O St. Joseph, foster father of Jesus Christ and true spouse of the Virgin Mary, pray for us and for all who will die this day.
By the love you bore to Jesus and Mary, and because you were granted the happiest of deaths, dying in their arms, obtain for me the grace of a holy death. When my last hour comes, be near me with Jesus and Mary; drive far from me the enemy of my soul, and win for me the grace to breathe forth my spirit in peace, saying with you: "Jesus, Mary, and Joseph, I give you my heart and my soul."
Grant that I may die, as I hope to live, in the friendship of God, fortified by the holy Sacraments, and destined for eternal rest.
St. Joseph, patron of a happy death, pray for me. Amen.
The Church has always taught her children to prepare, while still in health, for the one appointment none can escape. This is a memento mori — a loving remembrance of death — not morbid but hopeful, asking now for the grace of a happy death: to die in the friendship of God, strengthened by the Sacraments, at peace with Him and with all. Every Hail Mary already contains the petition, "pray for us… now and at the hour of our death."
The great patron of this grace is St. Joseph. A pious and ancient tradition holds that Joseph died before the public ministry of Jesus, in the very arms of his foster-Son and of the Blessed Virgin — the happiest death any man could have, attended by the Son of God and the Immaculate Mother. Because of this the Church honors him as Patron of a Happy Death and of the dying, and confraternities under his name have long prayed for this grace for their members.
What the prayer asks is what theologians call final perseverance — the great gift of ending one’s life in the state of grace. It cannot be earned outright but must be begged, and so the Church puts on our lips even now the aspiration meant for our last breath: "Jesus, Mary, and Joseph, I give you my heart and my soul." She also prays constantly, in the Litany of the Saints, to be delivered "from a sudden and unprovided death" — that we may not be taken unready, but die watchful, shriven, and at peace.
O St. Joseph, foster father of Jesus Christ and true spouse of the Virgin Mary, pray for us and for all who will die this day.
By the love you bore to Jesus and Mary, and because you were granted the happiest of deaths, dying in their arms, obtain for me the grace of a holy death. When my last hour comes, be near me with Jesus and Mary; drive far from me the enemy of my soul, and win for me the grace to breathe forth my spirit in peace, saying with you: "Jesus, Mary, and Joseph, I give you my heart and my soul."
Grant that I may die, as I hope to live, in the friendship of God, fortified by the holy Sacraments, and destined for eternal rest.
St. Joseph, patron of a happy death, pray for me. Amen.
O St. Joseph, foster father of Jesus Christ and true spouse of the Virgin Mary, pray for us and for all who will die this day.
By the love you bore to Jesus and Mary, and because you were granted the happiest of deaths, dying in their arms, obtain for me the grace of a holy death. When my last hour comes, be near me with Jesus and Mary; drive far from me the enemy of my soul, and win for me the grace to breathe forth my spirit in peace, saying with you: "Jesus, Mary, and Joseph, I give you my heart and my soul."
Grant that I may die, as I hope to live, in the friendship of God, fortified by the holy Sacraments, and destined for eternal rest.
St. Joseph, patron of a happy death, pray for me. Amen.