Righteous

One night, years ago, a singing duo named the Paramours gave a concert.

At the end, someone in the crowd shouted to them—

That was righteous, brothers!

That shouted praise caught the duo’s imagination.

They decided to adopt that term; to embrace it.

They decided to become—the Righteous Brothers.

Many of us were there, and remember their years at the top of the charts.

The rest of us have probably at least heard some of their biggest hits.

Like Unchained Melody and You’ve Lost That Lovin’ Feelin’.

Their music was referred to as blue-eyed soul.

Music by white artists with an emotional, rhythm-and-blues style.

A style more often associated with black artists.

A style with black-gospel-music roots.

When we follow those roots to the Gospels themselves, to the Bible,

We again find that term, righteous.

In today’s reading, it’s applied to our patron, St. Joseph.

Joseph doesn’t get a lot of coverage in the Bible.

Certainly not as much as say, Peter ... Paul ... and Mary.

But among those four great saints,

Joseph is the one who’s introduced as being righteous.

He’s one of the few people in the whole Bible 
Who is declared to be righteous.

Although, when we look at the meaning of the word,

We see that Mary was even more righteous than Joseph.

And St Peter and St Paul eventually achieved righteousness too.

But we most often associate that word with Joseph.

The word righteous comes in and out of vogue as a popular slang term.

Along the lines of: cool, radical and awesome.

It’s used to mean something like: excellent or extraordinary.

That’s no doubt the meaning that the shouting concert-goer had in mind.

Some more formal meanings are:

In accord with moral or divine law.

Free from guilt or sin.

Morally right, upright, virtuous.

Holy, pure, right with God.

One longer definition is:

Extreme perfection bordering on divinity

That bestows moral authority upon the subject.

Those ideas of near perfection and bordering on divinity

Seem very apt in describing St Joseph.

He was near perfection and bordering on divinity in a number of ways.

Literally, figuratively, physically, spiritually and virtuously.

Joseph spoke to God in prayer.

He listened to God’s word in Scripture.

He listened for God’s word in daily life and prayer.

He developed a spiritual nearness to God—
And that’s a nearness to perfection.

Because God is perfection.

Joseph also reached a state of near-perfection in his own personal virtue.

The Gospel’s declaration that he was a righteous man testifies to that.

We see that he tried to act in accord with moral and divine law.

That he worked to be virtuous, upright, holy, and right with God.

That’s why God chose him for his extraordinary mission in life.

That’s why God sent Gabriel to call him to that mission.

That’s why Joseph was able to hear Gabriel

And recognize the dream as a true calling from God.

Then, by taking Mary into his home, he became the foster father of Jesus.

And at that point Joseph became quite literally and physically 
Near perfection.

Physically near Jesus, who is God, who is perfection.

And finally, Joseph entered into heaven,

Where he’ll be near perfection for eternity.

Spiritually near as well as physically near.

How did Joseph, that poor carpenter, achieve all this?

It was through preparation, commitment and, of course, the gift of grace.

We know from our own experience, 

We can’t approach perfection without effort.

It takes practice and preparation.

This Advent is a special time of preparation.

Our time to draw nearer to that perfection that is God.

To accentuate that divinity that already dwells within us.

Our time to commit to strengthening our virtue.

To build on those gifts of grace that are so generously given to us.

To renew our efforts at becoming more nearly-perfect people.

It’s a time to let righteousness capture our imagination.

A time to adopt and embrace it for ourselves.

To enter a cycle of righteousness.

As we draw closer to God we become more righteous.

And as we become more righteous we draw closer to God.

We’re all called to righteousness.

And it’s actually something within our reach.

It’s not absolute perfection, it’s near perfection.

And we can grow in righteousness the same way Joseph did.

Speaking to God in prayer.

Listening to God’s word in Scripture.

And listening for God’s word in our daily life—and in our nightly dreams.

4th Sunday of Advent

Mt 1:18-24   Read this Scripture @usccb.org