Wednesday in Holy Week 2021

Matthew 26:14-25

Today’s Gospel reading starts with Judas going to the chief priests asking, “What will you give me if I betray him to you?” 

 

Throughout Lent this year, Fr. James Mallon and I have been focusing on the difference between a covenant and a contract. There are many fine and reasonable reasons for contracts, which basically say, “This is yours and this is mine,” whereas a Biblical understanding of a Covenant is, “I am yours and you are mine.” God has initiated a covenantal relationship with humanity, not a contractual relationship. Contracts are not inherently bad, but God didn’t establish a contract with us, God established a Covenant with us.

 

God speaks into our lives, “I am yours and you are mine.” Let that sink into the deep recesses of your soul. This is key to divine intimacy and the divine life in Christ.

 

Judas, however, enters into a contract with those who were looking for a reason to silence Jesus. His question, “What will you give me…?” is a very telling question for it is the death knell of the spiritual life because it doesn’t come from a place of gratitude and self-surrender but from a place of manipulation and self-interest. “What will you give me?” is a denial of intimacy in exchange for commodity. It is an exchange of a thing rather than an expression of relationship.

 

Gratitude is key to the spiritual life. In fact, the central act of the Mass, the Eucharistic celebration, is by its very meaning in English Thanksgiving. Gratitude is the starting point for the spiritual life around which everything else revolves for it accepts that the breath of life – life itself- is all gift. From this place of gratitude, the divine life can take root, grow and blossom through a mutual indwelling of covenantal gratitude.

 

“What will you give me?” is not an expression of openness to receive so much as a grasp to take. “What will you give me?” is not an expression of gratitude.

 

As the priest says in preparation of the gifts at the Altar, “By the mystery of this water and wine, may we share in the divinity of Christ, who humbled himself and shared in our humanity.”

 

Thank you, Lord, for sharing in our humanity and offering us through the intimacy of your Covenant an invitation to join in the divine life, as you call us deeper into our own humanity.

 

What are you grateful for today? Offer an expression of thanks to God as you hear God say to you, “I am yours and you are mine.”

Tuesday in Holy Week 2021

John 13:21-33, 36-38

 

There is a profound tension and distinct contrasts around the table in the Upper Room as we slowly read this intense text. Can you picture the scene? Imagine, the Beloved Disciple, reclining around the table next to Jesus and Peter. Jesus confides in them, amid the intimacy of being with them over a meal, that one of them is going to betray him. Peter, unable to resist the obvious question, asked, “Who is it?” 

 

Jesus immediately and directly answers him with eucharistic symbolism that reflects not only a life-giving intimacy about the mystery of God’s self-giving love, but also the heart-wrenching mystery of its coexistence amid evil.

 

Jesus takes bread, dips it in a bowl and gives it to his betrayer. I don’t know what was in the bowl, but could it have been wine? Did Jesus dip the bread in wine and give it to Judas? Whether it is wine or not, still, the sacramental nature of the moment is clear and it points to Jesus literally handing his body (and blood as representative of life) over to the evil tendencies of humanity.

 

In a few verses we have not only the intimacy of the meal and friendship, but the explicit intimacy of reclining with a beloved disciple in stark contrast with the betrayal of that same love.

 

The power of evil caused a man to betray a friend. 

 

The power of evil causes humanity to betray friendship with Christ, the very source of love. And here John’s symbolism of light and darkness, intimacy and loneliness provides a powerful image on the impact of this betrayal where he writes, “And it was night.” We have just gone from the intimacy of friendship with the light of the world over a meal, to walking in the darkness all alone.

 

We have witnessed the shift from power of intimacy to the estranged loneliness of abandon. The embrace of light versus the abandon of darkness.

 

The Beloved Disciple remains in the intimacy of friendship with Jesus, whereas Judas leaves to walk alone in the darkness.

 

When you are next around the Eucharistic Altar of Christ, in remembrance of the Upper Room and its intimacy, will you re-commit to remaining in the light of Christ’s intimacy? We know all too well the loneliness of walking alone in the darkness. Stay with Jesus. Rest, recline in his intimacy as a beloved disciple.

 

 

Monday in Holy Week 2021

Monday in Holy Week 2021

John 12:1-11

 

“Mary took a pound of costly perfume made of pure nard, anointed Jesus’ feet, and wiped them with her hair.”

