Palm Sunday – Deacon Pat Kearns
In the gospel proclaimed today we have followed Jesus from the praises of Palm Sunday, through His passion, His suffering, and ultimately His death.
For us Catholics, this week, Holy Week, continues the story of what we are, and who we are as a people.
This week is the most Holy Week of the year.
And beginning this week, today is Palm Sunday; where we celebrate that “First Joy” of the Lenten Season.
We celebrate our Lord’s triumphant entrance into Jerusalem where he was welcomed by crowds worshiping him and laying down palm leaves in the street before him.
In a few days, we will arrive at Holy Thursday – The most complex and profound of all religious observances, with the exception only to Easter.
Holy Thursday celebrates, as instituted by Christ himself, that of the Holy Eucharist and of the priesthood.
His last supper with the disciples, and the celebration of Passover, He is the Self-offered Passover victim.
Every ordained priest to this day presents this same sacrifice by Christ’s authority and command in exactly the same way.
The last supper was also Christ’s farewell to his disciples, some of whom would betray, desert, and deny him, all before the sun would rise again.
Then, following Holy Thursday is Good Friday, when the entire Church fixes her gaze on the cross at Calvary.
Each member of the Church tries to understand at what cost Christ has won our redemption.
In the solemn ceremonies of Good Friday:
• in the adoration of the cross,
• in the chanting of the “Reproaches,”
• in the proclamation of the passion,
• and in receiving the pre-consecrated Host, we unite ourselves to our Savior, and we contemplate our own death to sin in the death of our Lord.
Then…. The Easter Vigil.
The vigil, held at night, signifies Christ’s passage from the dead-to-the-living by the liturgy that begins in darkness, representing Sin and Death, and is enlightened by the fire and the Easter candle, the light of Christ.
The Church, the mystical Body of Christ and the community of believers, is led from spiritual darkness to the light of His truth.
We rejoice in Christ’s bodily resurrection from the darkness of the tomb:
• we pray for our passage from death into eternal life,
• from sin into grace,
• from the weariness and infirmity of old age to the freshness and vigor of youth,
• from the anguish of the cross to peace and unity with God,
• and from this sinful world unto the Father in heaven.
As we now begin Holy Week, it is a time for deep and sincere reflection on who we are, on our current relationship with Christ, and a time to embrace Christ’s passion.
Everything we are as Catholics rest upon this week.
The week that includes Christ’s Passion, His Death, and ultimately His resurrection.
It is a time for us to embrace our own passion, our own sorrows, our own troubles, our own crosses, and to die to the sinfulness of our lives.
The sinfulness that all too often is rooted in Greed, Pride, Lust, and Envy.
If not done already this Lent, it is time for Confession, a time to be freed from the shackles of sin.
It is a time to unite our lives with Christ.
It is a time to be resurrected with Christ.
To be spiritually resurrected anew, awakened to His joy, His freedom, His power, and His love.
Pause
His life is to become our life…
His life is to become our life…….
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