A number of years ago, I walked into the main entrance of St. Joseph’s Hospital and overheard a man asking someone in a rather loud voice, “Who the heck is St. Joseph anyway?” One of the four nuns who worked at the hospital happened to be sitting behind the Information Desk at the time, and she quickly hopped up from her chair before fixing the questioner with a look that could have come from a film stereotype of a nun teaching middle schoolers. Her response came in a soft voice that carried throughout the room, “He is the step-father of our Lord and Savior, thank you very much!” The man who initially asked the question looked incredibly abashed. Whenever I read the words of this morning’s Scripture, I remember that interaction.
In the midst of this incredibly familiar passage, there is a sentence that we can often overlook. “And her husband Joseph, being a just man and unwilling to put her to shame, resolved to divorce her quietly.” As a just man (or as a man who “was faithful to the law” as the NIV translation puts it), Joseph would have been expected to publicly divorce Mary on the grounds of adultery, which would have resulted in her being eligible to receive punishment, including the possibility of death by stoning under the strict letter of the Law of Moses. Yet even before he knew about the miraculous nature of Mary’s pregnancy, Joseph wanted to prevent such a punishment from happening.
Many of us experience an incredible tension between following the rules and doing what we know is right. Joseph sought to do what was right by Mary rather than adhering to the letter of the law. By seeking to divorce her quietly, he would have been saving her life; he would have been protecting her even as he distanced himself from her. We can read those words without understanding their context and miss the caring nature inherent in this man who only appears in these early chapters of Matthew’s and Luke’s Gospels. Even before he knew that this child would be the Messiah, he sought to protect Mary.