Reflection for Palm Sunday

 

Read Today's Mass Readings

 

After Jesus rose from the dead, he met two disciples on the road to Emmaus.  They did not recognize him but expressed to him their deep sorrow that the man they had hoped would be the Messiah had just been crucified in Jerusalem.  Luke recounts the story in his gospel:  “Jesus told them, ’You foolish men! So slow to believe all that the prophets have said!  Was it not necessary that the Christ should suffer before entering into his glory?’  Then, starting with Moses and going through all the prophets, he explained to them the passages throughout the scriptures that were about himself.” (Lk 24: 25-27)

This Holy Week, the Church contemplates the brutal reality of that suffering Jesus had to go through.  As Jesus did on the road to Emmaus, the Church helps us understand that truth by also presenting to us in the liturgy many of those passages from Moses and the prophets that pointed to his suffering, death and resurrection.  Today, on Palm Sunday, besides hearing the Passion, according to Matthew, we also hear one of the four “Servant Songs” written down by the prophet Isaiah.  Christians have always understood them to refer to the suffering servant, Jesus Christ.  He is the one who speaks a word that will rouse us in our weariness, even though he is the one who has taken up the burden that weighs us down.  He carries us. 

Jesus wanted the disciples to know that his suffering and death were not random events that occurred as the result of the actions of Judas or the Jewish and Roman authorities.  Rather, his suffering and death were the fulfillment of God’s promise throughout human history to send his own Son, a priest of the order of Melchisedek, a prophet promised by Moses and a royal descendant of David.  That Son would finally save all human beings from the consequences of their sins and from death.  But it would entail a great humbling and suffering on the part of God’s Son. 

Jesus wanted his followers to know that humiliation and suffering are not without meaning or value for us as well.

For reflection: In this past month of great change and threat, how have I been invited to share in the sufferings of Christ?  And how has God’s love shone through that suffering?

Reflection by Abbot Benedict Neenan, OSB

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