Saint Joseph the Worker

Pope Pius XII set up this memorial in 1955, placing it on 1 May, the day kept in many countries as Labor Day, to present Joseph as the model and patron of working people. The Gospels say that people in Nazareth called Jesus “the carpenter’s son”; the Greek word, tekton, means a craftsman who worked in wood or stone. Joseph lived by the work of his hands, and since Jesus himself is called “the carpenter” in the Gospel of Mark, it is commonly supposed that he learned the trade from Joseph.

The Gospels tell nothing more of Joseph’s daily life, and he is last mentioned when Jesus is twelve; tradition holds that he died before Jesus began to preach.