Thoughts on Good Friday

 

Good Friday Reflection: A New Garden

He drove out the man, and at the east of the garden of Eden he placed the cherubim and a flaming sword that turned every way to guard the way to the tree of life. (Genesis 1:24)   It’s day three of our Holy Week reflections - Good Friday.    What a day today is. It's overwhelming.    To understand what is happening on Good Friday, we have to start with the night of Holy Thursday. Jesus enters the Garden of Gethsemane and begins to pray. “Father, let this cup pass from me. Not my will but yours be done.”    Jesus’ agony is one of the most profound and mysterious parts of the Bible. In this simple phrase Jesus speaks from his two natures. As the perfect man, Jesus is praying the Passover prayer asking for the cup of suffering to pass from him. However, as God, he is asking for the blood to pass from him. In fact, just a few lines before he says, “this cup is my blood.”    The root of his agony is the tearing of Jesus the Man and Jesus who is God between these two prayers. As Messiah he is restoring the separation between God and Man that has existed since the Garden. Ultimately, he undoes the sin of Adam and Eve and submits himself to the will of the Father, “Not my will but yours be done.” Jesus sweats blood by his own volition and lets himself be handed over. Jesus the high priest has become the lamb led to slaughter.   There is so much to unpack here. But let's start with the fact that it all happens in a Garden. It’s not unintentional. Jesus wants us to think back to the first Garden. To Eden. He wants us to reflect on sin and expulsion. What has to be corrected is a matter of the heart and Jesus is correcting it through uniting his heart with ours. Adam and Eve desired to be God. If God allowed them to stay and gave them the tree of life forever, this corruption of the heart would spread its rot throughout creation. Unfortunately, they had to die.   But the secret is, how could that death become redemptive, not just punitive. Can good come from death? Jesus shows us this simple key to the Christian life. When we willingly die to ourselves for God, when we embrace our crosses, we are given new life. And not only are we given new life, we are given access back to the tree of life - the source of eternal life.   It's no coincidence that Jesus died on a cross made of wood. This tree made of human work from dead wood by an empire of war, soaks up his blood and becomes the new tree of life. The fruit of the tree is his body and blood.   When we suffer with love, keeping our eyes fixed on Jesus, the world becomes a new Garden ready to be planted and death becomes a doorway to the Kingdom of God.   Let us all embrace our crosses and repeat with Jesus today, “Not my will but yours be done.”  God bless you, Matt and the Catholic.Store team

Thoughts on Holy Thursday

 

Holy Thursday Reflection: The Heart of the Mass

Today is Holy Thursday and we’re continuing our series of Holy Week meditations with an exploration into the heart of the Christian liturgy, first celebrated on Holy Thursday some 2000 years ago - "Do this in remembrance of me." Yesterday we looked at the downfall of Judas and how we all can fall under Satan's control through little sins. The call to confession was not insignificant, for to fully enter into the graces of the Mass, we must come before the Lord with clean hearts. “Blessed are the pure of heart for they will see God.” This promise from our Lord in the Beatitudes is not just a promise that the pure of heart will make it to Heaven, it’s a promise for the here and now. The pure of heart will be given the grace to see God in this life and the next. When we come to worship with purified hearts, truly repentant and confessed, we come face to face with God in the Holy Eucharist. And when we come to see God - to truly see Him - we become witnesses to his work in the liturgy and enter into the heart of Christian worship. Holy Thursday Mass is famous for foot washing. Every Holy Thursday, the priest washes the feet of individuals from the parish. But, this isn't just a call to service, it is more importantly a directive from Jesus that what is about to happen is for those he is serving. For us, it’s a call to receive. To let Jesus work on us, to prepare us, to purify us. So in a sense, the Mass is a place where we aren't called to be active, but to be receptive to Jesus. And what is it that he wants us to be prepared to receive? “This is my body, given up for you.” Jesus gives up his body for the Apostles at the table. He gives up his body for the people who will believe in him through the Apostles throughout the ages - that’s you and me. He gives up his body for the Church.   In one sense, the heart of the Mass is the sacred heart of Jesus made tangible in the Holy Eucharist. But, the Holy Eucharist isn't stagnant. It's alive. His flesh and blood are poured out for each of us and given to dwell within the purified hearts of the believers. So, the Mass is about us.   Yes, but not entirely.  “This is my body, given up for you” isn’t only directed to us. At the same time, Jesus is giving his body to the Father. He, the Paschal Lamb, is the sacrifice offered for the sins of the world to God the Father Almighty. While laying his life down for us, he lays his life down in love for the Father. So, the Heart of the Mass is the offering to the Father.   Yes again, but not entirely.   The ultimate task of the Messiah is the restoration of Heaven and Earth as one. The Messiah heals the fractured wound caused by sin and brings God's original plan back together. And in the Eucharist, we become one. This is why we pray the Our Father prayer in the Mass, “on Earth as it is in Heaven.”   So the Mass is about this union. A union that the book of Revelation describes as a wedding feast! The Mass is about the heart of Christ, it is about the heart of the Father, and it is about our hearts for the purpose of bringing everything back together as one. And it is Christ alone who accomplishes this work. And where does Jesus choose this restoration to take place? Some might say the most sacred place in the Mass is the Holy Altar. It is, but is it not also the altars of our hearts? Jesus brings Heaven to the hearts of all those who receive him with pure intention. "The Kingdom of Heaven is within you." And it is you who are sent at the end of Mass to carry Jesus into the world!    This Holy Thursday, we pray you lift up your hearts to receive Our Lord with pure intention and with him, the fullness of Heaven. May God bless you this Holy Thursday, Matt & the Catholic.Store team

