suffer great personal opposition, even persecution. Bernardine, by contrast, seems more like a human dynamo, who simply took on the needs of the world. He was a greatest preacher of his time, journeying across Italy, calming strife-torn cities, attacking the paganism, he found rampant, attracting crowds of 30,000, following Saint Francis of Assisi's admonition to preach about "vice and virtue, punishment, and glory. " Saint Bernadine's primary contribution to the Church was powerfully promoting devotion to the Holy Name of Jesus. Through his preaching, he encouraged the faithful to center their lives on Jesus Christ, often displaying the symbol "IHS" as a reminder of Christ's saving name. His teaching emphasized that invoking the Holy Name brings grace, unity, and moral renewal, helping to reform Christian life in a time of social division. In this way, he deepened the Church's understanding of the spiritual power and reverence due to the Name of Jesus. Compared with Saint Paul by the pope, Bernadine had a keen intuition of the needs of the time, along with solid holiness and boundless energy and joy. He accomplished all this despite having a very weak and hoarse voice, miraculously improved later because of his devotion to Mary. As early as the second century, this treatise, which is of great rhetorical power and force in its admonition to faithful pilgrimage under Christ's leadership, bore the title "To the Hebrews." It was assumed to be directed to Jewish Christians. Usually, Hebrews was attached in Greek manuscripts to the collection of letters by Paul. Although no author is mentioned (for there is no address), a reference to Timothy suggested connections to the circle of Paul and his assistants. Yet the exact audience, the author, and even whether Hebrews is a letter have long been disputed. The central message of the Epistle to the Hebrews is that Jesus Christ is the perfect and eternal High Priest who fulfills and surpasses the old covenant, offering Himself once for all for the salvation of humanity. The letter teaches that through Christ, believers have direct access to God, and it calls them to persevere in faith, especially in times of trial, trusting in His definitive sacrifice. By showing how Christ completes the meaning of the Law, priesthood, and sacrifices of the Old Testament, Hebrews urges Christians to remain steadfast, confident, and faithful to Him.