With a Father’s Heart - The Year of St Joseph

We begin our school year with a year-round focus on our patron saint, Saint Joseph. Pope Francis has formally announced that 2021 is the Year of St Joseph, to commemorate his 150th Anniversary of the declaration of Saint Joseph as Patron of the Universal Church.

In our prayers, as we begin the new school year, we pray to St Joseph the Worker. Saint Joseph is held up as a model of such work. Pius XII emphasised this when he said, “The spirit flows to you and to all men from the heart of the God-man, Savior of the world, but certainly, no worker was ever more completely and profoundly penetrated by it than the foster father of Jesus, who lived with Him in closest intimacy and community of family life and work.”

To foster deep devotion to Saint Joseph among Catholics, Pope Pius XII instituted the feast of Saint Joseph the Worker in 1955. This feast extends the long relationship between Joseph and the cause of workers in both Catholic faith and devotion.

We will be unpacking the many different aspects of St Joseph each term that Pope Francis discusses in his Apostolic Letter including; 

• A beloved father

• A tender and loving father

• An obedient father

• An accepting father

• A creatively courageous father

• A working father

• A father in the shadows

Throughout the year, we will pray to St Joseph using Pope Francis’ prayer:

Hail, Guardian of the Redeemer,

Spouse of the Blessed Virgin Mary.

To you God entrusted his only Son;

in you Mary placed her trust;

with you Christ became man.

Blessed Joseph, to us too,

show yourself a father

and guide us in the path of life.

Obtain for us grace, mercy and courage,

and defend us from every evil. Amen.