Palm Sunday- Our Invitation
When you think of Palm Sunday, what images come to mind?
Perhaps it is the green branches distributed at the beginning of Mass, and folding makeshift origami crosses out of them during the homily. Or maybe it is the longer-than-average Gospel reading, following Jesus as he triumphantly enters the holy city all the way through what appears to be a devastating defeat as he dies on the cross and is buried behind a wall of stone. Perhaps you may have haunting memories of our own participation in that Gospel reading where we take the place of the crowd shouting, “Crucify him, Crucify him!” or maybe you remember singing songs like “Jesus, Remember Me” or “Were You There”. Or maybe you remember a slight sense of dread or annoyance as you received your palm branch and realized you’d be at Mass much longer than usual.
For myself, Palm Sunday is always a bittersweet day. On one hand, we know as Christians that the death and burial of Jesus is not the end of the story. Two thousand years later, we have the gift of hindsight and knowledge of the full story, just as Jesus (and most likely his Blessed Mother) did. Despite that fact, it can still be a jarring experience as we exit the Church. Though we know the ending of the story, for a brief moment in time we are liturgically transported back to that moment where all hope seemed lost, and we’re left hanging. When we look to the cross, we see the love of God outpoured in ultimate display. We also encounter the depths of human depravity from a human standpoint; God has come down to earth to be with mankind, and mankind killed him. “But God shows his love for us in that while we were yet sinners Christ died for us.” (Romans 5:8) As we look upon the cross, we are reminded of that age old truth which many of us have often heard: “Even if you were the only person on earth, God the Father still would have sent his Son, and Jesus still would have died on the cross for you.” Sometimes we forget that if we were the only person on earth, we would be the one driving the nails through his hand and his feet.
When we take a step back and reflect on what is taking place here, we see that a big “theme” of this day is taking ownership and responsibility for what transpired 2000 years ago in ancient Jerusalem. Alongside Jesus’ Jewish contemporaries, we too shout “his blood be on us and on our children” as Pilate pretends to wash his hands clean from the crime. Who are we in this story? Do we take responsibility and accept responsibility, or do we “wash our hands” and try to play make believe and claim we’re not at fault like Pilate?
As disturbing of an image as it may be, we are reminded today that our hands are bloody. We can’t shirk away from the reality that our sin, my sin, nailed Jesus to the cross. Though it seems dismal, when we finally acknowledge this, something mysterious begins to happen to happen to us interiorly. We hear Christ from the cross (and in our hearts) speak those words, “Father, forgive them. They know not what they do.” Through his blood we are transformed and redeemed and embraced. We come before our king and our God, repenting after seeing what we’ve done him. We are met not with the harsh judgement of a vengeful God, but rays of mercy and tender love. “Greater love has no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends… I have called you friends.” (John 15:13-15).
As our Savior hangs upon the cross, he gazes at us in love. Nothing we could ever do takes that love away from us. And as we are reminded through Jesus’ words to St. Faustina, “The greater the sinner, the greater the right he has to my Mercy.” And this is why Palm Sunday is bittersweet. We see the true wages of sin, but instead of being carried in our souls, they are carried by the God-man, the One who has the strength to carry them and destroy them once and for all, the One who makes all things new.
As you go to Mass this Sunday, I invite you to take a moment to place yourself in the Gospel story as it unfolds. Where are you in the crowd? What thoughts and emotions move through you as you see the triumphant king marching into the holy city to the jubilant cries of praise as palms and cloaks are laid before him? Where are you sitting, and what comes to your mind as Jesus celebrates his last supper with his friends? What are you doing while he sits and prays in anxious silence in the garden of Gethsemane? What stirs in your heart as you gaze upon the crucified God-man from Nazareth as he deals a death-blow to death itself and he breathes his last?
Palm Sunday is our invitation to enter into Holy Week, as we interiorly and liturgically place ourselves within the great mysteries of Jesus’ final days before his Resurrection.
May your week be blessed as we await the day of Jesus’ triumphant victory over the grave.
Jonah Souchy is a former member of NET Ministries and currently serves as the Director of Youth and Young Adult Ministry at Triumph of the Holy Cross Parish in Pennsylvania.
