Scripture Reflection, Palm Sunday, April 05, 2009: Love Conquers All

Scripture Readings:

Procession with the Palms:
Mark 11: 1-10 or John 12: 12-16
Mass:
Isaiah 50:4-7
Psalm 22:8-9, 17-18, 19-20, 23-24
Philippians 2:6-11
Mark 14:1-15:47

The Church’s readings on Palm Sunday invite us to participate in the profound drama of Jesus’ life – and of his disciples. With the people in Jerusalem we can see ourselves cry out: “Hosanna! Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord!” and a few moments later: “Crucify him!” We are put in front of the imposing picture of Jesus’ passion as we enter into Holy Week where we look on the details and go step by step through the last moments of Jesus’ earthly life on Holy Thursday and Good Friday.

The evangelists describe Jesus in different ways. There is Mark’s story which shows us a very human Jesus, who begs God to let the cup pass him and asks his friends to be with him in this moment of anxiety. But the disciples fall asleep and God remains silent. Jesus’ life ends with the desperate cry “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” (Ps 22) John Paul II comments on this passage in his Apostolic Letter Novo Millennio Ineunte: "Is it possible to imagine a greater agony, a more impenetrable darkness?” … "In reality, the anguished `why' addressed to the Father in the opening words of the twenty-second psalm expresses all the realism of unspeakable pain; but it is also illumined by the meaning of that entire prayer, in which the Psalmist brings together suffering and trust." (1)

John’s Gospel, which we’ll hear on Good Friday, shows Jesus already in the power of the Son of God. He seems to know what will happen. He is the actor, not the victim, as he makes clear in Jn 10: 17-18: “The reason my Father loves me is that I lay down my life—only to take it up again. No one takes it from me, but I lay it down of my own accord. I have authority to lay it down and authority to take it up again." (Jn 10:17-18) His ‘mission’ is to bring God’s love back to the people. He wants to teach us how to love one another in the same way the Father loves him. God’s love for mankind doesn’t know limits and this fact will eventually cost his life: “My command is this: Love each other as I have loved you. Greater love has no one than this, that he lay down his life for his friends.” (Jn 15:12)

Reading the two stories together, it becomes more clear that Christ’s passion, is not only about suffering and its meaning from a Christian perspective. It is about TRUST and LOVE.

A couple of years ago I got to know a beautiful family with four children. There were to be expecting their fifth child, when the father lost his job. Subsequently they had to move into a much smaller house in a different, more modest neighborhood. In the midst of all the struggles and moments of doubt and the unanswered question “Why?” my friends never lost their optimism. “God will take care of us”, they said confidently, taking it one moment at a time. And they experienced that God intervened every time things became really tight, through unexpected payments or the love of friends. This family was for me an example of what it means to trust in God and to believe that we are in the hands of a Father who will provide for everything.

Life in a community or a family can be challenging sometimes. Loving ‘until the end’, like Jesus did can mean many things: to listen to someone who wants to talk, even if I have other things to do; putting away things silently and repeatedly, even if it is not my responsibility; not to react angrily and offended to someone but say things in a loving, ‘constructive’ way; forgive and accept the forgiveness of others.

There are many things in our daily life that permit us to get in touch with Jesus’ passion and his suffering on the cross. We don’t have to wait for the ‘big things’. I’m sure we all have these small obstacles that keep us away from our call to holiness.

I like thinking Jesus is on my side especially in these moments of bigger and smaller struggles: in moments of tiredness, failure, limited patience, anxiety and so forth. The Church Fathers say "All that was assumed was redeemed." And the theologian Karl Rahner comments: “To me it seems the Crucified must have let all pains pass before his eyes at the time when he called out on the cross, without pietistic ideologies, ‘My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?’" (2) “He assumed death; therefore death must be something more than a sunset into a meaningless void. He assumed the state of being forsaken; therefore loneliness contains in itself the promise of a happy and divine closeness. He assumed lack of success; therefore defeat can be a victory. He assumed abandonment by God; therefore God is close even when we think we have been forsaken by him. He assumed all; therefore all is redeemed.” (3)

We are invited to walk with Christ in these moments of His and our struggles, His and our passion. He will help us turn things around and see them from a different perspective – the perspective of the cross. We can find His presence in all darkness, suffering or conflict. In Jesus’ death and resurrection we are reborn to new life. And this mystery will remain with us not only when we gather together to celebrate the Eucharist on this Palm Sunday – but in every celebration of the sacrament.

Birgit Oberhofer

(1) Apostolic Letter Novo Millennio Ineunte of His Holiness Pope John Paul II
(2) K. Rahner, Grace in freedom, New York : Herder and Herder, 1969.
(3) K. Rahner, "Misteri della vita di Cristo, Ecce homo!", in Nuovi Saggi II, Rome, 1968, II: 173-174.