It’s St. Joseph’s Day, which is a bigger deal for me than most folks, because:
- I’m named after relatives who were named after him, so that makes today my name day (in some countries, like Poland, name days are a bigger deal than your birthday).
- I was very sick, and almost died, as a baby – it was pretty miraculous that I survived, because the first doctors my parents took me to thought I was okay (when I was quite not okay). My life was saved with about 48 hours to spare, and I was in the hospital for a few days. I recovered, and was able to come home, on St. Joseph’s Day, which my parents always found significant. St. Joseph is good with the kids God gives him.
Liturgically, today is actually a bigger deal than St. Patrick’s Day, because while St. Patrick is very important to Ireland, St. Joseph is very important to the global Church. He’s the guy who guarded Mary and Jesus when Jesus’ life was threatened by Caesar, and he helped raise God the Son as his own Son. The Church honors him as patron saint of the entire Church. He’s been looking after the Church since it was just the Holy Family, and he continues to do so to this day.
If you’re interested, here are some traditional Sicilian foods for St. Joseph’s Day — basically, if you can, try and do an Italian meal tonight.
Hey Joe,
Happy name day! Here in Greece it is bigger then your birthday!
I mentioned you and your problems with Defending Contending on my podcast;
http://theologytoday.podbean.com/2010/03/19/battles-and-blessings/
Happy Name Day!
Phil
Phil,
Thanks for the mention: very kind of you! I’ll admit, I haven’t gotten much past the part that referenced me (I made it to the first commercial break), but when I get a chance, I intend to listen to the rest.
My girlfriend was sick this weekend, and so I went to her house to cook her dinner, and was listening to your podcast in her kitchen. She came in partway through, and assumed it was a typical apologetics podcast… then you mentioned me by name, and she startled. It was pretty funny: like if you were listening to the radio, and the announcer suddenly said something like, “Well, Phil Naessens, we hope you enjoyed that song. Coming up next…” Very Truman Show-esque.
On a more substantial note, I’d absolutely love to discuss Catholicism with you. From what perspective do you approach the issue? You mentioned a connection with the Greek Orthodox Church: are you Orthodox, or what is your own faith? That information tends to be helpful, I find.
I’m not sure how realistic an in-person meeting is since you’re in (I believe) Greece, but I suspect we can have a pretty charitable discussion between blogs if you’re interested – and you can decide on the format and topic. I can’t promse I’ll be very quick in responding – sometimes I am, sometimes it takes me forever, but I’ll do my best. Pax Christi!
Happy St. Joe’s day! Here’s to another year of exponential growth of this blog…