PALM SUNDAY – 2018 

Gospel  Mk 14: 1–15, 47

Ø  Mark gives us an introduction to the passion. 

Ø  He situates the event “the unleavened breads” and he tells us the decision of the religious and civil authorities of Israel: to arrest Jesus and kill him, but not during the Passover Feast. 

Ø  The death of Jesus, the true paschal lamb, will be during the Passover, He accomplishes the true and final liberation of humankind.  

Ø  Mark in his introduction narrates the act of love of that woman who will pour the nard perfume on the head of Jesus. 

Ø  Those who do not understand kindness, gratuity, complain “it could be sold …”

Ø  Judas Iscariot decides to hand him over to the priests.   

Ø  We have the stage ready for the   Passion.    

JESUS CELEBRATES THE JEWISH PASSOVER  

Ø  In this narration the scenes inside and outside alternate.  

Outside

Ø   The Apostles ask Jesus “Where do you want us to prepare the Passover supper?” 

Ø  Jesus responds telling them to follow a man they will encounter at the entrance of the city. The disciples go and do as they had been told, and get everything ready for the meal.     

Inside

Ø  Jesus arrives with the other apostles at sunset, time of the celebration of the memorial of the wonders God made for the Israelites on their departure from Egypt. 

Ø  Jesus says that one of them will betray him. They are surprised and sad and, one by one they ask him “Is it I Lord?   

Ø  Jesus answers without denouncing Judas who is present at the meal. And with great sorrow he exclaims: “woe to that man by whom the Son of Man is betrayed.
It would be better for that man if he had never been born!"   

Ø  And Jesus will transform this meal forever, with signs and words which will change the history of humankind forever.   

Ø  Jesus took  

o   The bread, pronounced the blessing, broke it and gave it to his disciples saying: “Take and eat, this is my body.”    

o   And taking in his hands the cup of wine, he pronounced the thanksgiving, and gave it to all, they drank and he said “This is my blood, the blood of the covenant, that is pour out for all.     

o   Jesus does sacramentally, with signs, what he will accomplish the following day on the cross: he will offer his life for all of us.  He will remain forever among us so that we will be able to give the true and only sacrifice to the Father.   

Ø  After singing the hymn, they leave and go to the Mount of Olives, but before Jesus tells them that all will abandon him, like the sheep that flee when the shepherd is wounded or killed.  

Ø  And he announces to them that once risen from the dead He will go ahead of them to Galilee. 

Ø  Peter cannot accept that they will betray him, he is not aware of his human weakness. But Jesus assures him that he will denial him three times before the cock crows twice. 

Outside

Ø  They go to the Garden; Jesus leaves most of the apostles at the entrance and goes further with James, John and Peter.   

Ø  Those are the same that were witnesses of his transfiguration.  

Ø  He separates from them and goes to pray to the Father. His prayer is filled with sadness, fear, suffering. The one who has fear is the Son of God, The creating Word, the Second Person of the Trinity, of God, God himself. He wanted to be with us, to suffer and rejoice like us, to be like us in everything but sin. 

Ø  Like us, he looks for the comfort from his friends, but he founds them asleep.   

Ø  Jesus asks the Father “if it is possible… Everything is possible for you… But, as he had said some days earlier He had come for this hour, to be faithful to the will of the Father, for the salvation of all, even if this cost him his life.     

Ø  He goes to his disciples a second time, they are still asleep, and He says to them, “you may continue sleeping…” Why does he say that” Because he has received the strength from the Father.  

Jesus y Judas

Ø  Judas comes leading a group of armed persons and kisses Jesus. What did you feel Judas giving a kiss of betrayal, kisses have another meaning.  

Ø  And Jesus surrender himself in the hands of those men, who do not know him and do not know how much he loves them, and that he is about to do the greatest sign of love for them.    

Ø  His apostles fled, only a young man follows the crowd that surrounds Jesus, Tradition says that this man was Mark the evangelist. 

Jesus and Peter  – Religious Trial

Ø  We have contemplated Jesus with one of his apostles: Judas  

Ø  Let us see now another of his apostles, Peter. We do not know whether Judas loves his Master, but we know from the Scriptures that Peter loved him, and was his friend. 

Ø  What had happened to you Peter?  

Ø  While Jesus is interrogated in the religious trial, Peter is outside, putting himself in danger.   

