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Because this column is devoted to promoting Catholic fatherhood, this is a special feast day: the Feast of Saint Joseph. The following is an updated version of a column that John wrote a few years ago. Men in history are often remembered for things like winning a battle, governing a country, composing a symphony, writing a masterpiece, or inventing a life-changing device. Today, the Church honors a man who did none of these.  Even in his own time, in the eyes of much of the world, this small-town carpenter was insignificant. But his greatness did not lie in his...

March 19, 2005Solemnity of Saint Joseph, husband of the Blessed Virgin Mary Psalm: Saturday 14 Reading I2 Sam 7:4-5a, 12-14a, 16 The LORD spoke to Nathan and said:"Go, tell my servant David,‘When your time comes and you rest with your ancestors,I will raise up your heir after you, sprung from your loins,and I will make his kingdom firm.It is he who shall build a house for my name.And I will make his royal throne firm forever.I will be a father to him,and he shall be a son to me.Your house and your kingdom shall endure forever before me;your throne shall...

St. Joseph, mirror of patience, pray for us!   ST. JOSEPH Charles L. Souvay Spouse of the Blessed Virgin Mary and foster-father of Our Lord Jesus Christ. The chief sources of information on the life of St. Joseph are the first chapters of our first and third Gospels; they are practically also the only reliable sources, for, whilst, on the holy patriarch's life, as on many other points connected with the Saviour's history which are left untouched by the canonical writings, the apocryphal literature is full of details, the non-admittance of these works into the Canon of the Sacred...