Good Friday: The Goodness of God Dying on the Cross

We are on our second day of the triduum. Today’s liturgy is called Good Friday of the Lord’s Passion. We don’t have a mass today. Instead, we have a liturgy which is made up of three parts: the Liturgy of the Word at which the Passion of Christ according to St. John is proclaimed and which ends with the Solemn Intercessions, the Adoration of the Holy Cross and Holy Communion.

Yes, this is the only day throughout the year where the church does not celebrate the Eucharist. There is also no wedding, baptism, confirmation and certainly no ordination. In fact, there are only two sacraments that are offered on this day: Reconciliation and the Anointing of the Sick. These sacraments truly underscore the meaning of this day and point to the reason why we call this Friday good: We call this Good Friday because it is a day of renewal, forgiveness and reconciliation.

Good Friday is a day of paradoxes. All four gospels openly tell of the passion of Jesus as a story of contradictions. It depicts Jesus proclaimed as king with a crown of thorns, a staff and clothed in a purple cloak. The soldiers spat on him and struck him on the head with the staff repeatedly. The people who shouted hosanna to our king when Jesus entered Jerusalem just a few days ago are the same people who shouted “Crucify him!” and elected Barabas to be released on the day of Passover. The greatest of these ironies is the cross. Jesus on the cross with the sign “Jesus of Nazareth, the King of the Jews,” died of a slow, painful, excruciating, gruesome, and humiliating death.

Franciscan Fr. Ron Rolheiser says that we tend to misunderstand “the passion of Jesus”. Spontaneously we think of it as the pain of the physical sufferings he endured on the road to his death. We are not helped by gruesome cultural depiction of Jesus’ passion like Mel Gibson’s film, “The Passion of the Christ.” This is also reinforced by our own Good Friday observances like the carrying of wooden crosses, crawling on rough pavement, self-flagellation and the re-enactment of actual crucifixion like the one in San Pedro Cutud, San Fernando, Pampanga.

This is not to downplay the brutality of Jesus’ pain but Rollheiser explains that what the evangelists focus on is not the scourging, the whips, the ropes, the nails, and the physical pain. They emphasize rather that, in all of this, Jesus is alone, misunderstood, lonely, isolated, without support, unanimity-minus-one. What’s emphasized is his suffering as a lover; the agony of a heart that’s ultra-sensitive, gentle, loving, understanding, warm, inviting, and hungry to embrace everyone but which instead finds itself misunderstood, alone, isolated, hated, brutalized, facing murder..[1] Think of the experience of dying covid-19 patients. Most of them die in isolation at the intensive care unit. Their families couldn’t go in and touch him or hold their hands. After they die, they are immediately cremated. It must have been so tragically sad.

Despite the brutality of the suffering and death of Jesus, however, the gospel of John portrays Jesus as victorious and in control of the whole situation. Franciscan Fr. John Boyd-Boland explains that John’s Jesus longs for the cup of suffering; he is determined to drink the “cup” of his death because this act is the ultimate in love, and reveals God’s love for us all. Then in his confrontation with Pilate, Jesus stands totally in command of the situation and Annas is left bewildered and confused. Having been struck on the face by the Temple police, Jesus is left totally composed after the incident. He replies that his teaching has always been open and explicit, “My kingdom is not of this world.” Here the prisoner interrogates his interrogator! Finally, upon the Calvary cross, Jesus dies with majestic assurance.

In openly depicting Jesus’ passion, suffering and death, are not the evangelists actually proclaiming that in a world of hatred, violence, and falsehood, truth, love, and goodness reigns? By showing Jesus’ resoluteness and benevolence up to the end, are not the evangelists decrying the travesty of worldly powers and pretentious kings instead? Could we have missed the greatest irony which the evangelists have employed?

We live in a world today not much different from the world when Jesus lived—a world full of contradictions and sufferings: Innocent and good people continue to suffer, the gap between the rich and the poor continue to widen, there is plenty of innocent killings, gender and racial discrimination continues, poverty and violence reigns. In the midst of the contradictions and suffering, the temptation is to go low and become like the worldly powers that supports and preserves these contradictions—violent, tyrannical, prejudiced, vindictive, manipulative and deceitful.

Following Jesus example, we need to embrace these paradoxes while standing true to ourselves. Sometimes we need to accept opposition to choose community; sometimes we need to accept bitter pain to choose health; sometimes we need to accept a fearful free-fall to choose safety; and sometimes we need to accept death in order to choose life. If we let fear stop us from doing these, our lives will never be whole again.

