Today's devotion: Saint Joseph, universal patron

Pater noster - Saint Joseph, pray for us!

The Church honors its Saints, but renders a particular cult to Saint Joseph, having constituted him Patron of the Universal Church.

St. Joseph guarded the physical body of Jesus and nourished it as a good father feeds the best of children.

The Church is the Mystical Body of Jesus; the Son of God is its invisible Head, the Pope is its visible Head and the faithful are its members.

When Jesus was tried to death by Herod, it was St. Joseph who saved him, bringing him to Egypt. The Catholic Church is fought and persecuted relentlessly; the bad guys disseminate errors and heresies. Who among the Saints can be more suitable to protect the Mystical Body of Jesus? Certainly St. Joseph!

In fact, the Supreme Pontiffs, spontaneously and also accepting the vows of the Christian people, turned to the Holy Patriarch as an ark of salvation, recognizing in him the greatest power, after that which the Most Holy Virgin has.

Pius IX, on December 1870, XNUMX, when Rome, the seat of the Papacy, was so much targeted by the enemies of the Faith, he officially entrusted the Church to St. Joseph, proclaiming him Universal Patron.

The Supreme Pontiff Leo XIII, seeing the moral unrest of the world and predicting at what precipice the working mass would start, sent the Catholics an Encyclical Letter on Saint Joseph. A part of it is quoted: «To make God more favorable to your prayers, so that He may bring sooner and wider help to his Church, we believe that it is extremely convenient that the Christian people get used to praying with singular devotion and a confident spirit, together with the Virgin Mother of God, his chaste Spouse Saint Joseph. We are well aware that the piety of the Christian people is not only inclined, but has also progressed on its own initiative. The divine house of Nazareth, which Saint Joseph governed with paternal power, was the cradle of the nascent Church. Consequently, the Most Blessed Patriarch also entrusted to himself in a special way the multitude of Christians, of which the Church is formed, that is, this innumerable family scattered throughout the world, on which he, as Spouse of the Virgin and Putative Father of Jesus Christ , has paternal authority. With your heavenly Patronage, assist and defend the Church of Jesus Christ ».

The time we are going through is very stormy; the bad guys would like to take over. Noting this; the great Pius XII said: The world will have to be rebuilt in Jesus and it will be rebuilt through Mary Most Holy and St. Joseph.

In the famous book «Exposure of the four Gospels», the first chapter of St. Matthew says in note: For four came the ruin of the world: for the man, for the woman, for the tree and for the snake; and for four the world must be restored: for Jesus Christ, for Mary, for the Cross and for Just Joseph.

Example
A large family lived in Turin. The mother, intent on the education of the children, had the joy of seeing them grow up in the fear of God. But this was not always the case.

Growing up over the years, two children became bad, due to bad readings and irreligious companions. They no longer obeyed, disrespected and did not want to learn about Religion.

The mother did her best to get them back on track, but she couldn't. It occurred to her to place them under the protection of St. Joseph. He bought a picture of the saint and placed it in the children's room.

A week had passed and the fruits of the power of St. Joseph were seen. The two traviati became reflective, changed conduct and also went to confession and to communicate.

God accepted the prayers of that mother and rewarded the faith he placed in St. Joseph.

Fioretto - Making a Holy Communion for those who are outside the Catholic Church, begging for their conversion.

Giaculatoria - Saint Joseph, convert the most hardened sinners!

Taken from San Giuseppe by Don Giuseppe Tomaselli

On January 26, 1918, at the age of sixteen, I went to the Parish Church. The temple was deserted. I entered the baptistery and there I knelt at the baptismal font.

I prayed and meditated: In this place, sixteen years ago, I was baptized and regenerated to the grace of God. I was then placed under the protection of St. Joseph. On that day, I was written in the book of the living; another day I will be written in that of the dead. -

Many years have passed since that day. Youth and virility are spent in the direct exercise of the Priestly Ministry. I have destined this last period of my life to the press apostolate. I was able to put a fair number of religious booklets into circulation, but I noticed a shortcoming: I did not dedicate any writing to St. Joseph, whose name I bear. It is right to write something in his honor, to thank him for the assistance given to me from birth and to obtain his assistance at the hour of death.

I do not intend to narrate the life of St. Joseph, but to make pious reflections to sanctify the month preceding his feast.