Passion Sunday

Palm Sunday

Jesus Christ’s state was divine,

yet he did not cling

to his equality with God

but emptied himself

to assume the condition of a slave

and became as men are;

and being as all men are,

he was humbler yet,

even to accepting death,

death on a cross.

 

                              Philippians 2:6-7

                                             Let the Lord enter;                                
                                                 He is king of glory                
                                                              Psalm 24:7

The palm leaves at Mass this morning!  I love seeing all the children waving them around, tickling one another, bending them into shapes and lopsided crosses:  their spindly tips rising above the pews like tendrils toward the light.  There is a tension in the air that arises from the mayhem possibilities of sword-like objects in the children’s hands.  Oh, the sensuousness of our religion coming through.  So many fingers curling around palm leaves, laying them on the wooden pews or sticking them in hymnal holders.  The meaning of them coming in increments: the image of Jesus, riding into town on a colt, radiant and illuminating all the dust of the earth, all the parched souls.  

Jesus rides into my heart this Easter season calling me to lay down my life, pick up my cross and follow Him, to keep beside His gentle gait, to keep close and adore His Sacred Heart, to be and love the least, to become the bright flame singing the song of Him; like so many palm leaves blazing before the Lord of Lords arriving, for His Passion in blackest torment, for the dark nails piercing, for all of us.  

Our hymn rising in the morning light like sparks, “Were you there when they nailed Him to the Cross?  Were you there when they laid Him in the tomb?  Sometimes it causes me to tremble, tremble, tremble….”