This is what Jesus has accomplished when he proclaimed in his last words in the gospel: “It is finished.” Jesus leads us to love, forgiveness, compassion and reconciliation despite the violence and brutality around him. God’s way is integration, reconciliation and communion. By his dying, Jesus reconciled once again heaven and earth.

As St. Paul proclaims,

“God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise;
God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong;
God chose what is low and despised in the world, things that are not,
to reduce to nothing things that are” (I Cor 1: 27 – 28).

Yes, ironically but perfectly, liberation is accomplished through God’s death. Liberation is accomplished through Jesus’ death on the cross.

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[1]Ron Rolheiser, OMI, The Agony in the Garden – The Special Place of Loneliness, February 22, 2004. Accessed 16/03/18 at http://ronrolheiser.com/the-agony-in-the-garden-the-special-place-of-loneliness/#.WqsieUxuI2w

HOLY THURSDAY: A NEW COMMANDMENT

Tonight we begin the paschal triduum. Paschal Triduum also called Easter Triduum, Holy Triduum, or The Three Days. They are the most important three days in the liturgy of the Catholic Church. First of this triduum is the evening mass of the Lord ’s Supper this Holy Thursday. In this mass we commemorate the Lord’s celebration of the Passover with his disciples. Being a Jew, Jesus and his disciples knew fully well the special meaning of the Passover. The Passover is the most important feast for the Jews.

The Jews celebrate Passover through a family meal. Traditionally the youngest child ask the question at the beginning of the meal: “Why is this night so special?  Why is this night so different from other nights?” There other questions that the child asks but clearly the questions are designed to relive and remember the Passover event—the story of the night of deliverance of the Israelites from Egyptian slavery.

Perhaps, during the Eucharist tonight we may ask why this night is so different from other nights. Why is this mass so different from other masses? Perhaps the most obvious reason what makes this mass special from other masses is the washing by the presider of the feet of 12 members of the community who represents the 12 disciples of Jesus.  All of the four gospels records the last supper. However, only John’s gospel mentions the washing of the feet. And this is a radical addendum to the last supper narrative.

We can only understand the radicality of John’s washing of the feet nuance to the last supper account if we understand the meaning of foot washing. In Biblical times, the dusty and dirty conditions of the region and the wearing of sandals necessitated foot-washing. Foot-washing, however, was reserved for the lowliest of menial servants. Jesus, therefore, by washing the feet of his disciples has willingly done the work of the slaves.

When I was a seminarian, part of our apostolate was to visit the Tahanan in Tayuman, Tondo which is run by the Missionaries of Charity of Mother Theresa. Tahanan is home to the elderly sick and dying collected by the sisters mostly from the streets. The first time I came there I was shocked at what I saw: The sisters bathing the sick, washing their clothes which were often soaked in shit, feeding them and nursing their wounds. I just silently mumbled, “My God, this is the work of slaves.” Indeed, the sisters are truly living out the mandatum of Jesus in tonight’s gospel.

Jesus was no slave but did what slaves usually do–wash the feet of their masters.  In the process, he freed his disciples out of slavery.  Jesus was no victim but immersed himself into the life of the victims.  In the process he liberated them so they may be victims no more.

Ironically, in our world today, we have masters but in reality they are slaves because they could not liberate others.  They can only attract followers who are fellow captives. Their captivation with power, wealth, and control prevents them to experience genuine freedom and to inculcate true liberation to others.

This is the reason why Holy Thursday is called Maundy Thursday. The name is taken from the first few Latin words sung at the ceremony of the washing of the feet,

“Mandatum novum do vobis ut diligatis invicem sicut dilexi vos”

(“I give you a new commandment, That ye love one another as I have loved you” [John 13:34]).

Jesus reinterpreted the meaning of Passover by becoming the example of a servant to his disciples. True freedom and liberation begins by taking the form of a slave and serving others. At the beginning of the triduum, Jesus calls us to join him in his passing over from slavery to freedom. “I no longer call you slaves but friends.”

Baclaran Church’s Perpetual Help Kitchen for Covid-19 frontliners and street families

In this time of pandemic, we pray to Jesus to give us the strenght and the courage that we may passover this terrible malady that has fallen into our world.  In this time of pandemic, the call to participate in Jesus’ passover becomes a greater calling as many people are dying, hungry and sick because of the virus. We can become true embodiment of the eucharist by our sharing of food and resources and reaching out to the most vulnerable in our society. We can truly follow Jesus’ mandatum of washing each other’s feet by our generous giving of ourselves even our lives, just as the frontliners have done, for the good of many.

