Lives to Inspire: Joseph, husband of Mary

“Can anything good come from Nazareth?” asks Nathanael about Jesus in John’s gospel.  Well, even before Jesus, we can answer with a hearty “Yes”.  Joseph came from that small, unimportant backwater.  We know so little about Joseph yet can infer so much.  God chose him to be the father of Jesus: to raise him, teach him a trade, and to pass on the beliefs and values of Judaism.  Jesus may have spent more hours alongside Joseph than any other person, and was in part what Joseph bequeathed to him.  Like Nazareth, Joseph was without fame or fanfare, yet he raised a son who would save the world.  He raised his son, whose Son, God would raise.  Joseph, who God spoke to in dreams, would not in his wildest dreams have foreseen what God would do through him.   

Joseph, of the line of King David, lived in Nazareth as a carpenter.  He was betrothed to Mary. In a dream, an angel tells him to marry her, though she is with child. They travel to Bethlehem where Jesus is born.  Joseph adopts him as his son.

A second dream leads Joseph to flee Israel and escape to Egypt to avoid the jealousy of Herod. After Herod’s death, they return and settle in Nazareth.

When Jesus is 12 years old he gets lost and his parents find him in the Temple. They return to Nazareth and Joseph and Mary continue to bring him up. Joseph is not mentioned after that point, so is assumed to have died before Jesus’ public ministry begins.

Books about Saint Joseph