Palm Sunday Year C, 2025

 

(Isaiah 50:4-7; Philippians 2:6-11; Luke 22:14 – 23:56) 

We are gathered together here in solemn preparation for the Easter Passover of Our Blessed Lord Jesus Christ and, on hearing St. Luke’s account of our Lord’s Passion and Death we have been struck by the horror of His sufferings and by His wondrously patient endurance.  Embracing the Cross, on the left hand by His total commitment to us and, on the right hand by His absolute trust in and love for His Father, He was, ultimately Himself, resting in the peace and joy of total fulfilment as our Redeemer, and as the lovingly obedient, only-begotten, Son of the heavenly Father.

We need to be clear in our minds about the difference between emotion and devotion, for they are not the same, nor are they necessarily found together.  Emotions express and affect our natural feelings, whereas devotion is the sign and measure of our supernatural commitment; moreover, our emotions are largely instinctive and self-centred whereas devotion is subject to our will and centred on God.  Devotion benefits greatly when backed-up by the appropriate ‘power’ of emotions; however, devotion is not necessarily diminished by the absence of emotions; indeed, devotion can be at its greatest when deprived of them.  Emotion, alone, is of no worth, its function is to assist what is more worthy than itself; devotion, on the other hand, is always solely and supremely commendable before God

Dear People of God, we are sinners and God alone is holy.  All the good we have, or can have, is His gift to us.  Therefore, we must never be surprised at our own possible weariness, dryness, or lack of emotional feelings, even on occasions like today, for that is a true  picture of us, for we are, of ourselves, barren and fruitless.

As Catholic Christians, however, our attention and expectations are centred on God.  He is good, and He has given His own Son to save us from our sinfulness.  What we have to try to do is what the Suffering Servant, in the first reading, shows us:

Morning by morning He, the lord God, awakens; He awakens my ear to hear as those who are taught. The Lord God has opened my ear and I was not rebellious, I turned not backwards.

Jesus, that is, woke up prepared to accept whatever His Father–of–Infinite-Wisdom–and-Love has planned for Him.   That seems simple enough for even us to understand, and beautiful enough for even us to imagine we would love to be able to accomplish it.  But oh! It is a course  that could and can only be lived out by One who was -- for love of His Father and for us -- totally self-less, patient beyond all measure, utterly committed to His calling as one sent by His Father, ONE  WHO NEVER EVER GRUMBLED against what His Father, in His infinite wisdom, knowledge, and love would or might ever, ever, ask of Him.

And that, indeed, is what we are, in fact, doing here today: we have put ourselves in Jesus’ way, waiting and listening in case He might possibly turn His gaze to see us and speak to us as He did to blind Bartimaeus, or even come to dwell a little with us as He did in the case of Zacchaeus.

However, we do most directly and earnestly beseech Him that whatever He does, He might lead us,  by His indwelling (thanks to Mother Church and Holy Mass) most Holy  Spirit, to greater and more sincere, more self-sacrificing, love for the heavenly Father, and thereby make us more worthy disciples of such a sublime Son Who put on human flesh that He might -- in our flesh and for us -- love the Father Who originally created our flesh as an expression of the divine goodness, bounty and beauty, of its Creator. 

5th Sunday of Lent Year C, 2025

 

(Isaiah. 43:16-21; Phil. 3:8-14; John 8:1-11) 

Today’s gospel passage is famous, exemplifying, as it does, what is certainly the most popular, and perhaps the best-loved, aspect of Jesus: His compassionate understanding of our human weakness.   Let us learn therefore by taking a closer look at it.

After having ostentatiously proclaimed the charge against the adulterous woman, the scribes and Pharisees then asked Jesus to tell them the best way of dealing with her.  Jesus; by way of response, we are told He then:

Bent down and began to write on the ground with His finger.

Notice that in His compassion Jesus did not look the woman straight in the eye; He was not seeking to cause her further embarrassment.  He would look her in the eye later when offering her His saving grace and giving her a final warning.

The main purpose of the scribes and Pharisees, some of whom were experts of the Law,   was to ensnare Jesus in legal technicalities; He was their principal target, and that is why:

            When they continued asking Him, (Jesus) raised Himself up.

The woman was publicly humiliated; the scribes and Pharisees, on the other hand, were standing there, spiritually proud and secretly malicious: Jesus wanted to both knock down their pride and thwart their malice, and so, standing up and facing them, He said:

            He who is without sin among you, let him first throw a stone at her .