Holy Thursday: A New Commandment

Tonight we begin the paschal triduum. Paschal Triduum also called Easter Triduum, Holy Triduum, or The Three Days. They are the most important three days in the liturgy of the Catholic Church.

First of this triduum is the evening mass of the Lord ’s Supper this Holy Thursday. In this mass we commemorate the Lord’s celebration of the Passover with his disciples. Being a Jew, Jesus and his disciples knew fully well the special meaning of the Passover. The Passover is the most important feast for the Jews.

The Jews celebrate Passover through a family meal. Traditionally the youngest child ask the question at the beginning of the meal: “Why is this night so special?  Why is this night so different from other nights?” There other questions that the child asks but clearly the questions are designed to relive and remember the Passover event—the story of the night of deliverance of the Israelites from Egyptian slavery.

Perhaps, during the Eucharist tonight we may ask why this night is so different from other nights. Why is this mass so different from other masses? Perhaps the most obvious reason what makes this mass special from other masses is the washing by the presider of the feet of 12 members of the community who represents the 12 disciples of Jesus.  All of the four gospels records the last supper. However, only John’s gospel mentions the washing of the feet. And this is a radical addendum to the last supper narrative.

We can only understand the radicality of John’s washing of the feet nuance to the last supper account if we understand the meaning of foot washing. In Biblical times, the dusty and dirty conditions of the region and the wearing of sandals necessitated foot-washing. Foot-washing, however, was reserved for the lowliest of menial servants. Jesus, therefore, by washing the feet of his disciples has willingly done the work of the slaves.

When I was a seminarian, part of our apostolate was to visit the Tahanan in Tayuman, Tondo which is run by the Missionaries of Charity of Mother Theresa. Tahanan is home to the elderly sick and dying collected by the sisters mostly from the streets. The first time I came there I was shocked at what I saw: The sisters bathing the sick, washing their clothes which were often soaked in shit, feeding them and nursing their wounds. I just silently mumbled, “My God, this is the work of slaves.” Indeed, the sisters are truly living out the mandatum of Jesus in tonight’s gospel.

Jesus was no slave but did what slaves usually do–wash the feet of their masters.  In the process, he freed his disciples out of slavery.  Jesus was no victim but immersed himself into the life of the victims.  In the process he liberated them so they may be victims no more.

Ironically, in our world today, we have masters but in reality they are slaves because they could not liberate others.  They can only attract followers who are fellow captives. Their captivation with power, wealth, and control prevents them to experience genuine freedom and to inculcate true liberation to others.

This is the reason why Holy Thursday is called Maundy Thursday. The name is taken from the first few Latin words sung at the ceremony of the washing of the feet,

“Mandatum novum do vobis ut diligatis invicem sicut dilexi vos”

(“I give you a new commandment, That ye love one another as I have loved you” [John 13:34]).

Jesus reinterpreted the meaning of Passover by becoming the example of a servant to his disciples. True freedom and liberation begins by taking the form of a slave and serving others. At the beginning of the triduum, Jesus calls us to join him in his passing over from slavery to freedom. “I no longer call you slaves but friends.”

Baclaran Church’s Perpetual Help Kitchen for Covid-19 frontliners and street families

In this time of pandemic, we pray to Jesus to give us the strenght and the courage that we may passover this terrible malady that has fallen into our world.  In this time of pandemic, the call to participate in Jesus’ passover becomes a greater calling as many people are dying, hungry and sick because of the virus. We can become true embodiment of the eucharist by our sharing of food and resources and reaching out to the most vulnerable in our society. We can truly follow Jesus’ mandatum of washing each other’s feet by our generous giving of ourselves even our lives, just as the frontliners have done, for the good of many.

Holy Monday: Preparing for the Passion, Death and Resurrection of Jesus

Throughout this holy week, the holiest of all weeks, we will reflect on the liturgical readings of each day. The readings of each day of the holy week lead us to the greatest event of our salvation–the passion and death of Jesus on the cross and his resurrection.

In the gospel (John 21: 1 – 11) of today’s Monday of the Holy Week, Jesus, after his grand arrival in Jerusalem, withdrew from the crowd and spent Sunday night quietly in the house of his friends, Mary, Martha and Lazarus at Bethany, the village at the foot of Mount Olives. Jesus may have sensed his impending suffering and death and chose to spend the last moments of his life in companionship with his friends. Mary, Martha and Lazarus. The siblings gladly received Him in their house and offered Him and his disciples a special dinner. 

