Homily
for Friday
2d
Week of Lent
March
6, 2026
Gen
37: 3-4, 12-13, 17-28
Matt
21: 33-46
Provincial
House, New Rochelle
Joseph Sold into Slavery by His Brothers
(Damiano Mascagni)
Today’s
readings are strangely juxtaposed. We
think readily of the patriarch Joseph compared with St. Joseph, especially
because of their dreams, but young Joseph’s dreams are just passed over in
today’s reading (Gen 37:5-11); and because both saved their people with a
journey to Egypt.
Instead,
today Joseph is likened to Jesus.
Joseph’s father “loved him best” (37:4), and Jesus was the Father’s
beloved Son. Both Joseph and Jesus
aroused the hostility of those who should have been closest to them. St. John tells us that Jesus came to his own,
and they received him not (John 1:11); Joseph’s own betrayed him and sold him
out (Gen 37:20-28).
Yet
God accomplished salvation thru the suffering of both. And both Joseph and Jesus readily forgave
those who harmed them.
For
his own mysterious reasons, God has called us to be his instruments of
salvation—hardly in the same way as Joseph saved his family or Jesus saves us
all. But we believe God will do what he
intends in us in spite of any opposition if we humbly let him use us and will
produce good fruit (Matt 21:43).
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