Random.
Maybe we should nominate this thread for transfer to IMHO, eh?
The short story “The Greatest Gift” has no Joseph, so that’s no help. The screenplay to It’s a Wonderful Life doesn’t identify who the Joseph might be, although Mr. Martini is heard at the opening praying to “Joseph, Jesus and Mary” to help George Bailey. Maybe the screenwriters thought it would be a little offensive to have Jesus or Mary engaged in the plot, so they got the lower-ranking Joseph to serve duty?
For a general reference on angels: Straight Dope Staff Report: What’s the deal with angels? although it doesn’t deal with the insidious notion that dead humans turn into angels somehow.
Agreed on both counts.
Jesus did say something that has led to the “dead folk become angels” idea.
Matthew 22:30 For in the resurrection they neither marry, nor are given in marriage, but are as the angels of God in heaven.
And in Jewish tradition, while Enoch did not die, there is the concept that he became the angel Metatron.
Metatron? As in hottie Alan Rickman Metatron?
Yeah, tho DOGMA has a somewhat different take than either Jewish tradition or I do (I think Metatron was that OT character called “The Angel of YHWH” who also seemed to speak AS YHWH and was actually a manifestation of The Son- JC.)