John 21: 2 says, “So they gave a dinner for him there.” We can interpret this as a celebration of the resurrection of Lazarus. Mary, Martha and Lazarus “gave” him this dinner. This is a thank you dinner to Jesus for raising Lazarus from the dead. This is not just an ordinary evening meal among friends. Its focus is on Jesus and his amazing power in raising Lazarus from the dead. And Lazarus is right there reclining at the table:  “Martha served, and Lazarus was one of those reclining with him at table.”

Since this is a dinner to honor and thank Jesus for his gift of life, Mary will now make her presentation. Perhaps the whole family planned this moment. Perhaps they pooled their savings to buy this gift. Or perhaps it is a hugely valuable family heirloom that has been passed on for years, and now the time has come to pour it out.

Mary took a liter of costly perfumed oil
made from genuine aromatic nard
and anointed the feet of Jesus and dried them with her hair;
the house was filled with the fragrance of the oil.

Martha’s role was to thank Jesus by seeing to the details of the dinner, and Mary’s role was to thank Jesus by pouring this expensive ointment out on Jesus. In both these ways they would express their wonder and joy and thanks for the greatness of Jesus and his grace and power to raise Lazarus from the dead.

But Judas speaks up with unbelievable disregard for what Mary has done. Verse 4:

Then Judas the Iscariot, one of his disciples,
and the one who would betray him, said,
“Why was this oil not sold for three hundred days’ wages
and given to the poor?”

If Judas wasn’t exaggerating, this eleven-ounce flask of nard was worth about $25,000 (three hundred twelve-hour days at minimum wage, a denarius was a simple, full day’s wage). Judas’s scheme of values was so deeply different from Mary and Martha and Lazarus’s that in a few days he would do the opposite of giving $25,000 for Jesus: he would sell him for a thousand dollars (thirty pieces of silver).

John tells us in verse 6 what is really in Judas’s heart:

He said this not because he cared about the poor
but because he was a thief and held the money bag
and used to steal the contributions.

Now Jesus responds to Judas to leave Mary alone.

“Leave her alone.
Let her keep this for the day of my burial.
You always have the poor with you, but you do not always have me.”

Jesus appreciated the tremendous love behind Mary’s action and saw it as a symbolical anointing for his burial. Dying as a common criminal, Jesus would normally not have been anointed. (And, in fact, he was not anointed after his burial; when the women went to do the act on Sunday morning, Jesus was already risen.)

A few days later after this incident, Jesus will do the same loving service for his disciples, washing their feet before the last supper. Up to the very end of his life, Jesus, showed that we can find the greatest meaning of our lives through servanthood. The pinnacle of this servanthood is Jesus’ giving his own life on the cross.

What can we learn from this beautiful story as we enter Holy Week?

Holy week is the preparation for the resurrection of Jesus. The siblings Martha, Mary and Lazarus’ hearts were full of wonder, gratitude and joy for Jesus who raised Lazarus into new life. Their overflowing affection was demonstrated in their lavish offering of special dinner and Mary’s anointing of Jesus’ feet with a very expensive perfume. These days of Holy Week, indeed, is more of a celebration of the joy and wonder of Jesus’ resurrection inasmuch as it is a commeration of his passion and death.

But in order to fully participate in Jesus’ resurrection we need to pass through suffering and death with him. Jesus showed us what it means to suffer and die with him through a life of servanthood. He showed this not just on the cross but during the anointing and washing of disciples’ feet at the last supper. This was also demonstrated by Mary in today’s gospel when she anointed Jesus’ feet. Anointing has always been a symbol of being chosen and sent on a mission–a life of discipleship and service.

In commemoration of this beautiful experience in Jesus’ life, Catholic dioceses all over the world, gather together with all the priest and the bishop at a Mass called the Chrism Mass.  Obviously this cannot be done today in all the dioceses given the unfortunate circumstances of the lockdown.

During the Chrism Mass, the bishop consecrates the sacred oils to be used in the sacraments of Baptism, Anointing, and Holy Orders. Each parish receives its annual supply of these oils at the Chrism Mass, which in some dioceses is celebrated on the Monday of Holy Week. The chrism in these sacraments is a symbol of our participation in the paschal mystey of Jesus–his life, death and resurrection.

As we begin Holy Week, we are called to prepare and participate  in the passion, death and resurrection of our Lord Jesus.  We are not here this week just to be mere spectators. We are to be part of the work, which the Paschal Mystery of Jesus inaugurated.  Like Mary, we can be part of Jesus’ passing over from death to new life by becoming God’s servant. We, too, are to be servants, ready, if necessary, to suffer as Jesus did for the sake of our brothers and sisters.

