St. Joseph, The Worker

St. Joseph's Workshop

Today we celebrate the feast of St. Joseph, the Worker.  Pope Pius XII instituted the feast day in 1955. Additionally, May 1st was chosen to coincide with Labor Day celebrations throughout the world, thus elevating and sanctifying the observance.

St. Josemaria wrote often that St. Joseph was a role model for working men:

You, who celebrate with me today this feast of St Joseph, are men who work in different human professions; you have your own homes, you belong to so many different countries and have different languages. You have been educated in lecture halls or in factories and offices. You have worked in your profession for years, established professional and personal friendships with your colleagues, helped to solve the problems of your companies and your communities. 

Well then: I remind you once again that all this is not foreign to God’s plan. Your human vocation is a part — and an important part — of your divine vocation. That is the reason why you must strive for holiness, giving a particular character to your human personality, a style to your life; contributing at the same time to the sanctification of others, your fellow men; sanctifying your work and your environment: the profession or job that fills your day, your home and family and the country where you were born and which you love. (Christ is passing by, 46)

The Church teaches that work is not a punishment, but instead can be a means of sanctification. Today, the Catechism of the Catholic Church continues to teach the efficacy of work:

2427 Human work proceeds directly from persons created in the image of God and called to prolong the work of creation by subduing the earth, both with and for one another. Hence work is a duty: "If any one will not work, let him not eat." Work honors the Creator's gifts and the talents received from him. It can also be redemptive. By enduring the hardship of work in union with Jesus, the carpenter of Nazareth and the one crucified on Calvary, man collaborates in a certain fashion with the Son of God in his redemptive work. He shows himself to be a disciple of Christ by carrying the cross, daily, in the work he is called to accomplish. Work can be a means of sanctification and a way of animating earthly realities with the Spirit of Christ.

The Second Vatican Council also explained that work is an integral part of a Christian's life. In their Pastoral Consitution on the Church in the Modern World, Gaudium et spes, they explained:

Christians should rather rejoice that, following the example of Christ Who worked as an artisan, they are free to give proper exercise to all their earthly activities and to their humane, domestic, professional, social and technical enterprises by gathering them into one vital synthesis with religious values, under whose supreme direction all things are harmonized unto God's glory (GS, 43).

During these tough economic times, let us "go to Joseph" (Gen 41:55) in prayer and ask him to intercede for those who work and those in need of work.

Prayer to St. Joseph (from EWTN)

O blessed Joseph, faithful guardian of my Redeemer, Jesus Christ, protector of thy chaste spouse, the virgin Mother of God, I choose thee this day to be my special patron and advocate and I firmly resolve to honor thee all the days of my life. Therefore I humbly beseech thee to receive me as thy client, to instruct me in every doubt, to comfort me in every affliction, to obtain for me and for all the knowledge and love of the Heart of Jesus, and finally to defend and protect me at the hour of my death. Amen

For Further Reading:
Joseph of Nazareth by Federico Suárez (Oct 1, 2004)
Go to Joseph by Richard Gilsdorf (Sep 5, 2009)
In St. Joseph's Workshop, St. Josemaria Escriva, (Mar 19, 1963)