Palm
Sunday of the Lord’s Passion
At
the Mass
 |
| MS M.44 fol. 6r |
Dear brothers and sisters,
The character of the Apostle Saint
Peter is an intriguing one. He is a man who both loves Jesus deeply and one who
repeatedly resists his will. We see this today as we reflect on the Passion of
the Lord. It is Saint Peter’s loving devotion to Jesus that draws him to that fire in the courtyard of the
high priest, while the others, except for John, had fled. And it is his repeated
resistance to the will of the Lord that keeps him at the fire. Is our love for Jesus strong enough to bring us to the
fire? Is our resistance to his will stubborn enough to keep as at the fire?
We also find something curious in the
dialogue with those bystanders at the fire. As he answers their questions,
Peter cannot bring himself even to mention
the name of Jesus: ‘I do not know this man about whom you are talking.’ His
denial has progressed from evasion (cf. Mark 14:68) to outright repudiation (cf.
Mark 14:70) to perjury (cf. Mark 14:71). But there is an ironic truth in his
denial: he does not yet truly know Jesus.[1]
In this, Saint Peter is a man very
much like many of us. As we enter this most holy of weeks, do we truly know
Jesus? How often do we evade answering questions or about speaking about Jesus?
During this week in which we
reflect upon the most important events ever to have happened in the universe,
we can draw near to Saint Peter at the fire. It is at that fire that we can
each begin
to
meditate on [Jesus’] passion [and] begin to be illumined by the fire of divine
love that radiates from the heart of Jesus through every moment of his
sufferings, to begin to experience that in his passion he loved me and gave himself for me (Gal 2:20).[2]
The closer we draw near to this
fire of divine love, the more we can understand and experience the mercy of
Christ. The more we allow his heart to warm our own, the more we will desire to
become like him and warm the colder areas of our own lives.
We find another curious aspect in
that alabaster jar from which the woman anointed the feet of Jesus. The Greek
word that our translation gives as “broke” literally means “shattered;” “the
woman gives up any possibility of reusing the flask or saving some of its
contents” (Mark 14:3).[3] Her
action was more than a physical one; it carried a deeper meaning with it. She
withheld nothing from the Lord Jesus and placed her very being at his service;
may we, too, not be afraid of being known by Jesus and shatter the jars of our stubbornness,
pride, and self-absorption at his feet. Let us place ourselves fully in his
service and so be transformed and renewed by the power of his love. Amen.
[1] Mary Healy, Catholic Commentary on Sacred Scriptures: The Gospel of Mark (Grand
Rapids, Michigan: Baker Academic, 2008), 303.
[2] Ibid., 302
[3] Ibid., 277
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