The Chaste Heart and Spiritual Leadership
How St. Joseph Impacted Christ's Ministry (Part 2)
This is part 2 of a series of articles devoted to examining the impact of St. Joseph on the ministry of Jesus. If you would like to read part 1 (which I highly recommend!), then click here!
Today, we are going to look at Christ’s stern words for the Pharisees. Ultimately, this reflects the strong leadership of Christ’s Sacred Heart; however, it reveals an important aspect of St. Joseph’s Chaste Heart, too.
It will be clear from the Scriptures that we examine today that St. Joseph was a stout defender of the true worship of God and orthodoxy!
“Thou shalt have no other gods before Me”. . .
Christ’s interaction with the Pharisees in the seventh chapter of the Gospel of Mark is scathing to say the least. Right away, the Pharisees challenge Jesus and His Apostles for not practicing the tradition of cleaning one’s hands before having a meal (Mark 7:1-5).
Just as the Pharisees were direct with Him, Jesus gets straight to the point. Christ begins to challenge the evil practices of the Pharisees, ultimately denouncing their man-made-traditions as “‘nullify[ing] the word of God in favor of your tradition that you have handed on’” (Mark 7:13). For a religious group that claims that it perfectly upholds the commands of the Old Testament, this is a MAJOR denunciation by Jesus! This is the equivalent of telling a lawyer with 30 years of law practice that his methods are completely wicked and destroy the purpose of the law.
What was it specifically that Christ was saying that the traditions of the Pharisees nullified? Amongst other issues, Christ explicitly names that the Pharisees fail to uphold the Fourth Commandment- “Thou shalt honor thy father and thy mother” (Exodus 20:12).
To give more detail, the Pharisees had a tradition that was essentially a loophole to retain one’s money instead of using it to care for one’s parents. The Pharisees taught that one could declare his money “dedicated to the service of God”. When he does that, he is supposedly loosed from the command to care for his parents in their old age.
Rightfully, Christ calls out the absurdity of that statement because it places a command of the Pharisees above a command given directly from God. It is no wonder that when Christ enters Jerusalem on Palm Sunday, He immediately cleans out the Temple of its corrupt activities and denounces the hypocritical practices of the Scribes and Pharisees. The Sacred Heart is the tabernacle, defender, and source of True Religion. In His human nature, Christ received formation in those roles from, of course, the Chaste Heart of St. Joseph- the provider, guardian, and first believer in the next chapter of that True Religion: the Incarnation.
True Worship shines brightly in the darkness of paganism
Consider the Flight into Egypt by the Holy Family. Although the land was no longer as hostile to the Jews at it was at the time of the Exodus, it was still a pagan nation. If there were other people who worshipped the True God amongst its members, we can reasonably assume that they were the religious minority at that time. This was a land that was absolutely dominated with idolatry!
This meant that St. Joseph had to take his role as the spiritual father, the domestic priest, more seriously than if they were still living in Israel. That’s not to say that St. Joseph was a slacker in this regard- by no means! It can’t be stated enough that God wouldn’t place His Only Begotten Son and the Immaculately Conceived Virgin Mary into the hands of an oaf! What it does mean is that- there were probably some spiritual lessons given to Jesus or a particular shielding of Jesus and denunciation of paganism and idolatry during the Holy Family’s time in Egypt. We can assume that that probably wouldn’t have been as common had the Holy Family been able to stay in Israel.
With those lessons that St. Joseph either directly taught to Jesus or Christ learned them by watching the example of His earthly father, Jesus surely carried those spiritual lessons with Him when He had to defend the True Worship of God when confronted by false practices.
Maybe that came from watching St. Joseph strongly reject offers to join in pagan worship as the Holy Family traveled the streets of Egypt. Perhaps St. Joseph used examples from their sojourn that he himself observed to better explain the importance of various Scripture passages and rituals of Judaism. Surely the Blessed Mother allowed St. Joseph to shape their Son like other fathers do! We already know that Christ willingly submitted to St. Joseph, too! “He went down with them and came to Nazareth, and was obedient to them” (Luke 2:51).
Perhaps the most shining example of St. Joseph teaching Christ about the True Worship of God came at The Finding in the Temple in the second chapter of Luke.
Christ’s zeal for God in His youth
When St. Joseph and Mary found Jesus after three days, He was in the Temple with the teachers. Now we can’t say with certainty, but it’s reasonable to assume that some of the men sitting with the child Jesus were partaking in the practices that Jesus would later denounce in His public ministry. Amidst all of this, Christ was asking questions that reflect a deeper understanding of the True Worship of God, “all who heard him were astounded at his understanding and his answers” (Luke 2:47).
Already, Jesus was showing a deep understanding of worship and theology. Now, this can mainly be attributed to the fact that He is the Son of God. This is where the mystery of the Hypostatic Union (the two natures of Jesus as fully-God and fully-man) invites us to contemplate the deeper mystery of the impact of St. Joseph on Jesus.
Already at the age of twelve, Jesus was well-versed in the Scriptures, and we can attribute that to St. Joseph’s piety and example. We won’t ever know the exact “percentage of impact” that St. Joseph had on Jesus’ discourse at the Temple, but we can have confidence that Christ was influenced by the saintly man, Joseph.
Surely Jesus’ knowledge only grew over time, and that was possible because St. Joseph led the Holy Family in their prayers and brought them to the Temple to worship God.
St. Joseph’s example made Christ decisive and clear in His Ministry
When we later see Jesus teach clearly and authoritatively, there’s a human element that bears the mark of St. Joseph’s Chaste Heart. Christ was quick to denounce the evil of sin, like not honoring one’s father and mother, but He also was quick to instruct His followers on how to properly live for God, the Sermon on the Mount and the Parables.
That intensity to renounce sins against one’s parents is sure to come from the Sacred Heart’s love for St. Joseph. The desire to teach simply and clearly would also pour out of the Sacred Heart in the same way that the Chaste Heart desired nothing more than to lead his family in the proper worship of the Almighty God.
Perhaps that clarity about what’s right and wrong when it comes to worshipping God was the impact that St. Joseph had on Jesus in the daily reality of living in the foreign, pagan country of Egypt. Not every lesson needs to be clever or take a lot of pondering. Sometimes, it’s best to instruct in a way that listeners can grasp quickly.
Jesus’ spiritual leadership is yet another way that St. Joseph’s influence shines through in the ministry of Christ. Clearly, the Chaste Heart was aflame for the True Worship of God, and Jesus wanted to share that love with the lost sheep of Israel.