Daily Gospel Reflection

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March 24, 2024

Palm Sunday of the Lord’s Passion
Mk 14:1-31
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The Passover and the Feast of Unleavened Bread
were to take place in two days’ time.
So the chief priests and the scribes were seeking a way
to arrest him by treachery and put him to death.
They said, “Not during the festival,
for fear that there may be a riot among the people.”

When he was in Bethany reclining at table
in the house of Simon the leper,
a woman came with an alabaster jar of perfumed oil,
costly genuine spikenard.
She broke the alabaster jar and poured it on his head.
There were some who were indignant.
“Why has there been this waste of perfumed oil?
It could have been sold for more than three hundred days’ wages
and the money given to the poor.”
They were infuriated with her.
Jesus said, “Let her alone.
Why do you make trouble for her?
She has done a good thing for me.
The poor you will always have with you,
and whenever you wish you can do good to them,
but you will not always have me.
She has done what she could.
She has anticipated anointing my body for burial.
Amen, I say to you,
wherever the gospel is proclaimed to the whole world,
what she has done will be told in memory of her.”

Then Judas Iscariot, one of the Twelve,
went off to the chief priests to hand him over to them.
When they heard him they were pleased and promised to pay him money.
Then he looked for an opportunity to hand him over.

On the first day of the Feast of Unleavened Bread,
when they sacrificed the Passover lamb,
his disciples said to him,
“Where do you want us to go
and prepare for you to eat the Passover?”
He sent two of his disciples and said to them,
“Go into the city and a man will meet you,
carrying a jar of water.
Follow him.
Wherever he enters, say to the master of the house,
‘The Teacher says, “Where is my guest room
where I may eat the Passover with my disciples?”’
Then he will show you a large upper room furnished and ready.
Make the preparations for us there.”
The disciples then went off, entered the city,
and found it just as he had told them;
and they prepared the Passover.

When it was evening, he came with the Twelve.
And as they reclined at table and were eating, Jesus said,
“Amen, I say to you, one of you will betray me,
one who is eating with me.”
They began to be distressed and to say to him, one by one,
“Surely it is not I?”
He said to them,
“One of the Twelve, the one who dips with me into the dish.
For the Son of Man indeed goes, as it is written of him,
but woe to that man by whom the Son of Man is betrayed.
It would be better for that man if he had never been born.”

While they were eating,
he took bread, said the blessing,
broke it, and gave it to them, and said,
“Take it; this is my body.”
Then he took a cup, gave thanks, and gave it to them,
and they all drank from it.
He said to them,
“This is my blood of the covenant,
which will be shed for many.
Amen, I say to you,
I shall not drink again the fruit of the vine
until the day when I drink it new in the kingdom of God.”
Then, after singing a hymn,
they went out to the Mount of Olives.

Then Jesus said to them,
“All of you will have your faith shaken, for it is written:
I will strike the shepherd,
and the sheep will be dispersed.
But after I have been raised up,
I shall go before you to Galilee.”
Peter said to him,
“Even though all should have their faith shaken,
mine will not be.”
Then Jesus said to him,
“Amen, I say to you,
this very night before the cock crows twice
you will deny me three times.”
But he vehemently replied,
“Even though I should have to die with you,
I will not deny you.”
And they all spoke similarly.

Reflection

Tom Jackson '10 M.A.
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Growing up, I always thought that Palm Sunday was a strange day. My little siblings and I began by picking out the best-looking palms (and I would try my best not to use the palms to poke them). Then, Mass started with a reading about the crowd welcoming Jesus into Jerusalem and praising him with “Hosanna in the highest!”

When the Liturgy of the Word began, things abruptly turned to today’s gospel. Even to a kid, the suffering of Jesus on his way to the cross is powerful and strange. In my church, the congregation would speak the crowd’s words, “Crucify him! Crucify him!” I never knew how to feel about that. I couldn’t imagine being in that crowd wanting to kill someone, especially Jesus, after praising him as the King of Kings.

As I’ve gotten older, I have come to realize that Palm Sunday does indeed fit together, and it fits together through the eyes of the crowd. The crowd is the counterpoint to Jesus. Instead of remaining firm in purpose and identity like Jesus, the crowd is fickle, moving swiftly from praise and honor to condemnation and hatred.

I am so often a member of that crowd. We all are. We cheer and honor Jesus with our words and, at times, even strive for true holiness, yet we also stray from God and choose sin and selfishness. Like the crowd, we choose to crucify Jesus. To be human is to be in this very state of fluctuation: to strive, to fail, to turn back, to fail again, and ultimately (hopefully) to always turn towards God again and again as many times as it takes.

