DETROIT (ChurchMilitant.com) – A new movie about the patron of the universal Church is showing for a very limited time at select U.S. theaters next week.
The documentary about St. Joseph, titled A Father’s Heart, comes out May 1 and will be available for one day in English and then one day in Spanish.
Fr. Donald Calloway, MIC, tells Church Militant:
I consider A Father’s Heart to be a fruit of the Year of St. Joseph. The year ended on December 8, 2021, but many incredible things continue to happen with St. Joseph. What makes this documentary worth seeing is that it is orthodox and gets everything right. The stories are inspiring and the places visited will make you want to go on pilgrimage to a shrine dedicated to St. Joseph.
The film features some of Calloway’s commentary and personal testimonies from individuals about their powerful experiences of St. Joseph’s presence in their lives. Its producers in Spain were reportedly inspired by Calloway’s book, Consecration to St. Joseph, to make the documentary.
Before the main feature, moviegoers will be treated to a short film produced by the Knights of Columbus called Our Liberator: St. Joseph and the Priests of Dachau. It’s a story that recounts the Polish priests at the Dachau concentration camp who, through the intercession of St. Joseph, were saved from Nazi execution.
May 1 is the feast day of St. Joseph the Worker. In 1889, communists chose May 1, or May Day, to be International Workers’ Day. In 1955, Ven. Pope Pius XII chose the same day to celebrate St. Joseph and the true dignity of work.
Calloway explains:
This feast was established by the Church to help overcome the threat of Communism in the mid-twentieth century, especially as it related to workers’ rights. Today, many of the ugly step-sisters of Communism (socialism, Marxism, etc) are plaguing governments, social policies, and education. We need to appeal to St. Joseph again so that he can help us overcome these threats to society and souls.
According to Pius XII, “The humble craftsman of Nazareth not only personifies to God and the Holy Church the dignity of the laborer, but he is also always the provident guardian of you and your families.”
In his encyclical Redemptoris Custos, Pope St. John Paul II goes further:
The importance of work in human life demands that its meaning be known and assimilated in order to “help all people to come closer to God, the Creator and Redeemer, to participate in his salvific plan for man and the world, and to deepen … friendship with Christ in their lives, by accepting, through faith, a living participation in his threefold mission as Priest, Prophet and King.”
In addition to going to see the movie, Calloway encourages, “I highly recommend that people try to attend Holy Mass that day, and also pray the Litany of St. Joseph on May 1. The Litany of St. Joseph has his official titles approved by the Church and it is a very powerful prayer.”
“All saints are powerful and great intercessors. But St. Joseph is the greatest saint after Our Lady and able to help us with everything because he is our universal spiritual father and the Patron of the Church,” Calloway continued. “St. Joseph is able to help us in every aspect of our lives because of his paternal relationship with us.”