4th Sunday of Advent 2025
Isaiah 7:10-14; Romans 1:1-7; Matthew 1:18-24
I am in “Do you remember?” mode again today. Do you remember Flanders and Swann, a somewhat aristocratic duo who regaled us with comic songs through the 1950s and 60s, and into the 70s?
Always formally dressed in dinner suits, they would sit, the bespectacled Donald Swann at the piano, the large and heavily bearded Michael Flanders in a wheelchair as a result of adult polio, interspersing their songs with light comic patter. Their most famous ditty is probably the “Hippopotamus Song”, with its refrain “Mud, mud, glorious mud: nothing quite like it for cooling the blood”.
About ten years ago, I was given a double CD of their programmes, the collections bearing the titles “At the Drop of a Hat” and “At the Drop of Another Hat”. I received them with glee, anticipating a feast of entertainment; but having listened to them, I found myself thinking “Oh! Is that it?” Their humour hadn’t aged well, but I was mostly irritated by the concert hall audience who would laugh uproariously at every remark, however banal.
I mention them because one of their songs concerned “The Unsung Heroes of the World”. This had stuck in my mind when I first heard it around 1970, because one of these heroes was “The Football Referee” in whose number I counted myself, then at the lowest level. To me, however, the greatest unsung hero of all time is St. Joseph, who features prominently in today’s Gospel.
Do you know how many of St. Joseph’s words are quoted in the Gospels? Not a single one, yet he played such an important role in the Incarnation, the coming in flesh of the Son of God, as the protector and spouse of the Blessed Virgin, and the foster father of God-the-Son-become-man.
Joseph is the archetype of the strong, silent man, seen but not heard, yet exercising considerable influence by his mere presence. He is harried from pillar to post by angels, who are constantly invading his dreams with their commands: “Do this. Do that. Take Mary as your wife. Go here. Go there. Take the Child and His mother.” I can almost imagine that he would be afraid to go to sleep, frightened of what he might be told to do next. In his dreaming, he is the New Testament fulfilment of another Joseph, his ancestor the patriarch, the son of Jacob, “the man of dreams”, who by his obedience rescued his tribe from famine, and drew them into Egypt, thus furthering God’s plan for His people.
This latter-day Joseph, another man of dreams, plays a not insignificant role in the rescue of the whole human race, as he fosters, protects, and brings up the Saviour of the world. He is enabled to do this by his faith, which justifies him, as it justified another ancestor, the patriarch Abraham.
The new translation, not for the only time, corrects a mistranslation from the Jerusalem Bible. In recounting Joseph’s initial resolution to renounce his claim to Mary, but to do it quietly, the Jerusalem Bible describes him as “a man of honour”. This completely misses the point. The Greek original has dikaios, which means “just”. What makes someone just? “Faith” says St. Paul. Thus, this singe word dikaios carries a weight of meaning: Joseph is just, because he has faith, and the phrase “of honour” fails to convey the significance of the word.
Joseph demonstrates his faith by his acceptance of the angel’s message, and his subsequent obedience to every demand which the heavenly visitors make. Imagine his feelings at this time: his hopes of a happy marriage appear to have been dashed; his fiancée is seemingly not the good and responsible girl of his imagination. Delight and relief, no doubt, upon learning that his faith in her was, after all both justified and justifying, but a need to come to terms with the reality that this is not to be a normal, consummated marriage, and that he must undertake the responsibility of bringing up a child who owns fatherhood in God alone.
Perhaps the most poignant moment for Joseph was the finding of the twelve year old Jesus in the Temple. Flooded with relief and joy at the successful outcome of the three day search, and standing helplessly by during the exchange between the lad and his mother, Joseph receives a harsh reminder of his status when the former speaks of being busy with “the things of my Father” by which he effectively states “Sorry, Dad, you are not my Father and can never have first place among my responsibilities”.
On the other hand, we are told that Jesus was obedient to both Mary and Joseph, and the bond between the growing youth and his foster father was underlined when Jesus was spoken of as “the carpenter’s son”. Indeed, in all of this, Joseph showed himself to be the greatest unsung hero of them all. During your Christmas celebrations, when the feast arrives, don’t forget to reserve a special “thank you” for him.
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