21/06/2026
The Fatherhood of God
Shedding new light on a familiar theme
Though it is not, strictly speaking a religious holiday, Father's Day gives us the opportunity to reflect upon a familiar theme in our tradition. In fact, Jesus never spoke about the fatherhood of God. He addressed God personally as Abba, father; he chose the Aramaic word which implies something deeper, more direct than is implied in our abstraction, "fatherhood." In calling God his father, Jesus signified that we are created individually in God's image. Our relationship with God is as close and as direct as that between any parent and child. Just as I know my own children personally, just as I feel they are bone of my bone and flesh of my flesh, so Jesus gave new meaning to the idea that God is our Father.
In this regard I believe that Jesus was speaking from the depths of his personal experience. He was speaking as the first born son of a carpenter from Nazareth, and from the depth of that relationship. In order to see the true meaning of what Jesus was saying, we need to explore his relationship to Joseph, for it lies at the root and source of all that we believe.
In fact, we know very little about Joseph. The early church took pains to suppress the memory of Christ's biological father. We must read between the lines of the gospel and reconstruct one of history's most important and interesting relationships. Though he is depicted in early Christian art simply as the carpenter, we remember that Scriptures identify Joseph as a descendant of the great kings David and Solomon. With this tradition of royalty in his blood, Joseph may have responded with real hope to Mary's dream that their first born son would one day be the king of kings. And he may have had reason to fear Herod's reaction to the news of the baby born in Bethlehem. In any case, a few days after Jesus was born, Joseph fled with his family hundreds of miles over the mountains and deserts; he sought refuge from Herod's power, just as hundreds and thousands of people are fleeing the terror in places like the Middle East at this very hour.
Because it was not safe to return to their own land, Joseph may have kept his family in Egypt for several years, raising the young boy in what amounted to a refugee camp in a foreign land. According to custom, it was Joseph's role to teach Jesus the mysteries of the scripture, and tell him the legends of Israel's past. And this he accomplished during their long sojourn in Egypt. Most importantly Joseph spoke to his son about the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. As a child, Jesus would have learned about God from his parents and he would have worked out his own understanding of God in the context of their family relationships.
Once they returned to Nazareth, Joseph taught his son the profession of a carpenter. In those days a carpenter was a professional of high standing in the community. He was the chief supplier of fuel for cooking and heating; he supplied parts for farm equipment, hardwood for chests, softwood for baskets. The carpenter was a planter of trees, responsible for maintaining the forests so that people would have all the wood and lumber they needed in future generations. And in that era, the carpenter was a builder and an architect.
Joseph knew how to lay a foundation, design and erect walls and ceilings for a one family house, or a larger public building. The popular paintings of Joseph working with Jesus in the solitude of the carpenter's shop are somewhat misleading, for as we have seen, carpentry involved a great deal more: cutting and trimming of trees in the forests, building measuring or making the calculations as a modern engineer would do, managing the forests.
And Joseph introduced Jesus to this active and demanding profession at an early age. Without doubt the lessons which Jesus learned as his father's right hand influenced the young man's thinking.
With all this in view, it is remarkable that Joseph's name is not even mentioned in the main narratives of the New Testament. In the tradition of Christian piety we hear a great deal abo
