Holy Cross Monastery, West Park, NY
Who looks outside, dreams; who looks inside, awakes. -Carl Jung
1875-1961
Joseph must have known, in his dream of dreams, that Mary carried the Word in her womb.
That Joseph trusted his dream, that Joseph accepted the non-rational unknown,
ennobles him in humility, courage, and integrity. That Joseph changes direction
overnight in a dark conversion, makes him both a mystical icon, and an icon of
hope.
Because Joseph is awakened by his dream, those of us looking on can take heart.
I can change direction. I can take risks. I can learn to see in new ways.
How did Joseph know to turn aside from supposed “righteousness” as he knew it,
that is, to put Mary away quietly, the less violent alternative according to
law, and instead, follow a dark, non-rational,
alternative kind of righteousness? Something in his life – a practice of
hope, perhaps - must have prepared him to pay attention to that
particular dream that night: do not
fear to take Mary as your wife, for the child conceived in her is from the Holy
Spirit.
Such a statement can make perfect sense in the context of a dream. Do not
fear to take Mary as your wife, because the child conceived in her is from the
Holy Spirit. AND you will take her to Mediterranean Disneyland in Alexandria
and take a ride on a flying elephant called Dumbo.
Then that baby of hers will walk on water and you'll have to go fetch him, but
you too, will walk on the water and then you'll help the king of Egypt shell
chickpeas.
How do you find the prescient dream within the silly dream? Joseph, like his
ancestor Joseph, the beloved son of Jacob, must have trusted his dreams. Okay,
maybe Dumbo and the king with chickpeas was too silly.
Dreams make sense while you're in them. But not upon waking. What is more
likely, really, that Mary experienced sexual relations (most likely unwelcome)
OR that she is pregnant by the Holy Spirit? I mean, really.
But the Messenger in the dream sweetens the message with a scripture passage pregnant
with hope, already deeply familiar to the dreamer: “Look, a young woman
shall conceive and bear a son, and they shall name him Emmanuel," which
means, "God is with us." Isaiah
7:14
But even more than his dreams, in order to embrace Mary's
unusual pregnancy Joseph must have trusted not only the voice of God in the
prophets, but the “through-line” tales
of reversals of power throughout story narratives from Abraham onward. First,
he chose not to blame the victim – Mary, which put himself at risk of being
forever an outsider. Second, he chose wild, illogical HOPE. Hope flies to hope.
Hope implies action.
Rebecca Solnit, the multifaceted activist and writer says,
“Hope is not a lottery ticket you can sit on the sofa and clutch, feeling lucky. It is an axe you break down doors with in an emergency. Hope should shove you out the door, because it will take everything you have to steer the future away from endless war, from the annihilation of the earth's treasures and the grinding down of the poor and marginal... To hope is to give yourself to the future - and that commitment to the future is what makes the present inhabitable.”
Rebecca Solnit, Hope in the Dark
Joseph is the embodiment of hope. He means to pass this hope on to his son. Imagine him cradling the little one, and singing, [first, burp the baby, then play with the baby]
Happy are those whose help is the God of Jacob, whose
hope is in the Lord their God,
who made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that is in them; who keeps faith
forever;
who executes justice for the oppressed; who gives food to the hungry.
The Lord sets the prisoners
free;
the LORD opens the eyes of the
blind.
The Lord lifts up those who
are bowed down;
the Lord loves the righteous.
The LORD watches over the
strangers;
he upholds the orphan and the
widow,
but the way of the wicked he
brings to ruin. Psalm
146:5-9
If Joseph could believe and hope in the Lord God's promise to execute justice
for the oppressed, give food to the hungry, set prisoners free, open the eyes
of the blind, lift up those who are bowed down, love the righteous, watch over
strangers, uphold the orphan and widow, then he probably had the potential to believe his espoused girl could be
pregnant by the Holy Spirit rather than by a bullying Roman soldier.
See Joseph's nobility in today's passage from Luke. Children are the cruelest of critics. But here is Joseph, the opposite of toxic masculinity, with the opposite of arrogance, Joseph swallows the insult, I must be in my Father's house. For his own son's sake. For his son's own emerging sense of identity. To protect Jesus' own belief in that “through-line” of reversals of hubris and hate.
Rebecca Solnit again,
“I believe in hope as an act of defiance, or rather as the foundation for an ongoing series of acts of defiance, those acts necessary to bring about some of what we hope for while we live by principle in the meantime. There is no alternative, except surrender. And surrender not only abandons the future, it abandons the soul.”A poor man laboring as an artisan, no doubt working for the Roman oppressors in nearby Sepphoris, Joseph drew hope from the texts of his tradition, and saw in them the opportunity to act within the crack of business-as-usual, this promise, this dream of all dreams.
― Rebecca Solnit, Hope in the Dark
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