Palm Sunday of The Passion of The Lord

Jan 30 2025

The Purpose of the Palm

Someone once told me that people come to church on Palm Sunday because they get something. But I like to think that palm says something they recognize as true.

“He emptied himself, taking the form of a slave, coming in human likeness,” writes Paul, quoting the words of an early Christian hymn. “He humbled himself, becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross,” follow soon after (Philippians 2:7, 8). Emptying and humbling are the two key words embracing the trajectory of the life of Jesus Christ, the Son of God: from incarnation to passion and death.

He poured himself out for us and for our salvation, certainly suffering physically—from the beating, the scourging, the crowning with thorns, being struck with a reed, spat upon, prodded, pushed, and stumbling up the hill to Golgotha. Then he was stretched out on a crossbeam, nailed to it, and lifted up, his body suspended between heaven and earth. Finally, he suffocated, unable to raise himself to take in more air.

There was also the inner suffering of abandonment, of seeing his disciples run off, of realizing that all those who had cried “Hosanna” a few days ago had either been silent or had cried out, “Crucify him.” Only the women had remained with him.

Today, when we take home a piece of palm, it invites us to prepare to renew our baptismal promises on Easter. Then we can add our voices to that solitary voice almost two millennia ago, saying, “Truly, this is the Son of God!”

Consider/Discuss

Do you have a special place for the blessed palm so it can call you to remember?
What does Mark’s Passion say to you?

Responding to the Word

Loving God, lift up our hearts to give you thanks and praise for all you have done for us through the saving death of your Son. We sing out in our day, “Blessed is he who continues to come in the name of the Lord. Hosanna in the highest.”

Jan 30 2025

Scripture Study for

The prophet’s ability to speak and the words that are spoken all come from God, but they are given for the sake of the weary. The speaker suffers both physical attack and personal insult. Despite this, he does not recoil from his call. He willingly accepts what appears to be the consequence of his prophetic ministry to the weary. In the face of his affliction, he maintains that God is his strength. For this reason, he declares that he is not disgraced and he will not be put to shame. There are no grounds to make these claims other than utter confidence in God.

The Philippians hymn states that though in the form of God, Christ chose the form of a slave. Without losing his Godlike being, he took on the likeness of human beings. He did not merely resemble a human being, he really was one. In a sense, Christ’s crucifixion, a common punishment for slaves, was inevitable given his controversial teaching. However, his subsequent exaltation is as glorious as his humiliation was debasing. It is important to note that while Christ was the subject of his self-emptying, his superexaltation is attributed directly to God. Now every knee shall do him homage and every tongue shall proclaim his sovereignty.

The entire Passion narrative lays bare the contradiction of Jesus’ life and the paradox of God’s reign. The initial fear of the religious leaders shows that Jesus had a following among the people, but it was the people who cried for the release of Barabbas and Jesus’ own death. Among his intimate followers, only the women remained faithful; one anointed him, others kept watch at his crucifixion and took note of where he was buried. Of the men who knew him well, one betrayed him, another denied him, and the rest fled for safety. It was a foreigner, a centurion, who publicly acclaimed his divinity. At the moment of his greatest agony, he was recognized as the Son of God.

Jan 24 2025

Crumpled with Grief, Returned to Dust

The Passion story in Mark does not point to her. Was she among the crowd of women? As we zoom in to that group, we see a woman whose eyes never leave the cross. She pushes back her scarf to reveal a face red from weeping. Her eyes brim with love. We cannot see it from the outside, but what happens to the heart of a mother as she watches her son die?

She looks at his bleeding hands. Her heart beats faster. Within her chest, it feels as though the muscle of her heart has been pounded into mushy meat, and she remembers: she remembers his fingers caress her hair when he stood behind her as a little boy. Her chest hurts. As he flexes his feet to push his body upward so that he can breathe, she remembers. She remembers the tiny heel that kicked off his swaddling clothes. Her chest hurts so hard that, like him, she can hardly breathe.

A man runs up to offer Jesus a drink. Her son lifts his head. His eyes search for hers. Those eyes always so full of love are now wrenched with agony. Even beneath the pain, she can feel his deep tenderness for her. How can he be willing to do this? The crown of thorns slips lower onto his brow. A crown of thorns encircles her heart, a heart so engorged that the crown constricts and tightens, like a ring constricting a swollen finger: a lifetime of mutual love, given away.

He cries out. He breathes his last. A sharp stab pierces her heart. Her knees give way. She crumples to the ground. She cannot look as they take his body down from the cross. No words come from her mouth. It is finished.

