St. Leonard Murialdo’s devotion to St. Joseph
On the eve of the feast of St. Joseph, a reflection by Fr. Accornero on the devotion of St. Murialdo
“Why did we choose St. Joseph?” asks St. Leonard Murialdo, founder on March 19, 1873, of the Giuseppini in the Collegio Artigianelli in Turin.
He responds, “While it is true that every saint is most valid protector, nevertheless the more ready and the more abundant is the copy of goods that are obtained from one who most approaches the throne of God. St. Joseph is one of the most exalted, glorified and beloved saints of God.”
In Josephine homes, the majority are laborers and artisans, and St. Joseph “is the holiest artisan after the artisan Jesus Christ” and is patron of artisans because “he chose to be an artisan in preference to any other social condition.”
Teachers, students and artisans,” Murialdo further explains, ‘must in a special way attend to the interior life’ that is, presence of God; purity of intention; union of affections with Jesus; love of God; ”one eye on the heart and the other on God. It is necessary to have a model to imitate and a protector who will obtain the gifts of the Holy Spirit; that is why “it is necessary to honor and be devoted to St. Joseph, a model of the interior, hidden life, of union with God.”
Youth need “to know their vocation, not only to what profession God calls a young person” without excluding “the great venture, the sublime dignity of the priesthood, the adventurousness of being chosen by God and called into some religious order or congregation.” Now the protector and teacher of vocation is St. Joseph, “who had the mission of directing the first steps of Jesus.
St. Joseph had the privilege of “expiring in the hands of Jesus and Mary and therefore became the protector of the good death.” Since “many collegians, after some time, abandon God, it is necessary to recommend them to the saint who can bring them back before death.”
Murialdo knows that “we are poor and live at Providence. Well Joseph is the Providence of Jesus and Mary. He is for all the poor: those who have recourse to him will meet their commitments because St. Joseph experienced the hardships and humiliations of poverty.”
Leonard Murialdo had a special devotion, like so many other figures and founders, to St. Joseph.
The 151-year-old First Vatican Council is abruptly interrupted by the outbreak of the Franco-Prussian War and the seizure of Rome (Sept. 20, 1870) by the Italian army with the end of the Papal States and temporal power. Pius IX in his decree “Quemadmodum Deus” (Dec. 8, 1870) and apostolic letter “Inclytum Patriarcham” (July 7, 1874) entrusted the Church to the protection of St. Joseph and proclaimed him “Patron of the Universal Church.” Truly tribulated times.
The “Quemadmodum Deus” decree has a curious history. Since the Italian government arrogates to itself the right to subject pontifical acts to scrutiny, Pius IX-who is not naïve-resorts to a decree of the Congregation of Rites, instead of a papal bull, and that therefore tells in the third person of the Pope: “In these most sad times the Church, on all sides attacked by enemies, is so oppressed that ungodly men thought that the gates of hell had prevailed against her, therefore the bishops of the Catholic orb forwarded to the Supreme Pontiff their and the faithful’s supplications requesting that St. Joseph be constituted patron of the Catholic Church.
Having in the Council renewed his questions and vows, Pius IX, dismayed at the mournful state of affairs, entrusted himself and the faithful to the most powerful patronage of the holy patriarch Joseph. In the same way that God had constituted that Joseph, procreated by the patriarch Jacob, superintendent of all the land of Egypt, to keep the wheat for the people, so, being about to send his only-begotten Son savior of the world to the earth, he chose another Joseph, of whom that one was a figure, and made him lord and prince of his house and possession and elected him custodian of his chief treasures.”
In essence, Pius IX asks St. Joseph to deliver the Church “from a plague of errors and vices, from the power of darkness, from hostile snares and adversities: ‘Defend us, protect us, assist us, save us.’”
Paul Il in his apostolic exhortation “Reclemptoris custos” (Aug. 15, 1989) explains that Pius IX “knew that he was not making a peregrine gesture, because by reason of the lofty dignity granted by God to this most faithful servant of his, ‘the Church, after the Blessed Virgin, always had in great honor and lavished with praise St. Joseph, and of preference resorted to him in distress.’” The Wojtylian encyclical celebrates the centenary of Leo XIII’s encyclical “Quamquam pluries” (Aug. 15, 1889): to St. Joseph, God “entrusted the custody of his most precious treasures.” It is accompanied by an “Oratio ad Sanctum Iosephum”: “Banish from us, O beloved father, the plague of errors and vices, assist us propitiously from heaven in this struggle with the power of darkness; and as you once saved from death the threatened life of the child Jesus, so now defend Holy Church from hostile snares and every adversity.” Again Leo XII in his apostolic letter “Neminem fugit” (June 14, 1892” extols the family of Nazareth as an exemplar for every family.
The pronouncements of the magisterium only confirm the spiritual and apostolic choices of Murialdo, who made devotion to St. Joseph a constant in his life of piety and in his Congregation. For him, St. Joseph “is a model of obedience, industriousness and humility; he is a point of reference and guide for educators because he educated the holiest of artisans.
Among the men’s religious institutes named after St. Joseph, three were founded by Italian saints, the Turinese Leonard Murialdo and Joseph Marello, and the Brescian John Baptist Piamarta. Murialdo founded the Giuseppini on March 19, 1873. St. Joseph Marello, a Turin-born, Asti-born priest and bishop of Acqui, founded the Oblates of St. Joseph or Giuseppini of Asti in 1878. Then there are Josephites of Belgium. Two Josephine women’s congregations and then 38 women’s congregations named after St. Joseph (including those in Aosta, Pinerolo, and Rivalba).