Ø  Jesus does  not answer the questions, only when he is asked about his identity he will speak. Are you de Messiah? He cannot be silent anymore, he has to say aloud who he is “Yes I am.” 

Ø  And he is condemned for telling the truth, for telling them that he is the Messiah that Israel has been waiting for centuries that he has come for our salvation, the salvation of all.   

Ø   Peter says that he does not know “that man”… and the cock crowed, Peter remembers the words of Jesus and cries.

Jesus and Pilate – The Political Trial   

Ø  The following day, Friday, they bring  Jesus before Pilate.   

Ø  Pilate  asks him: “are y ou the king of the Jews?” “Yes I am.”

Ø  But when Pilate asks him again, Jesus does not respond. What is the use to respond to someone who does not want to listen? 

Ø  Pilate is a coward, he is afraid of losing his position if he liberates Jesus, and follows what his fear dictates to him.

Ø  He makes the crowd choose between Jesus and Barabbas, how many times in human history has this situation been repeated…..   

Ø  Pilate pleases the crowd and hands Jesus over to the soldiers that torture him. 

Ø  When they finish torturing him, they put the cross on his shoulders and make him carry it to Mount Calvary, the place of the crucifixion.    

Ø  Since Jesus is so weak already, I they want to be able to crucify him, they force Simon of Cyrene to carry the cross. Simon is a worker who comes from the fields, he does not know Jesus, he does not care about him. 

Ø  In the film “The Passion” this scene is very well presented. Simon who is angry  I does not care about the suffering of that man, Jesus, little by little as he walks with him to the place of crucifixion he realizes that Jesus is an innocent and good man. Simon is transformed  and begins to love that person, he even defends him, he puts in danger his life.     

Ø   Jesus nailed to the cross, within the darkness of his sufferings, his fears, his loneliness, his abandonment thinks about the people he has helped during his life and he ponders, where are the lepers, the sick of all sorts, those who hunger, those who are abandoned…. None of them are here.

Ø  And where is the Father, I have done what I was sent to do, where are you? Why have you abandoned me?

Ø  And his mother cannot be close to the cross; she suffers with him in her heart and cries in silence.

Ø  Jesus gets  back his peace again, he feels again the presence of the Father who has never abandoned him, and Jesus surrenders himself in his Fathers hands.  

Ø   The way he dies, crying out, thing that a crucified person could not do because his lungs did not have enough air, makes de centurion realize that Jesus was more than man. “Truly this man was the Son of God.”

Ø  The veil of the sanctuary was torn in two from top to bottom. It is not needed anymore; Jesus is the temple and the sanctuary. Now what Jesus said to the Samaritan woman begins to be real, “to adore the Father in spirit and truth.” We will not seek the Lord in special places, in sacred places, because after the incarnation and the death and resurrection of Jesus the whole creation is sacred, it has been redeemed by the Son, the Creating Word of God.   

Because of this, God greatly exalted him and bestowed on him

the name which is above every name,
that at the name of Jesus every knee should bend,

of those in heaven and on earth and under the earth,
and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord,

to the glory of God the Father.

 CLARETIAN CORNER

At this moment I saw our Lord Jesus Christ, I had him present in very special way. He had so much pain for the evil of the church, that it seemed as if his Divine eyes were bursting into tears, and told me sorrowfully: “look, my daughter, if with tears I would be able to renew the spirit of my church, I would shed tears of blood. Because I did not spare myself to shed all my blood for her creation, but I left myself as pledge and memory of my infinite love for her, for her conversion until the end of time.  Venerable Maria Antonia París, Foundress of the Religious of Mary Immaculate Claretian Missionary Sisters, Autobiography 9.   

If a son had a very kind father and saw that he was being maltreated for no reason at all, wouldn't the son defend the father? If the son saw that this good father was being led to execution, wouldn't he do all that he could to set him free? Well, then, what should I be doing for the honor of my Father, who is offended with such indifference and who, though innocent, is being led to Calvary to be, as St. Paul says, crucified anew by sin? Wouldn't it be a crime to remain silent? What would be the sense of not doing everything we could? My God, my Father! Help me to prevent all sins, or at least one sin, even if I should be cut to pieces in the attempt. Saint Anthony Mary Claret, Founder of the Religious of Mary Immaculate Claretian Missionary Sisters, Autobiography 17.