Author: Pflaum

When Pope Francis declared the Year of Saint Joseph, the world was coming up on one year of the COVID-19 pandemic. Now, nearly a year later, the death toll continues […]

While the Church has always honored Saint Joseph as the spouse of Mary and protector of Jesus, in modern times especially, he has been given special homage as the patron […]

Pope Pius IX declared Saint Joseph the patron of the Universal Church. His successor, Pope Leo XII, dedicated an encyclical letter to Saint Joseph. It is On Devotion to St. […]

In 1870, Pope Pius IX declared Saint Joseph the patron of the Universal Church. It was on the 150th anniversary of that proclamation when Pope Francis declared the Year of […]

“Each of us can discover in Joseph—the man who goes unnoticed, a daily, discreet and hidden presence—an intercessor, a support and a guide in times of trouble. Saint Joseph reminds […]

In his apostolic letter “With a Father’s Heart,” Pope Francis reminds us that Joseph was “creatively courageous.” We don’t often think of courage as being creative. Too often we think […]

Part of the iconography that we use to identify pictures of saints are the symbols that are often portrayed with their images. Those symbols help us understand that the image […]

If you were to ask people what we know about the death of Joseph, odds are that they would say he died in the presence of Jesus and Mary at […]

When Jesus stayed behind in Jerusalem after Passover, we are told his parents found him “in the temple, sitting in the midst of the teachers, listening to them and asking […]

When modern readers read the account of the Finding of Jesus in the Temple in Luke 2:41–52, most tend to think, “How could responsible parents lose their kid like that? […]