By Barbara Aniello

ROME -  With one hand he lifts, with the other he holds steady; with a kiss he adores, and with a staff he leads. This is Joseph: active contemplation, contemplative action.

His incredibly young face, as portrayed by Maíno, restores for us all the vigor of a Joseph who is a tender, caring father, in love with his Son. Bowing humbly, Joseph hides his face from us; it remains in the shadows compared with his Son’s brightly lit face, in which Mary is reflected. Thus, the earthly father does not overshadow the Celestial father.

Between his fingers, darkened by work and the sun, Joseph holds the flesh of God made man, probing almost its soft thickness, feeling turgid floridity. Thus the father becomes a servant to his Son.

To adore means to enter into intimacy with the divine, to be in communion with him, to know God. In this way, by loving, we discover that we are ineffably loved first.

Joseph’s kiss is a Eucharist ante litteram, a sacrament he will never know. A father in the shadows, and his Son in the light.

Dr. Barbara Aniello is an art historian, musicologist and cellist. She is currently an associate lecturer at the Pontifical Gregorian University in the Faculty of History and Cultural Heritage of the Church.

Listening: A Corelli -  Concerto grosso op. 6 Nr 8 VI Pastorale

Image: Juan Bautista Maíno, The Adoration of the Shepherds, 1612, Prado Museum, Madrid. Oil on canvas.