“Saint Joseph a ‘Just Man’ and the Vocation of Parenthood”

By Michael Gambone ’08, Teacher of Religious Studies, Saint Joseph’s Preparatory School

“How does being a parent and having family connect with social justice?” I asked nervously.

Almost a decade ago, I stood up in a common room at The Jesuit Center for Spiritual Growth in Wernersville PA. and asked this question. For three days, I listened to women and men in Jesuit ministries speak about their experience of working towards social justice. I was still new to teaching, having spent a year in the Jesuit Volunteer Corps, continuing for an extra year at a Cristo Rey high school, before moving to a larger Jesuit high school. Many of the participants in the then-Maryland Province’s Magis program for lay formation were teachers, but others were social workers, spiritual directors, health care professionals: women and men with all sorts of vocations, all connected to the Ignatian charism.

On the last day of the retreat, a panel of laypeople spoke about their vocations, what Ignatian spirituality meant to them, and how each saw their work. Marriage was on the horizon in a few short months, and this question puzzled me for some time.

“I mean, how do you still work for justice as a spouse and parent?” I clarified, then sat down.

A married couple from Scranton, one of whom worked at Scranton Prep and the other who worked at Scranton University, answered without hesitation. “I was told,” said one of them, “that the best way to work for social justice was to raise a good family.”

This bit of wisdom hasn’t left me and continues to challenge me. I was reminded of this while reading a Catholic Worker article some years ago, where Dorothy Day connected Catholic social teaching to the home life of Saint Therese of Lisieux: Christian family is about creating a home where it’s easier to be good, just like fostering the common good is really about cultivating a society where it’s easier to be good.

How does this relate to Saint Joseph and the Year of Joseph? One of the few details about Joseph comes from the Gospel of Matthew, where Joseph is described simply as a “just man” (Matt. 1:19). Scripture operates on many levels, and this succinct phrase packs quite a few possibilities. The late Scripture scholar Daniel Harrington, S.J. points out that Joseph being “just” refers to his observance of the Jewish Torah: Joseph lived an ordinary life as a Jewish man, following the guidance of the Jewish law.

But why does this line—Joseph was “a just man”—still stick in my mind to this day, every time I think about this story? Though a cradle Catholic, I did not really become familiar with Joseph until my involvement with my high school youth group. I remember confusingly praying the Litany to Saint Joseph, puzzling over lines about him being a “terror of demons” and hoping for a “happy death.” I remember, in a fonder and quieter way, regularly praying in front of statues of Saint Joseph, while mass-hopping at local parishes, asking him to help me be a good man, especially one day a good husband and a good father. My prayer then, weirdly, has not changed all these years later: I still ask for the grace to be a good husband and father, and now, a good teacher. Does my prayer to be a “good man” find an echo in the Gospel of Matthew’s description of Joseph as a “just man”? I think it does—but there’s more to it, now, after attending a Jesuit school and working in Jesuit-sponsored ministries.

All those years ago in Wernersville, during the same weekend, another biblical scholar, John R. Donahue, S.J., accompanied our small group of laypeople and gave a powerful presentation on “righteousness” (tzedekah) and “justice” (mishpat) in the Jewish Bible. He passionately described “righteousness” (tzedekah) as the capacity to do the right thing and “justice” (mishpat) as actually doing what is right. If we’ve cultivated the capacity to do the right thing, then actually do it, and if everyone is doing it, then a community grows into shalom, a peace built on justice.

Calling Joseph a “just man”, then, is so much more than his observance of Jewish dietary laws and Sabbath practices. Joseph was a man of “righteousness” (tzedekah) and “justice” (mishpat), being attuned to the right thing and actually doing it. Perhaps it’s a stretch, but maybe we could say that Jesus grew up in a household where shalom was really present, learning from his family the capacity to do the right thing, then actually doing it: from the Torah’s command to “love your neighbor” (Lev. 19:18) to praying the Shema (“You shall love the Lord with all your heart...” in Deut. 6) to looking after the anawim, the poorest and most marginalized people in Galilean and Judean society (e.g., Lev. 19:34).

“Raising a good family is the best way to cultivate social justice,” I was told all those years ago. If we believe something of what the gospel accounts tell us, then isn’t this what Joseph, “a just man,” tried to do, in a way? Wouldn’t Jesus have learned this, in his humanity, from his family, especially Joseph?

One of my favorite and simultaneously exasperating moments of the day is helping my four-year-old daughter Cecilia to fall asleep. After my wife Victoria, another Saint Joseph’s University grad, finishes Cecilia’s bath while I change our one-year-old daughter Margaret into her pajamas, we switch, and Victoria begins Margaret’s bedtime routine and I handle Ceci’s getting ready for bed. Sometimes there’s time to color, or play a quick game as a “winding down” activity. However, most nights, especially these past few months, can become a tired tug-of-war at the end of an exhausting day.

One of those exhausting days was January 6th 2021. After watching the news for hours, I was probably more irritable than normal, and processing the many things I was thinking and feeling, while trying to convince Ceci it was bedtime. At some point, because she wouldn’t stay in her bed, I snapped and yelled, “That’s it! It’s time for bed!” She started crying, I regretted shouting, and motioned for her to sit in the chair with me. I apologized for yelling and she wiped her snot on my shirt.

“Do you know why daddy’s so upset?” I asked.

“No,” she sniffled.

“Well, daddy’s mad about the people on the news who broke into that building, the Capitol building”

She looked up, and said something I didn’t expect: “Oh, dad: you mean the bullies on the TV?”

I stopped. Bullies? I thought. I hadn’t used that word at all. Still, I nodded. “Yes, Ceci, all those bullies.”

We talked a little more about it. “Ceci,” I said, “do you think Jesus wants those bullies to break into buildings like that?”

Ceci laughed. “What? No, dad, Jesus wouldn’t want that.”

I decided to risk one more step in this surprising evening conversation. “Well, Ceci, what would you say if I told you that some of those people, the bullies, thought Jesus wanted them to break into that building."

Without pause, my daughter said, “Dad, that’s stupid. Jesus doesn’t want them doing that.”

A few minutes later, she was asleep, and I sat in the chair in her room praying my Examen, looking back at a tragic day, trying to be grateful, and finding overwhelming gratitude in an unexpected parenting moment in the dark. It makes me think and hope that, yes, perhaps it’s possible to cultivate a home where it’s easy to be good, where there is a commitment to social justice, where maybe children can learn the right thing and actually do it.

I believe this is one reason Pope Francis announced the Year of Saint Joseph. There are many ways to connect with Joseph, some traditional and some contemporary. However, it seems that Joseph, a “just man,” is an example of where Pope Francis sees Christ leading the Church: more deeply committed to the poor through issues of justice. The immensity of challenges facing our world, our nation, our state and local communities, not to mention our Church, could make this trajectory seem, some days, daunting at the very least. But, it should start somewhere, and one small place to start is the home, in a family, as it did for Joseph, a “just man.”