Ps 22:8-9, 17-18, 19-20, 23-24
Phil 2:6-11
Mk 14:1-15:47
"Chasing Donkeys, Fickle World, Self-Accusation"
(Youth Mass)
What an incredible reading that we have today!! Do you get to goto the movies often? I don’t know about you, but when I go to see a movie I want to see the movie trailers. Today’s reading is a movie trailer for what we are about to experience later this week starting this coming Thursday. It’s called the Easter Triduum. Not only that, this whole is called “Holy Week” because well… this week is the holiest week of our Church calendar. We have “Spy” Wednesday… where Judas goes and makes a deal with the Pharisees. We have Maundy Thursday – the Lord’s Last Supper and his commandment for us to Love one another, we have Good Friday – you guys have to know what that day means otherwise we should go home. We have the Easter Vigil on Saturday and then Easter Sunday!! This week is incredibly holy. But today’s Gospel recounts the Passion of our Lord – from His triumphal entrance into Jerusalem to his death on Golgotha. There’s just so much to talk about, but I am going to have a few things I want to bring to your attention and have you think about.
The first thing is that Jesus is riding in on a colt, a small donkey. This is something that most people don’t know. But the fact that Jesus, who is considered to be the Messiah, the new King of Israel, is riding in on a donkey is completely opposite of what a king is supposed to ride. He’s supposed to ride a war horse, because he is the conquering king. The irony is, he is riding on a beast of burden, a lowly donkey, and people are still cheering for him!!! It would be like the president of the United States riding through Brenham on a go-kart. But yet people are cheering. Does anybody have a donkey at home? Is it easy to ride? I had a friend who I was with on a silent retreat for one week. We spent our time in prayer and usually minded our own business. But towards the middle of the retreat, I was laying down in the grass and heard this crazy sound coming from the pasture next door. It was my friend creeping up on him like a tiger in the grass trying to get close to it to pet it. My friend said it was hard to ride a donkey – it was definitely humiliating for him. And so that’s how I remember Jesus coming into Jerusalem: Christ comes into the world conquering it not by a chariot or warhorse or the sword, but through humility – riding humbly into town on a lowly animal – conquering the world in peace.
The second thing I want to talk about is this crowd in Jerusalem. People are people and they are fickle. The Gospel readings today, cover an entire week… from Sunday and then to Thursday and Friday. Not even one week’s time, they went from singing the Lord’s praises to saying, Crucify Him! Crucify Him!! How fast do we pass judgment on the people we know and the strangers we meet? How do we really know if this friend is a good friend or a bad friend? Do we even bother to find out the truth? Every time you condemn your friends, making fun of them, teasing them or talking behind their back – you are doing the same thing the crowd did to Jesus. See how many people betrayed Jesus in this story? Not only the crowd, but even two of His best friends Peter and Judas specifically, but it is said that all of the disciples deserted Jesus save for one. One guy even ran off naked (I always found that part of scripture strange, but it turns out this has theological significance which I won’t get into here…). In the same way, that there is a temptation to be one of the crowd condemning, don’t forget also that because you are a Catholic Christian the world will seek to condemn you too. There will be times in your life, perhaps even now, you will feel the world reject you like Jesus was rejected – today you are popular and loved and the next day you are last week’s leftovers. But Jesus went through it for us and knows that we can handle when we ask Him to help us.
Finally, I want you to notice how our situation has changed in reading the Gospel. Today is special because we’ve broken it up into parts. It makes sense that Father is always Jesus and the narrator and the speaker are usually a single individual. However, who is the crowd? Everyone. What does this mean? It means that the Gospel no longer is read or proclaimed to you, but you become part of the Gospel. No longer are you passive observers to the story, but you are now actually part of the story of welcoming Jesus into Jerusalem and also there to crucify him. I remember when I was younger back at my home parish and we were reading the passion much like we are today. When it came time for us to say, Crucify Him! a little boy jumped the gun and screamed it out at the top of his lungs. It took me by total surprise and total shock. Here was this boy screaming with such passion like he was out for blood! “Crucify Him Crucify Him!” It was like I was there 2,000 years ago in Jerusalem. I was blown away. Every time before, I read the account of Jesus’ passion and death as an unemotional observer, it was just a recounting of the facts. But now, I realize that I am also right there condemning Jesus to a horrible and torturous death. I do this because I am a sinner. You are a sinner, we are all sinners and are all responsible for His death – we are just as guilty of condemning an innocent man to death as those people 2,000 years ago.
Fortunately, this incredible passion account is not over…. we have just experienced the trailer, the sneak preview. We still have the rest of the week to see and experience everything to its final and glorious conclusion. I want to invite you all to the Triduum starting this Thursday. It is a roller coaster of emotions for me and has so much deep symbolism and richness. This is so much more than a movie, it’s real life and it is written just for you and me. Jesus did what He did for each one of us as a gift of His love, the least we could do is to open this gift of love and see what he gave us. I wouldn’t want to miss it for the world and the world wouldn’t be the same if it missed it.
Awesome homily!
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