This Palm Sunday, I pray that we work to reconcile these two parts of ourselves. On this side of the veil of tears, we may never be perfect. We may often fall and join the crowd in crucifying Jesus, but we must also remember the Passion is not the end, and there is resurrection yet to come.

Prayer

Andrew Fritz, C.S.C.

Lord Jesus Christ, today you make your entrance into Jerusalem. Make your entrance today into the Kingdom of our hearts. We lay our lives before you like living palm branches. Take possession of all that is yours, for you live and reign forever and ever. Amen.

Saint of the Day

St. Óscar Romero

On October 14, 2018, Pope Francis canonized seven new saints of the Church, one of whom was the much-loved Archbishop Óscar Romero, long honored as a saint and martyr by the people of El Salvador. In standing with the marginalized and standing up to those who use their power to abuse and oppress the poor among the children of God, even at the cost of his life, Óscar Romero truly embodied Christ's words in John's Gospel: "Greater love has no one than this, that one lay down his life for his friends" (Jn 15:13).

Óscar Romero was born on August 15, 1917, in Cuidad Barrios, El Salvador. The young Óscar attended the local public school from grades 1-3, and then studied under a tutor, as the public school offered no further education. His father trained Óscar as a carpenter, and, while Óscar was quite adept as a carpenter's apprentice, he wanted to become a priest. Thus, Óscar entered the minor seminary in San Miguel at the age of thirteen, and then the national seminary in San Salvador after his graduation.

Óscar attended the Gregorian University in Rome, completing his studies cum laude at the age of twenty-four, one year too young to be ordained a priest. Accordingly, Óscar was ordained a year later, on April 4, 1942, in the thick of World War II. Óscar obtained another degree in theology, and then, once called back by his bishops, he returned home to El Salvador at the age of twenty-six.

Óscar was assigned to a parish and quickly gained a reputation for his care for the imprisoned and the poor, and his beautiful, impassioned sermons. In 1970, Óscar was appointed an auxiliary bishop of San Salvador, then, in 1974, he was appointed the bishop of the Diocese of Santiago de María, a rural diocese.

On February 23, 1977, Óscar was appointed archbishop of San Salvador, El Salvador's capital. Many wealthy members of the city's elite were pleased that Óscar, a Roman-trained, conservative bishop, had been appointed. As Marxist-infused liberation theology was growing in popularity throughout Latin America, those in power feared being ousted. But, to their chagrin, very soon after his appointment, the new Archbishop Romero's theological and political ideas underwent a rapid transformation. On March 12, 1977, Archbishop Romero's dear friend Rutilio Grande, himself a Catholic priest, was cruelly murdered by government thugs. Grande had been living in solidarity with the rural poor and speaking out against the military government. Grande’s death was a watershed moment for Archbishop Romero, as he realized that being a Catholic and being a priest meant standing with the poor and being a prophet against the establishment. Archbishop Romero ordered three days of mourning and a funeral mass in San Salvador's cathedral, despite advice to the contrary from those who feared government repercussions.

The rise to power of the Revolutionary Government Junta in 1979 led to increasing violence across the country, which would eventually become over twelve years of fighting. This escalating violence of the Salvadorean Civil War began to tear the country at the seams. Throughout the civil unrest, Archbishop Romero called for peace, held accountable the governments that were financing the violence, and criticized the Salvadorean government for its persecution of the Catholic Church. In his homily at Mass on March 23, the day before he died, Archbishop Romero rebuked the Salvadorean army for its violence against the citizens of El Salvador: “In the name of God, and in the name of this suffering people whose cries rise to heaven more loudly each day, I beg you, I implore you, I order you, in the name of God, stop the repression!”

Óscar Romero was murdered on March 24, 1980, while consecrating the Eucharist during Mass. His last words were a prayer for mercy for his assassin. Despite the danger of attending the funeral, thousands of Salvadorans attended his funeral Mass, even as the army fired into the congregation. His assassin has never been brought to justice.

Pope Francis beatified Óscar Romero in May 2015 in San Salvador. A crowd of more than 250,000 gathered to pay their respects to Archbishop Romero. Óscar Romero was canonized on October 14, 2018 at St. Peter's Basilica in Rome. The photograph to the right shows Archbishop Romero with Paul VI, who was canonized on the same day.

Saint Óscar Romero, bishop, martyr, and prophetic voice for the people of God—pray for us!

To learn even more about Saint Óscar Romero, watch this video lecture from the McGrath Institute for Church Life at the University of Notre Dame.