Spirituality of the Readings
Contrasts
Palm Sunday contains a contrast that tells us in advance what Holy Week is all about. This is why Sunday is called both "Palm Sunday" and "Passion Sunday."
The two Gospels set up the contrast. That is right, two Gospels. The first is read at the very beginning of the ceremony, during the procession of palms. Jesus is making a triumphant entrance into Jerusalem. The people are cheering wildly: “The whole city stirred to its depths,” Matthew tells us. Some people are asking, “Who is this?” and others in large numbers replying, “This is the prophet Jesus from Nazareth in Galilee!”
They soften his pathway, laying out palm branches before him and even spreading their own coats on the road. He is their man. They treat him as a king!
The Church procession reaches the front of the church, with parishioners holding actual palm fronds to illustrate the story. Mass continues, and the readings come. And now the tables are turned. In the second Gospel, we hear a reading of the passion according to Matthew. Here, Jesus the king is handed over to authorities, betrayed by one of his own disciples, and he completes his kingly entry to Jerusalem by receiving a royal robe of mockery and a crown of pain.
He did not turn away from this mockery. In fact he “set his face like flint” toward his humiliation (as it says in the First Reading of Sunday’s Mass; see also Luke 9:51-55).
This reading states the contrast beautifully. It is a passage from Isaiah, and is called the “Third Song of the Suffering Servant.” The first part of this reading says, “The Lord God has given me a well-trained tongue, that I might know how to speak to the weary a word that will rouse them.” This he did, and was applauded for it, treated like a king.
The second part says, “I have not rebelled, have not turned away. I gave my back to those who beat me .... ” Jesus knew well this passage from Isaiah.
So Palm/Passion Sunday presents a huge contrast between the world’s view of kingship and the holy and humble meaning of it. The Church has set up Sunday’s liturgy specifically for this purpose. Jesus begins as a hero and ends as an object of ridicule.
In this contrast, Jesus shows himself as a man of great humility. Each of us, including Jesus, is designed to love and be loved, to empty ourselves of any bad habit or out-of-control urge that pushes us toward pride. We become ourselves by remaining true to the God of Love who lives within us. Neither shame nor renown can pull us away from this, if we follow Jesus in his humility.
And then God will highly exalt him. God will say to the crowd, you were right about throwing palms, but not if you were trying to create a worldly hero. Real glory and greatness reside in quiet, unrelenting love, no matter how other people react.
We are in the presence of great truth here.
John Foley, SJ
**From Saint Louis University