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When sales fall, they call St. Joe

8/20/06



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The tradition of burying St. Joseph statues started about 500 years ago in Europe, according to Cates. An order of nuns, needing more land for a convent, buried their St. Joseph medals in the ground. They got the land, and word spread. The medals eventually turned into statues, and Joseph, a carpenter, who with Jesus and Mary makes up the Holy Family, became the unofficial saint of real estate.



The church takes no formal position on the statues — "It is not official church practice," said Terrence Donilon, spokesman for the Archdiocese of Boston. "It is more of a personal tradition for some people."br>
But Angele Fillion, a clerk at the St. Joseph the Worker Shrine, calls the practice akin to voodoo.br>
"It’s not the statue, it’s the faith that makes it work," said Fillion, who said she frequently has to restrain herself from coming on too strong about the importance of prayer to troubled homeowners who enter the shop looking for the statues — and little else.

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St. Joe 2.0: Geography of Faith

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