Consider/Discuss

We might prefer to imagine Mary as the serene, tall woman of Michelangelo’s Pietà rather than a crumpled woman collapsed in grief on the ground. Either way, tears in prayer can be God’s gift for healing.
Antonín Dvořák wrote his choral piece Stabat Mater after the death of two of his children; listen to the full orchestral version online and allow yourself to be immersed in the deep sorrow of that father. Find a moment this week to weep with God over the death of Jesus and the struggles of this life.
In this final week of preparation for Easter, listen anew to the story of how Jesus suffered and died. Follow St. Ignatius’ way of interpreting the scriptures, reading and then putting yourself into the scene of the passion of Jesus. What do you see? What does it feel like to be there?

Living and Praying with Word

Jesus of the Cross, sometimes the sorrows of this life make our knees give way and we crumple to the ground. In the dirt, we can feel so heavy that we cannot look up. In the dirt with us, there are many mothers and fathers who have gazed upon the dying of their sons and daughters. On the cross, your body was weighed down when you took our pains upon yourself. We can feel so crumpled on Good Friday. We have not yet gotten to Easter. We cannot lift ourselves from the dirt. Have mercy on us, O Lord. We cannot do this on our own. And we pray for those who are crumpled in the dirt with us. Come and be with us this day.

Jan 24 2025

Scripture Study for

The Servant of God in this passage from Isaiah has been equipped for the specific task of “speaking a word to the weary,” a work directed toward the well-being of God’s people, especially those who suffer. This word is not the Servant’s own, but the word of God, which the Servant seeks to hear “morning after morning.” Although in the hearing of the word the Servant knows speaking it will bring pain and rejection, he remains steadfast, not shirking his painful role, rebelling by refusing to speak. The strength required to carry out this thankless role comes from God alone, not from any inner strength or self-assurance possessed by the Servant himself.

In his Letter to the Philippians, Paul exhorts the contentious community to have in their relations with one another the same attitude that Christ Jesus had. The focus here is on the very fact of his existence in the human realm and the way he acted while on earth. This earthly presence was marked by profound, even unimaginable humility, in the very act of “emptying” himself, voluntarily depriving himself not only of his divine prerogative (not to suffer at all), but also of human dignity and security. This he did not have to do, but he did it out of willing obedience to a divine plan, which called for this sacrifice (for the good of God’s people).

The Markan account of Christ’s passion carries forward the theme of the first two readings, which is the willingness to forego human power to take on suffering. The repeated reference to Jesus as “the king of the Jews” or “the king of Israel” alludes to earthly power. Yet these expressions are uttered when he is completely powerless. It is at this moment that we hear the centurion proclaim Jesus Son of God. Mark tells us that the centurion came to this realization when he “saw how [Jesus] breathed his last,” yet what he has seen is Jesus crying out in pain and an apparent sense of being abandoned by God. Mysteriously, what the centurion sees in this dereliction, humiliation, and pain leads him to conclude that Jesus was in fact the Son of God.

Jan 14 2025

Jesus’ Last Journeys

Today’s Gospel before the blessing of the palms presents an exuberant scene. Imagine the large crowd just outside Jerusalem spreading their cloaks on the road, breaking off palm fronds, strewing them about and waving them as Jesus passes by. Hear the people shouting, “Hosanna to the Son of David.” As Jesus enters the city, the people there are asking, “Who is this?” The crowd accompany

ing him answers: “This is Jesus the prophet, from Nazareth of Galilee. This is the one who comes in the name of the Lord.” A journey of joy.

But a few days later Jesus took his last journey: a winding walk from the upper room on Thursday night out to the garden to Gethsemane, then to the house of Caiaphas, on to Pilate’s house and courtyard, and, finally, to the hill of Calvary. During this time, he was spat on and struck, stripped, scourged, and crowned with thorns; he was denounced, mocked, and ridiculed. Most likely some of the same crowd that cried out “Hosanna” cried out, “Crucify him!” It ended with his being nailed to a cross, and after three torturous hours, he died. At this journey’s end, there was one final cry from a small group, a centurion and the men with him: “Truly, this was the Son of God!” (Matthew 27:54).

Allow some time to relive these two journeys. You might hear some things you haven’t noticed before. Perhaps the words of one of the secondary characters or Jesus’ response to a particular situation or his silence before another will speak to you this time.

Consider/Discuss

What does it mean to acknowledge Jesus as the Son of David, the one who comes in the name of the Lord, the prophet from Galilee, the Son of God?
As this Lent comes to its end, where have these days taken you? What have you learned? What do you have to say to God?

Responding to the Word

We pray that we will follow Jesus faithfully all the days of our life, recognizing him as the one who continues to come in the name of the Father bringing life. We ask that we may trust in God as Jesus did until we see God face to face.