Homily for Thursday, Week 19 of Ordinary Time

Homily for Thursday
Week 19 of Ordinary Time

Aug. 14, 2025
Josh 3: 7-11, 13-17
Christian Brothers, St. Joseph’s Residence, N.R.

Israel crosses the Jordan
(James Tissot)

“The Lord said to Joshua, ‘Today I will begin to exalt you in the sight of Israel, that they may know I am with you, as I was with Moses’” (Josh 3: 7).

Joshua wasn’t Moses.  But God enabled him to do a work like Moses, leading Israel across the Jordan on dry land and subsequently—tho it doesn’t appear in the lectionary—to defeat and destroy Jericho and other cities as Moses had led Israel to victory in battle against their opponents.

In Joshua, Israel had a leader who resembled their “founder,” so to speak, a leader with his own character and gifts, and it was evident that God was with him.  It’s similar with our religious families.  None of you can be exactly like Edmund Rice, nor can any Salesian replicate Don Bosco.  But our calling has been to resemble them while living their charism according to our own character and gifts, in our time and place.  Inasmuch as we’ve done so, the people of God have been able to know that God has been with us, as he was with Edmund and John.

The manner of our resemblance to our founder necessarily changes as the phases of our lives unfold; but the vocation is the same:  to follow the founder’s charism, and ultimately to follow the Lord Jesus, as the collect for St. Maximilian says, addressing God:  “that, striving for your glory by eagerly serving others, we may be conformed, even until death, to your Son.”