5th Sunday of Lent: Dying to Give Life

As we enter into the fifth week of Lent, we draw closer and closer into the heart of the Lenten journey. As we said at the beginning of Lent, the heart of the Lenten journey is the paschal mystery of Jesus. Lent is journeying with Jesus in his passion, death and resurrection. As Jesus said in the gospel today,

Whoever serves me must follow me,
and where I am, there also will my servant be.
The Father will honor whoever serves me (John 12: 26).

In today’s 5th Sunday of Lent, Jesus talks about the approaching hour of his passion and death. Ironically, Jesus sees his passion and death, which he calls the hour, as a glorification. “The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified” (John 12: 23). The crucifixion is the moment when Jesus will be lifted up on the cross.

Jesus views his suffering and death always from the viewpoint of his resurrection. During this Lent, we are called by Jesus to see dying, suffering, penance and sacrifices from the perspective of the resurrection of Jesus. It is in this resurrection perspective of suffering and death that Jesus invites us to die with him. He proclaims,

Unless a grain of wheat falls to the ground and dies,
it remains just a grain of wheat;
but if it dies, it produces much fruit.
Whoever loves his life loses it,
and whoever hates his life in this world
will preserve it for eternal life (John 12: 24 – 25).

Jesus likens our lives to a grain of wheat. A single grain of wheat can yield thousands of new grains. But only if it falls into the ground and dies. If it does not die, it remains only a single grain. Like a grain of wheat, therefore, our lives can give life to thousand other lives. But only if we fall to the ground and die to ourselves. If we do not die, we remain a fruitless and insignificant individual.

Once again, Jesus talks about dying here from the perspective of the resurrection. Seen from the perspective of the resurrection, dying means active dying not passive dying. Active dying is intentional rather than submissive. Jesus showed this when he willingly accepted death on the cross. Many confused Jesus’ dying as submissive by reasoning that Jesus silently relented to all the pain and suffering inflicted upon him. Jesus’ suffering and death was not acceding to the oppressive powers that sentenced him to death. On the contrary, Jesus’ suffering and death was a very powerful act of resistance to violence and domination. We can equate Jesus’ dying to Mahatma Gandhi’s non-violent resistance which led to the independence of India from British rule.

Active dying is altruistic rather than self-centered. Active dying is not to nourish oneself but is directed to the other, a disinterested and selfless concern for the well-being of others. Active dying is more ontological, spiritual, psychological if you will, rather than physical. This implies that active dying is dying from the very core of our being. That is why before Jesus died on the cross, we can say that he already died–from the very core of his humanity. This was a very painful process for Jesus as shown in the agony of the garden. There, we saw Jesus profoundly struggling within his humanity but in the end relented to his Father’s will:

“Abba, Father,
for you all things are possible;
remove this cup from me;
yet, not what I want,
but what you want” (Mark 14: 36).

Oftentimes, we emphasize in Lent, especially during Holy Week, the physical and, therefore, gory details of the whipping, crowning with thorns, carrying of the cross, falling and crucifixion of Jesus. We are not helped by gruesome cultural depictions of Jesus’ passion like Mel Gibson’s film, “The Passion of the Christ.” This is also reinforced by our own Good Friday observances like the carrying of wooden crosses, crawling on rough pavement, self-flagellation and the re-enactment of actual crucifixion like the one in San Pedro Cutud, San Fernando, Pampanga. It is in this this context that Fr. Ron Rolheiser, OMI commented that we tend to misunderstand “the passion of Jesus”. This is not to downplay the brutality of Jesus’ pain but Rollheiser explains that what the evangelists focus on is not the scourging, the whips, the ropes, the nails, and the physical pain. They emphasize rather that, in all of this, Jesus is alone, misunderstood, lonely, isolated, without support, unanimity-minus-one. What’s emphasized is his suffering as a lover; the agony of a heart that’s ultra-sensitive, gentle, loving, understanding, warm, inviting, and hungry to embrace everyone but which instead finds itself misunderstood, alone, isolated, hated, brutalized, facing murder.[1]

Herein also lies the subtle power of the active dying of Jesus. The active dying of Jesus highlighted more the brutality, violence and injustice done to him. Jesus, by actively choosing death, has paradoxically unmasked the oppressive forces that caused his death. Thus, Jesus’ dying became a powerful symbol for the unjust death of millions of the innocent and the poor in history. The brutality of the crucifixion of Jesus despite his innocence is repeated today in the senseless death inflicted upon thousands of innocent people by the powerful, abusive and bullies of this world. We have seen this in our own country through the extra judicial killings of mostly poor people who were not given the opportunity to prove their innocence, the abject poverty and injustice which inflicted slow death to millions of poor people despite the enormous display of wealth in our world today, the killings of activists whose only crime is to stand for human rights, justice and of the defense of poor, the killings of innocent babies inside the womb, the deaths of innocent children from the dengvaxia vaccine. These deaths are senseless, unnecessary and repressive. Therefore, the cross of Jesus stands as a powerful symbol of protest against the killing of the innocent and the wickedness of the powerful who perpetuates the status quo of dominance and oppression.

