Palm Sunday of the Lord's Passion

Now, there is the passion – Matthew’s this year.  Why hear this story of Jesus’ suffering and death every year?  Because suffering and death are the test of one’s deepest values, the crucible we all have to face.  The passion of Jesus tells us how Jesus faced death and the sufferings of death.  When we hear Matthew’s passion, we can look at each character to see how they might reveal something of our own response to Christ.

There are the disciples.  In the darkest hour, they bail out.  Consider both Judas and Peter.  While Judas went out and hung himself, Peter went out and wept, and became the rock on which the early community was built.  As for the others, the final image we have of them is one of flight, but that too will be transformed to one of reconciliation and renewal on Easter.  Failure can give way to fidelity.

The opposition is found among the leaders.  They turn the crowd against Jesus, and mock him on the cross.  But remember, they serve to remind us how we, too, can be closed off to him and his message and fail to respond to the grace the gospel offers us.  The opponents of Jesus invite us to examine our own values as a nation, our tendency to resort to violence to solve our problems, whether it is crime at home or fear of hostility abroad.

It is often the unexpected ones who respond with courage and generosity, like the women who followed him from Galilee.  Two of them show up at the cross, at the burial, and at the empty tomb.  They are sent to proclaim the good news of the resurrection.  There are also the centurion and the soldiers with him who move from fear to faith: professing, “Truly, this was the Son of God.”  Finally, there was Joseph of Arimathea, the rich man who summoned courage to face up to fickle Pilate and to lay Jesus’ body in his own new tomb.  All of Matthew’s people have something to say to us, if we stop and spend time with them.

But at the center of the passion is Matthew’s Jesus.  In the garden, Jesus prays that the Father’s will be done.  That is what matters.  When arrested, Jesus refuses violence.  He stands before the Sanhedrin and accepts his role as Christ and Son of God.  He stands silent before Pilate and the people as they condemn him.  He ends his life with the words of Psalm 22, the prayer of the Just One who holds onto trust in God, despite the assaults of his enemies.

Jesus is the servant, his mission finding completion in the cross that frees people from sin and death.  At his last meal Jesus proclaims his blood is to be poured out for many.  He is the servant of Isaiah who gave his back to those who beat him, who did not shield his face from buffets and spitting.  Jesus is the one whose death brings salvation.  Jesus ushers in a new age – an age of forgiveness and life.  From his death comes new life.  Jesus is – Christ Our Hope.

Paul A. Magnano

Pastor