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St. Joseph, WD40, and a Craftsman Wrench (Happy Father's Day!)
CatholicCulture.com ^ | June 2014 | George J. Galloway

Posted on 06/14/2014 7:30:23 PM PDT by Salvation

St. Joseph, WD40, and a Craftsman Wrench

American country music singer and songwriter, Toby Keith, wrote and recorded a favorite song of mine that I played continuously when I was camping last weekend. It’s called “Made in America.” Perhaps you’ve heard it, but on the off chance you haven’t, here are some of the lyrics:

He’s got the red, white, and blue flyin’ high on the farm
Semper Fi tattooed on his left arm
Spent a little more in the store for a tag in the back that says ‘USA’
He won’t buy nothin’ that he can’t fix,
With WD40 and a Craftsman wrench
He ain’t prejudiced, he’s just made in America.

As my wife and I were camping in our trailer, I was constantly fixing things as I usually do. You know, like adjusting the level of the camper, making sure the water, electrical, and sewer hookups were perfect, repositioning the awning and hanging festive lights off of it, checking the propane, tightening a screw here and there or a nut and a bolt. Not to mention chopping firewood, gathering kindling, and making sure there was plenty of wood on the fire at all times.

I’d look around the campground and see most of the guys doing the same things. We were on vacation, but we were busy doing stuff – tweaking something, getting it just right. It’s part of our DNA. We just can’t help it.

We’re the husbands and fathers of those we love. We have to provide. We have to use our labor, our God-given talents as men to shelter, protect, and defend our families, even in the most trivial ways and on camping trips. And, yes, most of us are driven the same way on behalf of our country, our homeland, our communities and churches.

Give us a job to do and we’re happy, satisfied, complete. If we didn’t get dirt under our fingernails, then we would feel empty. It’s really that simple. Why men are psychoanalyzed and researched over and over again is a waste of time. Men need to do what men are meant to do – what they were created by God to do: they need to work or they can’t sleep at night. They’re tactile creatures. Using their hands to do a job is innate.

And my wife, who knows how to relax, is seated, comfortably, on a nice camping chair we just bought, like a princess on her throne, sipping from a glass of much deserved chardonnay, and looks at me doing non-stop odds and ends, shakes her head, completely befuddled. I wonder if she thinks all men are as crazy as I am.

Sure, I do take time in the early morning, when the sun’s just up, and you can see your breath on a brisk, cool morning. I love to hear the sound of a cold mountain stream or brook skipping its way over a stone-strewn bed and cast a fly. I love the way it feels as I release the line using my fingers to control its distance, to place my lure exactly where I want it to go. Every man wants to do that. To place things exactly where they want things to go, when it’s the right time, when it feels natural.

Men are control freaks. I don’t like flying in an airplane, because I want to fly the plane. I want to control my own destiny. I enjoy sailing only when I control the canvas and rudder. I never like it when someone else drives the car, because I want to be in command of the wheel. It’s always I.

Not because I’m an egotist (better ask my wife that question). But, because I need to be the director of my own play – nothing is more sacred to me than my wife and family, period.

To put these things into someone else’s hands would be the ultimate betrayal.

Joseph, the carpenter from Nazareth, had to have felt the same way. Maybe he didn’t have WD40 and a Craftsman wrench (and duct tape, I couldn’t live without duct tape), but he had his tools: his saws, his mallet, his plane, his hand drill, his plumb bob and A-frame mason’s level. These were the tools of his trade. This was how he made a finished product from a piece of timber or raw wood. The same wood his foster-son would later be nailed upon.

And he must have instructed his son the only way he knew how – in carpentry. He taught him how to steam and plane a stave so that it could be fashioned into a barrel, strapped and secured with wooden hoops, before the age of the cooper. He taught him how to build a table or a chair. How to measure twice and cut once – all the necessary things a father teaches a son, which always have immeasurable value in any life-changing decision.

His decision: the girl, Mary, is pregnant. Not by him. She needs his help. He knows how to fix things. That is what he was born for. He has a dream. Everything in his life up to this point tells him to use the law. To banish, if not have her stoned to death. It is his right to do this. But, he had this dream. He was given his orders.

