In the first joyful mystery of the rosary, we meditate on the Annunciation, the angel Gabriel asking Mary to be the mother of Jesus. Mary responded, “Be it done unto me according to your word.” That is in Luke. Today’s Gospel is from Matthew (1:18-24), and we could call it the Annunciation to Joseph.
Matthew gives Joseph a huge compliment. He describes Joseph as “righteous/just.” (Matt 1:19) It meant Joseph was very close to God. That makes sense because after Our Lady, St. Joseph is the next highest saint. Not many people are called righteous in the Bible and Joseph is one of that small number. Being righteous/just in the Bible means living perfectly according to God’s commandments, fulfilling God’s will perfectly, living a very holy life. In the early chapters of Luke’s Gospel, the elderly couple Zechariah and Elizabeth are described as just, and Simeon in the temple.
Joseph’s righteousness is, I think, a key to understanding Joseph in today’s Gospel. Mary and Joseph were betrothed. Couples were betrothed one year before marriage which meant they were legally bound to each other, but they did not live together until the wedding ceremony took place at the end of the betrothal. During this time of betrothal, Mary conceived of the Holy Spirit. Since betrothal was a legal agreement, even though the couple were not yet living together, the only way to break it was by divorce. It wasn’t divorce in our understanding; it was more like breaking an engagement. Matthew tells us Joseph decided to separate from Mary quietly. It was because Joseph was righteous that he decided to do so quietly because if he did it publicly, according to the law it would have left Mary in danger of being stoned to death although it seems that law was not implemented at that time. (Men brought a woman caught in adultery to Jesus in John 8 and they had the stones in their hands ready to fling at her but that looks like a trap to test Jesus’ reaction. He told them the one without sin could cast the first stone, so they dropped their stones and left.)
It looks like Mary had already told Joseph that she had conceived of the Holy Spirit and was carrying Jesus. Mary was so holy, the holiest person on earth after Jesus, that Joseph, who was righteous, must have known her account was truthful. So why did he make up his mind to distance himself from her? Various answers have been given to that question over the centuries. To my mind, there is one answer that makes sense because of Joseph being the next highest saint after Our Lady and being a righteous person: Joseph did not consider himself worthy to be close to Our Lady and Jesus. Joseph knew a miracle had occurred and that God was working in an extraordinary way in Mary, and he felt unworthy to be her husband. An ancient homily (quoted in Filas, The Man Nearest to Christ p74-75) put it like this: when Peter saw the miraculous catch of fish he said, “Depart from me Lord for I am a sinful man” (Luke 5:8); when the centurion came to Jesus asking Jesus to cure his slave, he said, “Lord, I am not worthy to have you enter under my roof” (Luke 7:6); when Mary visited Elizabeth, Elizabeth said, “how does this happen to me that the mother of my Lord should come to me?” (Luke 1:43) The ancient homily says, in a similar manner, St. Joseph felt unworthy to be close to the holiness of Mary and Jesus, so he decided to distance himself from Mary quietly. Many saints and theologians have understood Joseph’s decision in the same way. So, the angel came to Joseph to reassure him and asked him to continue with Mary, to marry her. Just as Mary and Joseph were extraordinary in every way, their marriage was also; Mary was ever Virgin as we say in so many prayers.
In recent years, St. Joseph has rightly come to be honored more in the Church as his name was added immediately after Our Lady’s in the Eucharistic Prayers. We have four Eucharistic Prayers. Pope John XXIII added Joseph’s name to Eucharistic Prayer I in 1962 after Our Lady’s name, and Pope Benedict XVI approved the addition of Joseph’s name in Eucharistic Prayers II-IV and Pope Francis implemented it in 2013.
Joseph was righteous and there is nothing he would want more than for each of us to also be righteous. I conclude with St. Teresa of Ávila telling us how powerful an intercessor St. Joseph is for us in heaven:
I don’t recall up to this day ever having petitioned him for anything that he failed to grant. It is an amazing thing the great many favors God has granted me through the mediation of this blessed saint, the dangers I was freed from both of body and soul. For with other saints it seems the Lord has given them grace to be of help in one need, whereas with this glorious saint I have experience that he helps in all our needs and that the Lord wants us to understand that just as He was subject to St. Joseph on earth . . . so in heaven God does whatever he commands. (Teresa of Ávila, The Book of Her Life, Spiritual Testimonies, and Soliloquies, vol. 1, The Collected Works of St. Teresa of Avila, ICS Publications, pp79–80)
© Fr. Tommy Lane 2025
This homily was delivered in a parish in Ireland.
More Homilies for the Fourth Sunday of Advent Year A
Joseph, Man of Faith, and Patron of the Church
First Reading background Trust in the Lord for his Blessing 2018