Today’s Feast of the Immaculate Conception of our Blessed Lady is the closing day of the special Year of St Joseph, announced this time last year by Pope Francis in his letter Patris Corde – With a Father’s Heart.
Lough Derg has posted some devotional material for St Joseph on our website www.loughderg.live and we intended to have a focus on St Joseph, had we been able to be open for our usual pilgrimage season in 2021. But the disruption to our usual patterns of worship from public health measures around Covid-19 meant that even beyond Lough Derg the Year of St Joseph probably did not have the impact we might have expected.
Still, this may not be totally inappropriate. Often, as Pope Francis wrote in his letter, St Joseph is ‘the man who goes unnoticed’ – who does not draw attention to himself, but gives all his energy to the care of Jesus and Mary.
In the prayer which concludes his letter, the Holy Father says to St Joseph:
‘To you God entrusted his only Son; in you Mary placed her trust; with you Christ became man.’
Surely if Mary and Jesus and the Father of All found Joseph so trustworthy, then we too, you and I, may go to him with complete trust in our times of need.
Blessed Joseph, to us too show yourself a father, and guide us in the pilgrimage of life. Amen.
Watch Mary’s Pause and Ponder with Poetry in Advent reflection here