Joseph was born of pious parents at Cupertino, a
town of the Salentines in the diocese of Nardo, in 1603. He spent his
boyhood and youth in the greatest simplicity and innocence. The
Virgin Mother of God delivered him from a long and painful malady
which he had borne with the greatest patience, upon which he devoted
himself entirely to works of piety and the practice of virtue. But
God called him to something higher, and in order to attain to closer
union with Him, Joseph determined to enter the Seraphic Order. After
several trials he obtained his desire and was admitted among the
Minor Conventuals in the convent called Grotella, first as a
lay-brother, on account of his lack of learning, but afterwards, God
so disposing, he was raised to the rank of a cleric. After making his
solemn vows he was ordained a priest and began a new life of greater
perfection. Utterly renouncing all earthly affections and everything
of this world almost to the very necessaries of life, he afflicted
his body with hair-shirts, chains, disciplines and every kind of
austerity and penance: while he assiduously nourished his spirit with
the sweetness of holy prayer, and the highest contemplation. By this
means, the love of God, which had been poured out in his heart from
his childhood, daily in creased in a most wonderful manner.
His burning charity shone forth most remarkably in
the sweet ecstasies which raised his soul to God, and the wonderful
raptures he frequently experienced. Yet, marvellous to tell, however
rapt he was in God, obedience would immediately recall him to the use
of his senses. He was exceedingly zealous in the practice of
obedience and used to say that he was led by it like a blind man, and
that he would rather die than disobey. He emulated the poverty of the
seraphic patriarch to such a degree that on his deathbed he could
truthfully tell his superior he had nothing which, according to
custom, he could relinquish. Thus dead to the world and to himself
Joseph showed forth in his flesh the life of Jesus. While in others
he perceived the vice of impurity by an evil odour, his own body
exhaled a most sweet fragrance, a sign of the spotless purity which
be preserved unsullied in spite of long and violent temptations from
the devil. This victory he gained by strict custody of his senses, by
continual mortification of the body, and especially by the protection
of the most pure Virgin Mary, whom he called his Mother, and whom he
venerated with tenderest affection as the sweetest of mothers,
desiring to see her venerated by others, that they might, said he,
together with her patronage gain all good things.
Blessed Joseph’s solicitude in this respect
sprang from his love for his neighbour, for he was consumed with zeal
for souls, urging him to seek the salvation of all. His love embraced
the poor, the sick and all in affliction whom he comforted as far as
lay in his power, not excluding those who pursued him with reproaches
and insults, and every kind of injury. He bore all this with the same
patience, sweetness and cheerfulness of countenance as were remarked
in him when he was obliged frequently to change his residence by the
command of the superiors of his Order, or of the holy Inquisition.
People and princes admired his wonderful holiness and heavenly gifts.
Yet, such was his humility that, thinking himself a great sinner, he
earnestly begged God to remove from him his admirable gifts: while he
begged men to cast his body after death in a place where his memory
might utterly perish. But God, who exalts the humble and had richly
adorned His servant during life with heavenly wisdom, prophecy, the
reading of hearts, the grace of healing and other gifts, also
rendered his death precious and his sepulchre glorious. Joseph died
at the place and time he had foretold, at Osimo in Picenum, at the
age of 61.
Joseph was famous for miracles after his death and
was enrolled among the blessed by Pope Benedict XIV and among the
saints by Pope Clement XIII. Pope Clement XIV, who was of the same
Order, extended his Office and Mass to the universal Church.
Dom Prosper Guéranger:
While in France the rising spirit of Jansenism was driving God from the hearts of the people, a humble son of Saint Francis in southern Italy was showing how easily love may span the distance between Earth and Heaven. “And I, if I be lifted up from the Earth, will draw all things to Myself,” (John xii. 32) said our Lord, and time has proved it to be the most universal of His prophecies. On the Feast of the Holy Cross we witnessed its truth, even in the domain of social and political claims. We will experience it in our very bodies on the great day when we will be taken up in the clouds to meet Christ, into the air (1 Thessalonians iv. 16). But Joseph of Cupertino had experience of it without waiting for the resurrection: innumerable witnesses have home testimony to his life of continual ecstasies in which he was frequently seen raised high in the air. And these facts took place in what men are pleased to call the noonday of history.
* * * * *
While praising God for the marvellous He bestowed on you, we acknowledge that your virtues were yet more wonderful. Otherwise your ecstasies would be regarded with suspicion by the Church, who usually withholds her judgement until long after the world has begun to admire and applaud. Obedience, patience and charity, increasing under trial, were in contestable guarantees for the divine authorship of these marvels which the enemy is sometimes permitted to mimic to a certain extent. Satan may raise a Simon Magus into the air: he cannot make a humble man. O worthy son of the seraph of Assisi, may we, after your example, be raised up, not into the air, but into those regions of true light, where far above the Earth and its passions, our life, like yours, may be hidden with Christ in God! (Colossians iii. 3).
Also on this day according to the ROMAN
MARTYROLOGY:
The birthday of St. Methodius, bishop of Olympius
in Lycia, and afterwards of Tyre, most renowned for eloquence and
learning. St. Jerome says that he won the martyr’s
crown at Chalcis in Greece at the end of the last persecution.
In the diocese of Vienne, the holy martyr Ferreol,
a tribune, who was arrested by order of the impious governor
Crispinus, most cruelly scourged, then loaded with heavy chains, and
cast into a dark dungeon. A miracle having broken his bonds and
opened the doors of the prison, he made his escape, but being taken
again by his pursuers he received the palm of martyrdom by being
beheaded.
Also the Saints Sophia and Irene, martyrs.
At Milan, St. Eustorgius, first bishop of that
city, highly commended by St. Ambrose.
At Gortyna, in Crete, St. Eumenus, bishop and
confessor.
And in other places, many other holy martyrs,
confessors and virgins.
Thanks be to God.