While Jesus’ death was a non-violent protest against the dying of the innocent, Jesus invites us to a meaningful death–to active dying. Jesus calls us to actively lay down our lives for others: “No one has greater love than this, to lay down one’s life for one’s friends” (John 15: 13). The active dying of Jesus is repeated in history through the martyrs and saints who offered their lives not just for the church but for all humanity, the heroes who sacrificed their lives for their people, and the many nameless people who because of their work for justice, peace, freedom and human rights were unjustly killed, tortured and disappeared.

As we enter more intensely into the Lenten journey, Jesus calls us to actively die to ourselves. What does an active dying entail? It entails immersing more deeply into the paschal mystery of Jesus. It entails following Jesus more intensely in his passion, death and resurrection: “Where I am, there also will my servant be (John 12: 26).” Like Jesus, it entails profound love and humility. Jesus’ intense relationship and love for his Father motivated him to finally accept his cup of death on the cross. Jesus’ great love for the people especially the oppressed and rejects of society led him to the path of the cross. Following Jesus, we can only thread the path of active dying if we will have an intense relationship and great love for his Father and for others especially the weak and downtrodden. We need to become passionate and great lovers for God and humanity.

Furthermore, like Jesus “who, though he was in the form of God, did not regard equality with God … but emptied himself, taking the form of a slave” (Philippians 2: 6), we need to have profound humility. As Jesus said, “Unless a grain of wheat falls into the ground and dies (John 12: 25),” likewise, we need to fall into the ground. The Latin word for ground is humus which is also the root word for humility. Like Jesus we need to humble and die for ourselves so we can serve God and others.

Let me end with a prayer,

Lord Jesus! We call upon your name. Grant us love and humility so we may die and rise up with you. So we may become abundant fields of wheat for others. Amen.

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[1]Ron Rolheiser, OMI, The Agony in the Garden – The Special Place of Loneliness, February 22, 2004. Accessed 16/03/18 at http://ronrolheiser.com/the-agony-in-the-garden-the-special-place-of-loneliness/#.WqsieUxuI2w

Holy Wednesday: Handing Over to Darkness

Photo by Kat Jayne from Pexels

On this last day of Lent, Holy Wednesday of the Passion Week, we hear in the gospel how Judas cut a backroom deal with Ananias and his corrupt family, to hand over Jesus for 30 pieces of silver. 

One of the Twelve, who was called Judas Iscariot,
went to the chief priests and said,
“What are you willing to give me
if I hand him over to you?”
They paid him thirty pieces of silver,
and from that time on he looked for an opportunity to hand him over.

This action by Judas earned him the title of “spy” from medieval Christians, in accord with the traditional definition of the English word, “one who keeps secret watch on a person or thing to obtain information.” Thus, this day has often been called Spy Wednesday.

Handing over was the term used in the gospel for Judas’ action. The term occurs three times in today’s passage. In Greek the term handing over is used for betrayal.  This term ‘handing over’ is like a refrain all through the Gospel and reaches a climax here. John the Baptist was handed over. Now we see Jesus being handed over. The followers of Jesus will also be handed over into the hands of those who want to put an end to their mission. Today, Jesus and his disciples are handed over to darkness.  

Many parishes and religious communities celebrate a special service of evening prayer known as Tenebrae (from the Latin for growing darkness) on this night, during which Scripture passages on the Passion are read and a candle extinguished after each reading, until the church or chapel is in darkness.

During the meal, Jesus drops the bombshell: “One of you is about to betray me.” It is revealing that none of them points a finger at someone else. “Is it I, Lord?” Each one realises that he is a potential betrayer of Jesus. And, in fact, in the midst of the crisis they will all abandon him.

How easily do we blame Judas for Jesus’ death and how fast we are to judge him. I am not removing any culpability from Judas but most of the disciples also betrayed Jesus. We, in one way or another, have also betrayed Jesus. The fatal mistake of Judas, perhaps, is that compared to most of the disciples, he never came back to Jesus. Darkness and guilt has so overwhelmed him that he was not able to come to the light. We can, like Judas, either abandon Jesus in despair or, like Peter and the other disciples, come back to him in genuine repentance.