Joseph, poor and simple, strong, with forearms and hands and shoulders twice the size of most men, doesn’t hesitate. He believes. He is a soldier. A soldier who takes upon his back, and upon his heart, an unbelievable job. He accepts. He actually, without a moment’s pause, accepts. He is now the hand-servant of the Lord. It is his fiat – his “yes.” He now participates in the redemption of all mankind. But only because he said “yes” – because Joseph took it upon his own muscular shoulders to carry the burden which would eventually become our salvation.

Mary said “yes.” That was the first part. She said “be it done unto me.” But Joseph also had to say “yes.” Not vocally. Guys don’t have to use words. Deeds are more important. If he didn’t return the salute, if he hesitated, if he weighed things in the balance of his plum line, what would have happened?

Okay, there was certainly no WD40 and a Craftsman wrench, or duct tape, in Joseph’s time; although I really think he would appreciate these things.

After all, a carpenter can never have too many tools.

And, I think, Toby Keith would never compare himself or his own father to St. Joseph the Worker. No man in his right mind would. Nobody would want his job. You have to be called by the highest pay grade to do something like protecting and raising The God-Child. But, men can certainly relate to a guy named Joseph the carpenter. He’s the fellow next door. He doesn’t ask too many questions. He sees the situation for what it is and gets the job done. Fathers can identify with that. Good soldiers can, too.

Semper Fi. And have a great Father’s Day.



TOPICS: Apologetics; Catholic; History; Theology
KEYWORDS: catholic; fathersday
Happy Father's Day to all the dads out there.
1 posted on 06/14/2014 7:30:23 PM PDT by Salvation
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To: nickcarraway; NYer; ELS; Pyro7480; livius; ArrogantBustard; Catholicguy; RobbyS; marshmallow; ...

Happy Father’s Day Ping!


2 posted on 06/14/2014 7:31:08 PM PDT by Salvation ("With God all things are possible." Matthew 19:26)
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To: Salvation

Good one!


3 posted on 06/14/2014 7:38:38 PM PDT by Inyo-Mono (NRA)
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To: All
St. Joseph, WD40, and a Craftsman Wrench (Happy Father's Day!)
Pope at Mass: The joy of fatherhood
Holy Husbands: A Heavenly Gift
What Happened to Dads?
"Be a Dad!" (Book Review)
Divine Fatherhood is the Source of Human Fatherhood: Fathers as Gift
Priests of the Domestic Church: A Father's Day Homily (Tissue Alert)

A Prayer for Fathers
No Better Gift for Father’s Day
Gift of Fatherhood: Kneel before the Father from Whom Every Family in Heaven on Earth is named
Fathers are important
Fathers
Fatherhood and Religion
The New Catholic Manliness (about priests)
Dads: Men for All Seasons
The Father of Fathers
On The Demise of Fatherhood

Father’s Day 2009: “An End to Buffoonish Fathers”
Of Treacheries, Tykes, and the Trinity (Fatherhood, Family, Effects of Abortion)
Priests and the importance of fatherhood [Catholic Caucus]
[OPEN] The Government, Divorce, and the War on Fatherhood
Study Shows Christianity Makes Men Better Husbands and Fathers
Study Shows Christianity Makes Men Better Husbands and Fathers (Open)
Honoring Thy Fathers
Priests of the Domestic Church: A Father's Day Homily
The Blueprint for Heroic Family Life [Fathers' Day] [Ecumenical]
Honoring Thy Fathers

A Father's Tough Love
Children Who Have An Active Father Figure Have Fewer Psychological And Behavioral Problems
Where Have All the Christian Men Gone? My Conversation with John Eldredge
The Transforming Power of Prayer [Part 1] (Catholic Man)
The Transforming Power of Prayer, Part 2 (Catholic Man)
The 10 Paradoxes of Fatherhood, There is a certain immediacy about motherhood that cannot
The Story of Champions [Father's Day]
What Makes a Man a Hero? [Father's Day]
The New Catholic Manliness
Applying St. Benedict's Rule to Fatherhood and Family Life - Using 6th-Century Wisdom Today

4 posted on 06/14/2014 7:40:13 PM PDT by Salvation ("With God all things are possible." Matthew 19:26)
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To: Salvation

Does Sears still replace broken Craftsman tools no questions asked?


5 posted on 06/14/2014 7:43:49 PM PDT by Gene Eric (Don't be a statist!)
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To: Gene Eric

I haven’t been in a Sears for ages; let us know when you find out.


