Palm Sunday

Moving from Lent into Holy Week

Although we are still technically in the season of Lent, Palm Sunday of the Lord’s Passion shifts us into the unique time of Holy Week.

Holy Thursday is traditionally the Chrism Mass, held by the bishop to consecrate all the sacramental oils used in the coming year. Thursday evening is the Evening Mass of the Lord’s Supper. Then there is Good Friday of the Lord’s Passion. The Easter Vigil follows on Saturday evening. These three services actually constitute a single liturgy – the Triduum. This is most starkly evident on Good Friday when the presider processes in with no fanfare and no opening Rites. The Easter Vigil liturgy is the oldest liturgy the church possesses and is traditionally the time to baptize and receive adult Catholics into the faith.

As we enter into Holy Week we often want to rush right to Easter’s joy. But Holy Week reminds us, as did Lent, that Easter joy is only gained by the road of suffering. Are we willing to walk these days alongside Christ as he suffers?

Today’s Readings

Today is a victory parade! How is the victory won? On the cross. It’s an illogical joy! Jesus rides in as a lowly conqueror on a donkey to claim his throne. He does not save the world with worldly power, but rather with love. It reminds us that the only entry into Christ is through his love for us, a love which encompasses humility and suffering. Having the victory parade before the cross reminds us that liturgy happens in the context of kairos time, not chronological time.

Much of what we know about ancient Christian liturgy comes to us from a woman named Egeria. Between 381 and 384 AD she made a pilgrimage to the Holy Land and visited most of the popular spots of the day. In a letter back home she described the Holy Week liturgies as they were practiced by the Christians in Jerusalem.

You can read more about Egeria and read her account here
Another good article can be found here.

Isaiah 50:4-7

Isaiah I: shape up or else; exile is coming 1-39
Isaiah II: Book of Consolation, comfort in captivity 40-55 Deutero Isaiah (suffering servant songs)
Isaiah III: going home 56-66 Trito Isaiah; struggle for a new temple and new leadership

Chapter 49 through the beginning of chapter 51 moves us from sorrow to the hope of redemption. The people are in exile and long to return home. They need hope to persevere. This is the same movement echoed by Holy Week: we move through the sorrow of Jesus’ suffering and death into the hope of the resurrection.

Today’s reading is an excerpt from one of the suffering servant songs (Isaiah 42:1–4; Isaiah 49:1–6; Isaiah 50:4–7; and Isaiah 52:13–53:12). All these songs describe someone who brings hope and salvation. In their original context, they describe a nation rather than an individual. This is because the society was collectivistic with an emphasis on family and groups rather than our individualistic society with an emphasis on the person. So these are traits of a whole group of people. It wasn’t until the Christians read back through this material that they picked it up and applied it to a single person. The application of the suffering servant songs to Jesus is probably the oldest theology in the New Testament.

Everywhere these suffering servant songs appear, they interrupt the narrative flow of the surrounding text. If removed, the flow is restored. It’s almost as if they were not native to the text and someone just stuck them in at random places.

Another translation renders verse 4 as
The Lord YHWH has given me a disciple’s tongue
that I may know how to sustain the weary.
The word rouses me in the morning,
in the morning he rouses my ear
to hear like a “disciple.”
He rouses my ear to hear like a disciple.
Disciple is the passive form of the Hebrew word “to teach.” One must first experience what is to be transmitted to others just as Jesus will experience the passion for us. Experiencing what one teaches is part of what it means to be a disciple.

We’ll see verses 5-7 play out in the gospel reading.

How do you exercise a “disciple’s tongue” by sharing your experience with others?

Philippians 2:6-11

Biblical commentator Charles Barclay had this to say about this passage: “the diversity of opinion prevailing among interpreters is enough to fill the student with despair and to afflict him with intellectual paralysis.” This may be the most commented-on passage in the New Testament.

The genre of this reading is not systematic theology – it’s a hymn for public worship; it’s poetry and song. Describing Jesus as “in the form of God” and “taking on human likeness” is metaphorical rather than theological language. A priest named Arius tried to read this poetry as literal and, based on that, he taught that Jesus was not God. That theological debate was solved by the Council of Nicaea in 325. We have Arius to thank for every week tripping over the words “consubstantial with the Father” in the Nicene Creed.

Most likely, Paul was not the original author of this hymn as it has a different vocabulary and style. This may be the earliest Christian hymn we possess.

A key theme of this letter is JOY. Not a superficial joy in the absence of suffering and difficulty, but rather a deep joy that can spring forth out of a prison cell (1:7,13), the suffering church (1:29-30) and the possibility of martyrdom.

The letter to the Philippians was concerned with unity. In this letter Paul was addressing a pastoral crisis: there was danger of division and he exhorts them to unity. Jesus is the model of this. The central event in the drama of salvation is an act of humble self-emptying. Our Unity comes through renunciation of the natural, selfish state and the taking on of the divine state.

A great way to pray with this passage is to sing it or listen to it in musical format. You might want to make up your own melody and sing it. Or you can listen to one of many chant versions here.

Matthew 26-27

Every year on Palm Sunday we read a different gospel account of the Passion – the trial, suffering, death, and burial of Christ.

The term “Passion” comes from the Latin verbs patior and passus, “to suffer, bear, endure”, from which also comes “patience, patient”. It is the short final period in the earthly life of Jesus Christ. Passus is the root of the word passive. Up until now Jesus has been in active ministry. Now he is passive to the work of God.

One small detail I will point out in this reading: 27:51 the Temple veil is torn from “top to bottom.” The veil in the temple was a huge, immensely heavy curtain that separated the holy of holies from the outside. It prevented ordinary people from entering God’s presence. There’s no way a person could tear it, even from the bottom. For it to tear and tear from the top down is God’s action. The veil has been removed – we are no longer prevented from entering God’s presence!

It’s easy to get lost in the proclamation of such a long reading! I’d encourage you to set aside time before Sunday to read slowly and prayerfully through this passage. If you’d rather listen to the passage, a dramatized version is available here: chapter 26s, chapter 27. Try to engage your imagination and enter the drama. Maybe choose one of the characters and try to view the events through that character’s eyes. Possibilities include:

• Judas
• Peter
• James or John, the sons of Zebedee
• One of the other disciples
• One of the chief priests or elders
• The high priest Caiaphas
• Someone in the courtyard with Peter
• Pilate
• Barabbas
• Pilate’s wife
• Someone in the crowd
• A soldier
• Simon of Cyrene
• One of the thieves crucified with Jesus
• Mary Magdalene
• Joseph of Arimathea
• Jesus

What details emerge as you read or listen from a specific point of view? How does it help you feel more connected to and a part of Jesus’ suffering?

Questions to ponder

How do you exercise a “disciple’s tongue” by sharing your experience with others?

What details emerge as you read or listen to the gospel from a specific point of view? How does it help you feel more connected to and a part of Jesus’ suffering?

How do these readings prepare you for the coming joyous Paschal feast?

Scripture texts in this work are taken from the New American Bible, revised edition © 2010, 1991, 1986, 1970 Confraternity of Christian Doctrine, Washington, D.C. and are used by permission of the copyright owner. All Rights Reserved. No part of the New American Bible may be reproduced in any form without permission in writing from the copyright owner.

© 2023 Kelly Sollinger