Saint Joseph’s Day is just a few days away, March 19th, and I thought it’d be good for the soul to take a moment to consider the various traditions associated with this beloved Italian feast day. From altars to pasta to zeppole, Saint Joseph’s is really a celebration of the family, as Joseph, of course, was the earthly father to Jesus and Mary’s husband, making him the head of the Holy Family. The feast day is of Sicilian origin, and to this day, the Sicilian enclave of New Orleans continues to be a major celebrator of Saint Joseph’s Day, with elaborate parades and altars dominating the whole weekend long.
In my hometown in New York, a lovely family originally from Bari goes through the trouble of erecting a beautiful Saint Joseph’s altar every year. They open their home to anyone who wants to enter. The priest from the local parish comes to bless the bread and say a prayer for all those in attendance, including, and most especially, the children. I go every year with my mother, and it fills me with such joy. I’ll never live in the hamlets my parents grew up in. Never experience a feast day as they did, with all its vibrancy and community warmth, but I do have this, and it’s the next, truest, best thing.
The altar itself is said to have originated as a table, set in honor of Saint Joseph who, in the Middle Ages, answered prayers amidst famine and sent the fava bean crop, which saved the people from starvation. Perhaps that’s why there are several food items associated with this day—pasta con sarde, spaghetti with sardines, topped with bread crumbs, a symbol of Joseph’s carpentry work (“sawdust”), elaborate braided bread rings shaped as tools or simply rounds, and zeppole, the cherry-topped dessert that’s filled with sweet cream. The whole arrangements is meant to be a bounty upon the table.
It’s a day that asks us to rejoice and celebrate; spring, after all, is just around the corner, along with the resurrection. We take the time to enjoy one another’s company at the table or before the homemade altars, and we honor the family, fathers in particular (in Italy, Saint Joseph’s Day is also observed as Father’s Day.)
When we keep these traditions, taking the time to cook a dish, bake a treat, build or visit an altar, we’re keeping a connection to the world that came before us. We’re holding on to the Old World while living in the new, honoring our ancestors and living the celebrations that they, too, once upon a time, relied on to feed their spirits.
Thanks for being here with me, truly.
Buona Festa di San Giuseppe!
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Hope all is well with you & your little ones!!