Palm Sunday of the Lord's Passion

As far as I know, today is the only Sunday in our calendar with two names. 

Today we celebrate what we commonly call Palm Sunday. Despite the length of the gospel, we come to get our token bit of spring.  Palm Sunday, Ash Wednesday bring out the crowds.  If only we could figure out give-aways for about 25 more Sundays in the year, our churches would be jammed.  “Toaster Sunday at Christ our Hope”,” free water and wine glasses at the cathedral;” by the end of Ordinary time, you’d have a complete set.

Today, we change our routine, we gathered in a different place, we heard and re-enacted the story of the Lord’s triumphant entry into the Holy City. The crowds, as we just did, sang their delight: Hosanna to the Son of David, Blessed is he who comes in the name of the lord. Praise be to him, the king of glory. 

Yet today’s real name is Passion Sunday, when we hear again the telling of God’s passionate love for us. We hear Luke’s account of a story we know too well; of the breaking of the bread and the breaking of faith; of Jesus’ heart breaking open in fear and anguish in the garden;  violence outside, and betrayal with a kiss; mocking elders and Peter, the rock, crumbling into grains of shifting sand; Pilate’s irony and Herod’s search for parlor tricks; the lash, the trumped up sentence, the long slow haul up the hill, with only one small light, a foreigner who helped him carry the load; nails, a prayer for forgiveness, taunts and thief at his side who steals his way into paradise; the veil of the temple, the veil of his body torn in two. So much blood.

We’ve heard it all before.  The length of the telling makes us weary; gives way to distractions. What more is there to learn?

Simply this.  Today we celebrate, yes we celebrate, the passionate love of God for us. God’s passions are not like ours.  Our passions elate us, distract us, leave us faint or weak. In the end, they never satisfy, are never satisfied, they burn out and leave ashes behind.

What we celebrate today is the constant passion of God, the passionate love of God for us:  it is eternal and deep, tender and all-encompassing. Even unto death, death on a cross.  That passionate, unwavering mercy is an endless ocean in which we float, buoyed up by the salt of God’s tears, washed clean in the water and blood that flowed from his side, nourished by what we share here at this table. Here we find courage and hope, in the saving tide of God’s mercy.

Lord, by your cross and resurrection, you have set us free; you are the savior of the world. 

Thomas Lucas, S.J.