This week, Holy Week, together we journey with Jesus Christ, in a most endearing way: through his passion; his carrying of the cross; his crucifixion, death, and burial; the silence of his tomb; to the moment of his rising to eternal resurrection. These are the most foundational, the most mysterious, the most consequential acts of God-for-us, through which God in Jesus saves the whole human race from the seemingly overwhelming power of sin, seen from our perspective, and from its final consequence, eternal death. In the cross and resurrection of Jesus, sin and death are overcome, defeated, are no more.
We enter Holy Week with Jesus, who enters Jerusalem enrobed, enfleshed, as the prophetic Messiah: a man of weakness and compassion, a lover of the poor and the scorned, who knows all our joys, all our longings; he embraces our slavery to sin; a man of suffering, the Suffering Servant, who feels in his body the wounds inflicted and burdens imposed by the fading work of evil; a man of perfect humility, led by the Spirit, rejecting every command or suggestion that does not come from the mouth of God; he enters Jerusalem, enters the sacred time and place, riding on a donkey.
He comes not to be served, but to serve: he washes the feet of his disciples, he washes our feet, to heal our bodies, our minds, and our spirits, to follow in his footsteps, that we may walk in his ways, that we may imitate him in kindness, compassion, and healing love; he feeds his disciples with the bread and the wine, that is, his body and blood; he feeds and strengthens us with the Eucharist, in which Jesus, human and divine, preparing for his own journey from death to life, gives us the gift of himself, the gift of his own power that prevails over sin, and conquers death. He feeds us with the mystery of our new life to come.
He comes as God’s pure love: love that fallen humanity cannot fathom; love more powerful than any other power; love that purifies our souls of sin, as like the purest of water, love that melts away our sins, as like the hottest of fire; love that embraces all in the heart of God; love that saves us from sin and redeems risen humanity, for all eternity.
Jesus came to us, to die on the cross, and to rise, so to lead us to God, to the Garden, the kingdom of heaven, to freedom and life as children of God. Jesus comes to us today, to nourish our faith and hope in his love, God’s love for us, love that cannot die, love that is forever. Jesus will come again, to every heart who calls upon him, at every place and time that we need him, teaching us that sin and death have been conquered, and that love and life are ours, for eternity.
– Fr. Gerry McDougall, SJ