This Holy Wednesday, before the Triduum happens, Jesus invites us not to remain and be overwhelmed by darkness and evil, but progress to the path of light and life with him. Jesus calls us from handing over to passing over from darkness to light.

 

 

 

Holy Monday: Preparing for Jesus’ Death

Following Jesus’ grand arrival in Jerusalem, Jesus withdrew from the crowd and spent Sunday night quietly in the house of his friends, Mary, Martha and Lazarus at Bethany, the village at the foot of Mount Olives. Jesus sensing his impending suffering and death, spent the last moments of his life in companionship with his friends. Mary, Martha and Lazarus gladly received Him in their house and offered Him and his disciples something to eat. 

True to character, Martha is the active hostess. Mary,  on the other hand, brings in a jar of an expensive perfumed ointment filling the house with its fragrance. Mary anointed Jesus’ feet and dried them with her hair. 

Jesus appreciated the tremendous love behind Mary’s action and saw it as a symbolical anointing for his burial. Dying as a common criminal, Jesus would normally not have been anointed. (And, in fact, he was not anointed after his burial; when the women went to do the act on Sunday morning, Jesus was already risen.)

Following this tradition, Catholic dioceses all over the world, gather together with all the priest and the bishop at a Mass called the Chrism Mass. The bishop consecrates the sacred oils to be used in the sacraments of Baptism, Anointing, and Holy Orders. Each parish receives its annual supply of these oils at the Chrism Mass, which in some dioceses is celebrated on the Monday of Holy Week.

A few days later, Jesus will do the same loving service for his disciples, washing their feet before the last supper. Up to the very end of his life, Jesus, showed that we can find the greatest meaning of our lives through servanthood. The pinnacle of this servanthood is Jesus’ giving his own life on the cross.

As we begin Holy Week, we are called to prepare for the commemoration of the passion and death of our Lord Jesus.  We are not here this week just to be mere spectators. We are to be part of the work, which the Paschal Mystery of Jesus inaugurated.  Like Mary, we can be part of Jesus’ passing over from death to new life by becoming God’s servant. We, too, are to be servants, ready, if necessary, to suffer as Jesus did for the sake of our brothers and sisters.

How to turn Holy Week into a pilgrimage — Aleteia — Catholic Spirituality, Lifestyle, World News, and Culture

The liturgies bring us to specific, physical places, which enable us to accompany Christ in his footsteps.

via How to turn Holy Week into a pilgrimage — Aleteia — Catholic Spirituality, Lifestyle, World News, and Culture

Holy Week ends in Resurrection, not in Crucifixion

In the National Shrine of Our Mother of Perpetual Help in Baclaran, Holy Week is the biggest week of the year. Throughout the Holy Week celebrations thousands of devotees will flock to the shrine every day of the Holy Week. Many devotees will attend the liturgical services of the Holy Week at the shrine. The lines at the confessional will be the longest in the whole year. Many will do the stations of the cross inside and outside of the church.

The highlight of the Holy Week activities is the Paschal Triduum: Holy Thursday – Evening Mass of the Lord’s Supper, Good Friday of the Lord’s Passion and the Holy Saturday evening of Easter Vigil. Among these most important liturgies,  Good Friday is the most well-attended. The church is packed and crowds overflow to the outside of the church. But the same big crowd is nowhere to be found during the Easter Vigil. In my almost ten years at the shrine, Easter Vigil crowd could hardly fill the church.

This somehow reflects the Filipino’s penchant for identifying more with Christ’s suffering and pain.  Filipinos have suffered for so long time that the ordinary Filipino is called Juan de la Cruz (John of the cross). No wonder, two of the most popular icons of Christ amongst Filipinos are the Poong Jesus Nazareno and the Santo Entierro – both icons depict Christ’s suffering and death.

Fr. Ferdinand R. Santos once commented that the Philippine Holy Week is world-famous, not for its piety, but for its bloody flagellants and actual crucifixions that identify with pain in its most literal and physical extreme. Filipino religiosity can make suffering appear as an end in itself. This is a far cry from the liturgy of the triduum which conveys that the passion of Jesus doesn’t end in suffering but leads inexorably to the resurrection.

Santos warns us that detached from the resurrection, the suffering and death of Christ becomes a tragedy. Worse, it does tremendous violence to the innate human capacity to rise above defeat.

