Palm Sunday 16.3.08 Conflicting emotions
When we come to Mass – any Mass – we are experiencing a double emotion.
Mass is sometimes called a celebration. We celebrate God’s love for us; we celebrate the Resurrection; or any other part of our faith; or the particular feast or occasion.
Then again, Mass is rightly considered a sacrifice. Each Mass is a renewal, a making present of the death of Christ on Calvary. We thought we were celebrating but now we are back to sober reality.
In fact both positions are true. We are doing both. We are celebrating the many good things that flow from our relationship with God. We are also mourning/atoning for the many bad things that led to the Crucifixion and its continual rejection.
No Sunday brings this tension out better than today – Palm Sunday.
We started with a joyful procession of acclamation. We relived the welcome Our Lord received when He entered Jerusalem. Our Hosannas were sincere.
Then we are abruptly brought face to face with the rejection He received. The Passion Gospel spells it out in great detail, and from there we move to the altar to re-enact His death through sacramental signs.
We are happy He loved us enough to die for us; we are happy He rose from the dead and offers us eternal life.
We are unhappy that it was necessary for Him to die, that is, that our sins had created this need.
We are unhappy that we have continued to sin against Him even when we have understood the role He has played.
The tension we feel cannot be resolved quickly, and it will remain while the world remains in a state of rebellion. If everyone converted overnight we could be really happy then, with no restraint. But in the meantime we must have a melancholy aspect to our celebrations.
Today, with the whole Church, we mourn for Him who has been pierced. We mourn for the rejection He has experienced then and since from the human race.
And we pray with all our hearts that things can be different, that He will be accepted by many, that there will be a widespread awakening to His reality and importance. That His welcome – so brief and so fickle the first time – will be enduring the next time.