Those erstwhile accusers melted quietly, away one by one, until Jesus was finally left alone with the woman who was still standing for all to see, and to her He simply said:

            Neither do I condemn you.  Go, and from now on do not sin any more.

Now, dear  friends on Christ, what is for us the real meaning and significance of Jesus’ actions here?  Recall what the prophet Isaiah said in our first reading:

See, I am doing something new! for I put water in the desert and rivers in the wasteland for My chosen people to drink, the people whom I formed for Myself, that they might announce My praise.

What would this NEW THING be? The scribes and Pharisees had recognized aright that the woman taken in adultery was a sinner.  What they did not understand, however, was that this woman’s ‘Law-lessness’, was a symptom of the sinfulness of the whole of God’s People, from which none of those present was exempt: she and they, ‘God’s chosen people’,  were still slaves, not, indeed, to Egypt, but to wilful SIN.  The scribes and Pharisees could not understand what the prophet Isaiah had foreseen: he had spoken of a new thing, a new act of God.  God’s new act would bring about a new creation, a new People of God able to sing a new song, expressing both the beauty and goodness of divine glory and human salvation.  How?  

Do you remember the Gospel reading just a fortnight ago?  There, Jesus told a parable about a landowner wanting to cut down an unfruitful tree whilst the gardener pleaded:

Sir, leave it for this year also, and I shall cultivate the ground around it and fertilize it; it may bear fruit in the future.  If not, you can cut it down.

Jesus knew it would be Himself Who would fertilize the fruitless tree of God’s planting with His most Precious Blood; and that the orchard tree of the parable figured the whole root and stock of sinful Adam, represented today by the adulterous woman,  the self-righteous scribes and Pharisees, and the surrounding crowd of faithless onlookers. 

We are now in a position to understand the whole picture.  How could Jesus condemn this woman for whom He was soon to give His life on the Cross?  In fact, it would be easier to save her because she had just been made aware of and, we trust, ashamed of, her sinfulness.  Jesus was going to give all sinners, like her, one last chance -- such was the very purpose of His life, death, and Resurrection: He would loosen the bonds of sin by pouring out His own Most Precious Blood in sacrifice on Calvary.  His final words on both these occasions have the same significance:

It may bear fruit in the future. If not, you can cut it down.

Neither do I condemn you; go and sin no more.

The scribes and Pharisees, refusing to recognize and unwilling to admit their own sinfulness, thereby made it much more difficult for Jesus to set them free. For their own sakes, therefore Jesus tried to make them realize and admit the truth about themselves:

Let the one among you who is without sin, be the first to throw a stone at her.

Many sinners today neither have nor want a clear understanding or true knowledge of Jesus and His teaching; they are stuffed up with pride at their supposed ‘human right’ to live as they see fit, and find delight in their lustful ignorance of God and the reality of sin.

But we, Catholics and Christians, most grateful disciples of Jesus, must never forget that  our God is a God of both Truth and Beauty; and that, as physical beauty is built upon the sure basis of a good bone structure, so spiritual beauty calls for a firm foundation of obedience to God’s will and Christian truth.  The Goodness and Holiness of God are likewise co-ordinated, for His love for us can only be fully realized by calling us upwards, out of our earthly condition, towards Himself as ‘sharers’ in the holiness of His Son.  He, in no way, intends to allow us to live for an earthly destiny: Jesus was sent, and He still intends, to lead His own, with Himself, heavenwards to their Father.   Remember what the prophet Isaiah in our first reading said:

I have formed My chosen people for Myself that they might announce My praise.

That is indeed our ultimate calling and privilege in Jesus: to sing the praises of God in heaven for all eternity, in ecstatic joy, blessed peace, and total fulfilment, with Jesus our  saviour, by His most Holy Spirit our most intimate Guide and ‘other self’, to Him Who is our Father.  And so that we ourselves might attain to the Resurrection from the dead,  and live, praising God for all eternity, Paul tells us:

Forgetting what lies behind but straining forward to what lies ahead, I continue my pursuit toward the goal, the prize of God’s upward calling, in Christ Jesus.

Let us also, aspiring to maturity in and with Christ, adopt this attitude with him, the  self-styled ‘unworthy Apostle’,  who nevertheless proved to be the greatest sufferer-for-Christ of them all.