Jesus, indeed, experienced the most brutal physical pain and death any human being can ever endure. Jesus, in his own humanity, however, did not want to go through his suffering and death. In the end, Jesus willingly accepted suffering and death on the cross not because he took pleasure from pain or humiliation but to fulfill the Father’s will; “Father, if you are willing, remove this cup from me; yet, not my will but yours be done” (Luke 22:42). His struggle to say yes to his Father’s will was so intense that he sweat blood.

Consequently, God does not want to inflict pain on us nor does God want us to suffer foolishly and die a senseless death. Injustice, poverty, war and hunger are social evils that are not acceptable to God, and never have been. This goes without saying that God does not want us to inflict pain on ourselves even if it is to commemorate God’s own suffering and death on Good Friday. God willingly suffered and died because it was God’s way of leading us to the true meaning of glory and new life. 

The divine perspective on suffering and death challenges our perspective of glory and victory.  Glory and triumph in human standards is to bask in fame, power, wealth, honor and influence. Seen through this standard, Jesus’ suffering and death was a massive failure. But God’s glory and victory is different from ours. God’s glory and victory is expressed in various times and places in the Gospel, like in the Beatitudes, in Jesus’ parables and Mary, representing the human response–Magnificat. In these proclamations, God’s glory and victory represents the reversal of fortune: In God’s Kingdom those who struggle in life now—those who are at the bottom or on the edges of human society—will suddenly find themselves at the top and in the center. On the other hand, those who now enjoy the greatest human security and social advantage will experience the opposite of their lives on earth.

Seen through God’s standard of glory and triumph, Jesus’ suffering and death, therefore, was a powerful protest against all forms of oppression and domination. Jesus’ resistance to the cruel and inhuman acts by his captors represents the strongest protest against evil and subjugation.    

Holy Week is not the time to try to replicate Jesus’ physical suffering. No human reenactment of Jesus crucifixion, though how brutal it can be, can ever repeat Jesus’ pain and suffering. Instead, Holy Week is the time for the deepest examination of our lives, our values, our attitudes vis-a-vis Jesus’ gospel values and standards. This Holy Week all of us will stand trial before Jesus. How did we continue to crucify Jesus in our world by our sinful embrace of the world’s standards and values? How did we continue to crucify Jesus in our world by the pursuit of our own glory? How did we continue to crucify Jesus in our world by inflicting humiliation, pain and suffering to others especially the weak?

Our responses to these self-examination represents the crosses that we shall carry to our own Calvary with Jesus. These are the crosses that we need to willfully be crucified to.  These are the crosses that we need to willingly die to. 

By dying to these crosses, we shall allow the new life that we receive at our baptism to rise up again. At the end of Holy Week, the celebration of Jesus’ resurrection at the Easter Vigil of the Holy Night of Easter, we can truly renew our faith and proclaim our allegiance to God’s power of love and goodness and at the same time proclaim our fundamental opposition to evil. 

May you have a blessed Holy Week.

 

 

 

Entering Holy Week with Our Mother of Perpetual Help

Tomorrow we start the Holy Week. Holy Week, the last week of Lent, is the holiest of all weeks of the year simply because it is the week when we commemorate the suffering and death of Jesus that will lead to his resurrection.

Bro. Daniel Korn, C.Ss.R., a Redemptorist brother from the Denver Province, invites us to enter Holy Week with Our Mother of Perpetual Help.  We can do this by contemplating on the icon of Our Mother of Perpetual Help.

As we embark on the journey of Holy Week, let us turn our eyes towards the image of Our Mother of Perpetual Help. Throughout this Lenten season, the Icon of Our Mother of Perpetual Help has invited us to contemplate the mysteries of the Passion, Death and Resurrection of Jesus. Do you know that the second name of the Icon is the Virgin of the Passion?

Two angels present to us the instruments that were used in the passion and death of Jesus. Center our attention on the Christ child as he looks toward the Angel Gabriel in the icon. We can see how Jesus is straining towards the Angel with the cross and nails by the mark on his neck.

With that clear image, the artist tells us that Jesus is focused with great attention upon his pending pain and death. By the look on Jesus’s face, like the look of his Mother, he is contemplating the meaning of these symbols that foreshadow his passion.

Through our Baptism we were plunged into this very mystery of the dying and rising of Jesus. In our daily actions we are called to show forth the image of Christ, the Redeemer of the world.

Spend time this week often praying with the icon of Our Mother of Perpetual Help. Give our attention to Jesus and the angels who present the instruments of the passion. Remember Mary, the Mother of Sorrows, and keep company with her during the days ahead.

May we all have a blessed Holy Week with Our Mother of Perpetual Help.