Page 63 - Reflections on St. Joseph

lived with him and who with paternal affection embraced and kissed Him; he even most
abundantly nourished Him whom the faithful would eat as bread come down from Heaven so
that they may have eternal life. Because of this sublime dignity, which God conferred on His
most faithful Servant, the Church has always given high honor and praise to most blessed
Joseph, after the Virgin Mother of God, his spouse, and invoked his intervention in difficult
times.”

The document calls “most sad” the present time: “Now, in these most sad times, the very same
Church, on every side attacked by its enemies, and oppressed by the gravest evils, such that
impious men thought that the gates of hell had finally prevailed against her, by means of the
most Excellent and Venerable Bishops of the entire Catholic world, sent to the Supreme Pontiff
their supplications, and those which the faithful committed to their care, asking that he deign
to constitute St. Joseph as Patron of the Catholic Church.” “With the Sacred Ecumenical Council
of the Vatican renewing again their requests and their desires, our most holy lord, Pope Pius IX,
in consternation for the most recent and lamentable condition of things, and to entrust himself
and all the faithful to the most powerful patronage of the Holy Patriarch Joseph, wanted to
satisfy the desires of the most Excellent Bishops and so solemnly declared him Patron of the
Catholic Church, enjoining that his feast, falling upon March 19....” (cf. Pius IX Quemadmodum
Deus, December 8, 1870).

A Document for the saddest of times

Pope Pius IX entrusted the entire Church to the protection of St. Joseph in a very sad time. The
long period of Pius IX’s pontificate (1846-1878) was particularly torturous, both from the
political and the religious point of view. Pius
IX’s refusal to enter into conflict against
Austria (April 29,1848) was held to be the
cause of the failure of the war, and drew upon
him such unpopularity, that after Carlo
Alberto’s victory at Goito in May of 1848 and
the armistice imposed by Radetsky at Cusozza
in July, he was forced to flee from Rome
(November 24). After his return from Gaeta
(April 12, 1850) with the help of the French,
Pius IX was continually the target of anti-
clerical liberalism. The Siccardi Statutes
(1850) laid down in the Kingdom of Sardegna,
were later extended to other regions in Italy,
leading to the deportation of Bishops,
suppressions of collegiate churches and of
religious orders, sequestration of religious
property and the incarceration of priests. At
the same time, there were religious
persecutions in Spain as well as in Germany, Pope Pius IX
Poland and Russia.

Reflections on st. joseph 39