Mary gave her heart only to God and Joseph

February 22, 2022 • 2 min

From The Life and Glories of St. Joseph, in file "The Life and Glories of St. Joseph", page 129
By Edward Healy Thompson, M.A.

Such was the glory accruing to Joseph from Mary’s choice of him, but its splendour would have been incomparably increased if the priceless riches which from that moment he received as the dowry which she brought him could have been manifested.

Mary, as the daughter of the Eternal Father, had been endowed with incalculable treasures of grace; and St. Bernardino of Siena is of opinion that these, so far as he was capable of being their recipient, were communicated to Joseph when the Blessed Virgin, accepting him as her spouse, gave him her heart.

For we must observe, with this holy preacher, that the glorious Virgin did not offer her heart to Joseph simply that he might know its movements and thoughts better than any one else, though this was much—in fact, she told St. Bridget that she was known only to God and to Joseph; what an inconceivable honour !—but she also gave him her heart as his possession.

And who can form any conception of what that heart contained? Solomon declared that it enclosed more interior riches than did all the just souls of ancient times: “Many daughters have gathered together riches; thou hast surpassed them all”. [Prov. xxxi. 29.] “All the treasures of God and of the Saints were in Mary,” says the Seraphic Doctor.

Now this precious dowry was conceded to Joseph to be to him a glorious ornament, or, more strictly speaking, in order to establish a suitable uniformity in the alliance about to be contracted; that he might sustain with greater splendour the august dignity of Spouse of Mary.