6 posted on 06/14/2014 7:45:01 PM PDT by Salvation ("With God all things are possible." Matthew 19:26)
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To: Salvation

Sad, isn’t it.

Thanks for the HFD ping!


7 posted on 06/14/2014 7:57:36 PM PDT by Gene Eric (Don't be a statist!)
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To: Salvation
Thanks very much for this post, Salvation. I have many fond memories of my late father spanning more than a half-century.

He did all our plumbing, major work on the vehicles, and electrical work - OK, the electrical was less successful that his other endeavors. His first job - at age 15, was as a crewman on a river dredge on the Delaware River. Up and down the river from the Delaware line to Trenton.

While still in High School, he worked as an iceman - he was proud of his ability lightly to pull a 75 lb. block of ice from the ground to his shoulder. He joined the Navy before his 18th birthday and walked across the stage at his commencement in 1945 wearing the uniform of a sailor in the U.S. Navy

And on another note, he was the first member of our family to graduate from college, went on to achieve a Ph.D in Physiology from Georgetown University, was a three-war veteran of the U.S. Navy, and was married to my Mother for 45 years, in which they won through much adversity without faltering.

God Bless You, Father! We miss you, your humor, your wisdom and your love these many years later!

Happy 239th Birthday To The
United States Army!
Then it’s hi! hi! hey! The Army’s on its way. Count off the cadence loud and strong;
For where’er we go, You will always know That The Army Goes Rolling Along."

8 posted on 06/14/2014 8:22:39 PM PDT by ConorMacNessa (HM/2 USN, 3/5 Marines RVN 1969 - St. Mlichael the Archangel defend us in Battle!)
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To: ConorMacNessa

A beautiful tribute to your father. Thank you.


9 posted on 06/14/2014 8:56:59 PM PDT by Salvation ("With God all things are possible." Matthew 19:26)
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To: Salvation

I actually got my husband a tool kit for Father’s Day, because our daughter took practically every one we owned last time she was here.

There were signs up in the ladies’ room at the gym saying “Get him a back-waxing for Father’s Day!”


10 posted on 06/15/2014 3:40:58 AM PDT by Tax-chick (I have a classic sports car.)
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To: Salvation

A good and blessed Father’s Day to all the fathers and father-like figures out there!


11 posted on 06/15/2014 4:04:09 AM PDT by Biggirl (“Go, do not be afraid, and serve”-Pope Francis)
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To: Salvation

Love it! Thanks for posting.


12 posted on 06/15/2014 5:26:58 AM PDT by NYer ("You are a puff of smoke that appears briefly and then disappears." James 4:14)
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To: Salvation; zot; tired&retired; SandRat; SeekAndFind; Interesting Times; SeraphimApprentice

Thank you for posting this Father’s day column


13 posted on 06/15/2014 10:31:10 AM PDT by GreyFriar (Spearhead - 3rd Armored Division 75-78 & 83-87)
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To: GreyFriar

Thanks for the ping to this very good article.


14 posted on 06/15/2014 3:25:38 PM PDT by zot
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To: GreyFriar; NYer

Most welcome!


15 posted on 06/15/2014 3:26:20 PM PDT by Salvation ("With God all things are possible." Matthew 19:26)
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To: Salvation

Just beautiful. Thank you.


16 posted on 06/15/2014 4:53:38 PM PDT by Mach9
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To: Gene Eric

Not sure, unfortunately the closest Sears is now so far away the $4/gal gasoline consumed to get there likely makes the transaction uneconomical.


17 posted on 06/15/2014 5:00:10 PM PDT by nascarnation (Toxic Baraq Syndrome: hopefully infecting a Dem candidate near you)
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To: nascarnation

Agreed.

Way back when... I would keep any broken tools in the trunk in the event I was in the area of a store. Glad to say that only had one cracked socket and a chipped flat head that I recall. Otherwise, had reliable lifetime with ratchets and general point wear.


18 posted on 06/15/2014 5:16:40 PM PDT by Gene Eric (Don't be a statist!)
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To: Salvation

Very nice post!


19 posted on 06/15/2014 6:21:49 PM PDT by Gerish (Feed your faith and your doubts will starve to death.)
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To: Gerish

Thanks.


20 posted on 06/15/2014 6:46:24 PM PDT by Salvation ("With God all things are possible." Matthew 19:26)
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