READINGS: Isa 50:4-7; Psa 22:8-9,17-20,23-24; Phil 2:6-11; Lk 22:14-23:56
THEME: THE HOUR HAS COME!
Throughout the gospel, but most vividly in the gospel according to St. John, the hour of Jesus is spoken mostly in three stages: the/his hour is coming (cf John 2:4, 7:30; 8:20); the hour has not come (cf John 4:23; 5:25; 16:2,4,25,32); the hour has come (cf John 12:23,27; 13:1; 16:21; 17:1; Lk 22:14).
Jesus himself affirms that he has come for something that has already been planned to happen at a particular hour (cf John 12:27) and his earthly ministry moves at arriving at that hour. It is the hour of Jesus’ glorification through his death on the cross.
At the beginning of his public ministry, just shortly after his baptism according to the Synoptic account, Jesus was driven into the desert where he combatted with the evil one.
Then the scripture says that “when the devil has finished every test, he departed from him until an opportune time” (Luke 4:13). The Holy week which begins with the feast of Palm Sunday brings forward both the hour of Jesus and the opportune time for the return of the devil.
Having looked for a way to get at Jesus, and not finding, at the opportune time which is marked and governed also by the arrival of the hour of Jesus’s glorification, the devil now found one of his disciples, Judas, as a disposed instrument to get at Jesus.
In the Passion narrative according to St. Luke, this hour of Jesus which has the glorification of Jesus as its finality brought with itself some events, from which we choose the following:
- The Last Passover with his disciples
Passover is the Jewish festival traditionally observed on 14 Nissan and celebrated as the liberation of the people of Israel from Egypt. At this festival, a Passover lamb is to be slaughtered, roasted, and eaten in a family circle.
It is on this occasion, as a matter of fact, on the very day that the Passover lamb was to be sacrificed, that Jesus made a unique Passover celebration with his disciples in which, instead of a slaughtered lamb, he offered himself to the disciples.
That means, Jesus gives himself as the lamb for the salvation and liberation of his people. Passover commemorates the Jewish liberation from slavery. And locating the beginning of the ‘hour’ of Jesus at this Jewish feast of Passover, Jesus demonstrates that the hour of our own liberation from the forces of the evil one has come.
- The weakness of the disciples towards Prayer
It is true that Jesus has come for this hour, and that he had prepared himself for it and was always conscious of it, when the hour did arrive, he needed all the more the company and the activeness of his disciples.
Before he fully surrendered himself to the Father’s will, he went into prayer on the Mount of Olives. This Mount of Olives somehow becomes a chosen place of meeting between Jesus and his Father, where Jesus goes in for his prayer.
In fact, Luke says that it was Jesus’ custom to go to this mountain. Last Sunday, we saw him coming down from the same Mount of Olive where he stayed for the whole night, and from where he came down to the Temple to teach the people (cf John 8:1-2). Jesus had a mountain where he goes to spend time in prayer with his Father. One of the reasons for the choice of mountain is because of its serenity.
Do we have such reserved areas we have chosen for our spending time with our God? When we feel so scared about what is coming and the heaviness of life, where do we go to?It is to this Mount of Olives that Jesus took his disciples that they too may keep him company in prayer.
But instead of seeing the serenity of the mountain as an occasion to pray, they saw it as a decorum for sleep thereby excusing themselves from whatever Jesus was passing through. When Jesus came to them and found them sleeping, he asked them “why are you sleeping?”
I feel Jesus asking me the same question, “my son, why are you sleeping?” “in this world where the evil one is roaming about every second seeking for a soul to devour, why are you sleeping?” “When you are expected to be morally and spiritually active lest you become a prey for the evil one and to the passions of the flesh, why are you sleeping?”
Once we accept to be at the side of Jesus, then we accept to be always spiritually awake lest we “come to the time of trial” (Lk 22:46). Are we sleeping or are we spiritually awake with Father our Master?
- The betrayal and desertion by his disciples
When one is not spiritually charged and spiritually awake, the result is always betrayal and desertion of Jesus when the time of trial comes. Because the disciples of Jesus failed to charge themselves spiritually, when it was time for them to demonstrate their affinity with Jesus, they fell short of their status. If they had been awake and with Jesus in prayer, they would have been one with Jesus in accepting the Father’s will.
But because they were sleeping, when it was time for Jesus to hand himself over, the disciples thought it was time for a war (cf Lk 22:49-50). If they had been in prayer, they would have realized that God’s fight is not of sword but of submission to the divine will.
At certain point, after Jesus had been arrested, none of his disciples remained in the scene except Peter (cf Lk 22:54). We remember that earlier on, Peter promised Jesus saying “Lord, I am ready to go with you to prison and to death” (Lk 22:33). Here in v.54, we see Peter following Jesus into the high priest’s house.
But when we had expected Peter to stand his ground and defend Jesus and his discipleship, he denied having known Jesus, not once nor twice, but thrice (Lk 22:56-60). In the high priest’s house, Peter was the only person remaining in Jesus’s team.
When it was time for Peter to testify and bear witness for Jesus, he said “I do not know him (Jesus)” (Lk 22:57). After having denied Jesus for three times, you can imagine how disappointing and heart breaking the gaze of Jesus to Peter was (Lk 22:61).
So also does Jesus turn always to look at us when he notices that instead of defending our relationship with him by the way we speak and act, we do the contrary. But when we come to our senses that we have betrayed Jesus; when we look at Jesus hanging on the cross and see how he gazes at us reminding us our friendship with him and his love for us, what do we do?
Do we run to the sacrament of reconciliation to weep for our sins, our denials of him and to ask him for pardon, or do we remain at the courtyard of the evil one receiving the temporary warmth of the world?
Dear friends, the feast of Palm Sunday ushers us into the most important week in the life of the Church and humanity as a whole. May we join our Lord in his passion for us in order to rise with him to the new life he desires for us.
Wishing you a very wonderful holy week
Fr. Henry Chukwuezugo Nnamah
Catholic Diocese of Aguleri