Just because you love someone doesn't mean you can have them and sometimes it means you shouldn't and sometimes it's no one's fault. Just because Joseph loved Mary doesn't mean he could have children with her, because he loved God's plan and Mary's welfare more than the idea of being with her. And for me this kind of heartbreaking selflessness is something I relate to a lot, because sometimes even though the feeling of love is there, it's not meant to happen in the way we expect, and sometimes the way we are called to love people is different from the way we feel we want to, and sometimes the way to love people through your actions is exactly the opposite of what you think your heart is telling you.

But at its core, that love is what drives you. That love of God (and of whoever it is that you love) can be and IS heartbreaking and sometimes we have to make a choice that seems impossible, for the sake of the other person and the sake of God. And the very feeling that makes it impossible- love- is the very feeling that makes it possible. If Joseph loved Mary any less he would have acted on his feelings and just had *** with her- or if he loved her even less than that he would have left her to die, just to save his own image. But he didn't. He proved that he loved her more than those things. He loved her more than himself and he loved her more than anything else in the world. He created a seemingly inexplicable paradox- he loved her so much that he was willing to give up expressing it, for her sake. And by not expressing it, he did.

Isn't that incredible? That he reached a level of love that absolutely divided his own interests from hers and made him willing to sacrifice the usual expression of that love and maybe, just maybe, the sacrifice of the usual expression of love was the ultimate and perfect expression of love. Because it wasn't a usual love. Joseph didn't love Mary with a usual love.

He loved her in a way that didn't for a second stop to think about himself, his own wishes. He loved her enough to not love her, even though everyone else told him he should and even though the plan for everyone else seemed to follow an ordinary path- marriage, then ***, then children. Joseph proved that the ultimate expression of love isn't just following this path- it's being brave enough to do whatever is best for the other person and God regardless of what the world tells you and what your own passions tell you.

Joseph loved Mary enough to give up all hope of loving her the way his heart told him he ought to. He gave up the entireity of his own heart to her, keeping nothing for himself. He loved her the way God did. And that is love.