 

The cost of this perfume irritated Judas. “Why was this perfume not sold for three hundred denarii and the money given to the poor?” 

 

The impetus to serving the poor, among the many important issues of justice, does not stand in tension with the Gospel when one sits at the feet of Jesus in intimate servanthood to Him. Loyalty to Jesus does, however, expose any self-interest in the act of apparent servanthood. Jesus exposes Judas’ self-interest, in contrast to Mary’s prophetic act of anointing Jesus’s feet. Her true act of prophetic, apostolic devotion is for the sake of nothing more than ordering one’s desire to love.

 

Mary’s model of discipleship is not practical, but neither is Jesus’ ministry to the world. His love isn’t practical, it’s overwhelmingly prodigal, wasteful, abundant.

 

Is there any self-interest in my servanthood to Jesus? If so, I must return to the feet of Jesus before I consider any line item on the parish budget, or my own personal budget, for that matter.

 

As I enter into Holy Week, I pray for the grace to sit as Jesus' feet and smell the fragrance as I bask in the witness of Mary, who knew the abundance of God’s love. Help me, Lord, to surrender even more to your merciful provision.

Palm Sunday 2021

Palm Sunday 2021

Isaiah 50:4-7,  Psalm 22,  Philippians 2:6-11, Mark 15:1-39

 

Have you ever been had a close friend share something with you, that left you with no real idea what to say in response? Words, any words, might seem too shallow for the moment, whether euphoric or heart-wrenching.

 

As I prayed with the Gospel, this stood out to me:

“He took Peter, James and John and began to be distressed and agitated.”

 

Jesus became distressed and agitated…and he said, “I am deeply grieved, even to death.”

 

Distressed. Agitated. Grieved.

 

Not words we typically ascribe to Jesus of Nazareth, a man of peace and healing.

 

And the Gospel continues, in description of the disciples’ response, “They did not know what to say to him.”

 

We are beginning our sacred time of Holy Week. A time the Church has set aside for us to deepen in the central events of our faith. A time when we are invited to walk intimately with Christ, of participating in the divine life amid our human reality.

 

Throughout Lent, Fr James and I have led a preaching series on “Renewing Our Covenant”, through which we looked at the differences between a Covenant and a contract, we have come to see that a contract says, “This is your and this is mine” whereas a Covenant says, “I am yours and you are mine.”

 

This week, God wants to speak into your life, “I am yours and you are mine.” This is expressed through God’s radical gift of self. God’s total self-giving, through Christ, for you and for many, for the forgiveness of sins (as we will hear at the Altar).

 

For the past two weeks, as part of this series, Renewing Our Covenant, we considered the Covenant God made through David. King David. God promised to establish an “eternal kingdom” through David.

 

The Church professes this Davidic kingdom, this eternal kingdom, is fulfilled through Jesus Christ, the new Covenant of God’s very own body and blood.

 

And Jesus, who ushered in the New Covenant, “… took Peter, James and John and began to be distressed and agitated. I am deeply grieved, even to death.”

 

And, “They did not know what to say to him.”

 

What do you say to him? 

 

Jesus, the eternal king, as just expressed his total vulnerability to us by expressing how he is feeling about this calling on his life. Vulnerability…from a King…from an eternal King…from God…really? Can this vulnerability be real?

 

This Kingdom ushered in by Christ, if measured against any worldly standard, was an abject failure. A rag-tag group of men and women of low station in society, followed a penniless field preacher from Galilee to usher in the new kingdom.

 

And he was beaten up by the authorities and killed. Done. That’s pretty much the very definition of a failure.

 

Of course, God didn’t fail on the Cross, We have all failed to keep our Covenant with God, all of humanity has, time and time again. But through the  lens of that which the world sees as failure, God ushers in the victory of Divine Love. This is grace and we did nothing to merit such a great gift.

 

This Holy Week, I invite you to fully participate in the week by attending, either in person or online, the liturgies as we journey with this eternal King; this vulnerable king, this humble king, this triumphant king.

 

As was written to the Philippians in our second reading, “Though he was in the form of God, did not regard equality with God as something to be exploited, but emptied himself…”

 

What do you have to say to him?

 

I invite you into this conversation with God this week.

 

What do you have to say to him?