PALM SUNDAY-17-04-2011

JESUS GIVES UP HIS LIFE

The Evangelists are not reporting the passion and death of Jesus to move us. They are showing us Christ who freely gives up his life for love of all people.
The first reading tells us what happens to each “servant” who wants to be faithful to the mission God has entrusted him
The gospel presents the only one who has fully realized in himself the image of his “servant”: from the glory of the Father to the Humiliation of the death on the cross, to the glory of the Father to the humiliation of the death on the cross, to the glorification of the resurrection. This is also the course proposed to every person.

Nobody is excluded from the kingdom of heaven except through human fault.
(St. Thomas Aquinas)

Dear beloved sisters and brothers in Christ,

Our first reflection on Palm Sunday is this day ushers us into Holy Week. And it introduces us to Holy Week with a memorial of our Lord’s solemn into Jerusalem. This solemn moment at close of Christ’s earthly life shows that he went voluntarily to his death. He went to it with royal freedom and dignity.
Throughout his life he had waited for his “moment” And during the public life he had referred to it so often. Yet he is not crushed by the prospect of it all. It is an hour of triumph, when he will redeem mankind and seal with his own blood his love of man.
It was Palm Sunday that that for the first time Christ during his earthly life allowed royal homage to be paid Him. They had tried to make him king; but his hour had not yet come, he dodged them.
At solemn Mass the faithful will repeat this drama. We shall make a procession with Palm branches in our hands. Those branches are symbols, symbols of our loyalty to Christ our king. They are also symbols of our willingness to do Him homage. Of course we profess our faith in it, the king of kings, everyday, but today we are given an opportunity to do it publicly.
This event also brings us face to face with suffering. We all have to prepare for our Calvary. It is not lip-service, but by his words. There are those who will feel they can’t be left home to watch TV and will move with the crowd and also singing Hosanna! Hosanna! Hosanna! Son of David, but they will stop there and the coming Sunday after back to square one, what the young people call “KAMA KAWA” business as usual.
Dear brothers there is left one week to prepare for Easter, five weeks are already gone: looking back we may wonder what we have done. Have I said an extra prayer? My relationship with my neighbor, have I tried to make them back, have we done an extra good act? Have I received sacraments more frequently and more fervently? What effort have you made to mend your life? Have you tried to reconcile with those with whom I was not friendly? Have you tried to control yourself where love was inordinate? In one word have you made yourself a good Catholic?
You have seen runners gain speed and gain on those who are leading a minute or two before the end.
Let us make firm resolves for a real spiritual renewal so that the celebration of Christ’s resurrection in the body may be an occasion for our spiritual resurrection.
Let us rejoice with the triumphant Jesus at his solemn entrance and allow him entrance into our lives. Let us dedicate our lives to him as our supreme Lord, our savior and our king. And lastly, let us take our cross daily and follow in his footsteps. Don’t we too feel tempted to let go of everything when evil triumphs and we can do nothing about it? But just when we think that there is nothing to be done, we should remember that angels of the Lord “will soon roll away the stone and sit on it” (28:2)

“He who has no vision of eternity will never get a true hold of time”
(Carlyle)