Thoughts on the Last Supper

 

Wednesday of Holy Week

Matthew 26:14–25

Friends, today’s Gospel is from Matthew’s account of the Last Supper, where Jesus acknowledges Judas as his betrayer. God’s desires have been, from the beginning, opposed. Consistently, human beings have preferred the isolation of sin to the festivity of the sacred meal. Theologians have called this anomalous tendency the mysterium iniquitatis (the mystery of iniquity), for there is no rational ground for it, no reason for it to exist. But there it stubbornly is, always shadowing the good, parasitic upon that which it tries to destroy. Therefore, we should not be too surprised that, as the sacred meal comes to its richest possible expression, evil accompanies it.   Judas the betrayer expresses the mysterium iniquitatis with particular symbolic power, for he had spent years in intimacy with Jesus, taking in the Lord’s moves and thoughts at close quarters, sharing the table of fellowship with him—and yet he saw fit to turn Jesus over to his enemies and to interrupt the coinherence of the Last Supper. Those of us who regularly gather around the table of intimacy with Christ and yet engage consistently in the works of darkness are meant to see ourselves in the betrayer.  Bishop Robert Barron

Thoughts on Palm Sunday

Tomorrow is Palm Sunday. The Church will joyfully celebrate the triumphant entrance of Christ into Jerusalem. All over the world, the faithful will carry a palm into Mass. In some places, parishes celebrate with elaborate processions through the streets. In the United States, palm branches are blessed with holy water outside the church or in the narthex, then the congregation processes in to celebrate Mass.

We find ourselves in the final stretch of Lent, just before Holy Week begins. As we approach the finish line, we hope your Lenten observances, fasting, abstinence, and sacrifices have borne good fruit. We commend your faithfulness and encourage you to persevere. There is still time in these remaining days to deepen your prayer. Perhaps add a Rosary, meditate on the Stations of the Cross, or make a meaningful act of almsgiving.

Palm Sunday marks the beginning of Holy Week. The liturgy opens with the blessing of palms and a solemn procession, recalling the crowds who spread cloaks and branches before the Lord as he entered Jerusalem. Yet the tone quickly shifts. At Mass, we hear the full reading of the passion, and the same voices that cry “Hosanna!” speak the words of the crowd calling for his crucifixion. Palm Sunday holds joy and sorrow together: the triumphal entry and the looming cross, glory and sacrifice intertwined.

May these final days of Lent be a time of renewed focus and gratitude. Take up your blessed palm and let it remind you that Christ is King, not only of Jerusalem long ago but of your heart today. Walk with him through the passion, remain close to him in prayer, and prepare to rejoice with him at Easter.

Bishop Robert Barron 

Thoughts on Holy Week

Entering our Holy Week…

Beginning this Sunday, Palm Sunday, we enter a companionship with Jesus, who enters his time of fully offering himself to us, and for us. We begin with his entrance into Jerusalem—riding, not a war horse or in a chariot, but on a donkey. This is the “Lamb of God” presenting himself as the paschal lamb, the one who is sent to bring deliverance from bondage, unconditional love for the world.

His journey to the Cross and his resurrection to glory is, as St. Ignatius says, “the greatest mark of His love.” And we are invited to make this journey with Jesus, gifted with gratitude and compassion—and joy. It is our opportunity to spend time with him, as we pray for the grace of compassion—as one would accompany a friend who is going through a loving but difficult time.

Holy Week can be a time when we are drawn together by bonds of love, with gratitude for this wondrous gift. And we can pray for the resurrection grace of sharing in the joy of Jesus in His risen glory and fullness of life.

The hymn, What Wondrous Love Is This, celebrates so well these gifts of love, compassion, gratitude, and joy—that we share in this holy week:

What wondrous love is this, O my soul!

When I was sinking down, sinking down,

Christ laid aside His crown for my soul!

To God and to the Lamb who is the great “I Am”

While millions join the theme, I will sing.

And when from death I’m free, I’ll sing and joyful be:

And thro’ eternity, I’ll sing on.

May all of us have a blessed week!

Len Kraus, S.J.

Thoughts on the Annunciation of the Lord

 

Solemnity of the Annunciation of the Lord

Luke 1:26–38

Friends, in today’s Gospel, the angel Gabriel reveals to Mary that she will bear a son who will reign from David’s throne. As background, note that God had promised that David’s throne would last forever, but his line had apparently been broken in 587 BC. Six hundred years later, Gabriel appeared to Mary, who was betrothed to a man named Joseph of the house of David. Greeting her as “full of grace,” the angel announced that she will conceive in her womb and bear a son: “He will be great and will be called Son of the Most High.” Then comes the kicker that would have taken the breath away from any first-century Jew listening to the story: “And the Lord God will give him the throne of David his father, and he will rule over the house of Jacob forever, and of his Kingdom there will be no end.” What seemed to have come to an end had in fact just gone underground and was now ready to appear fully in the light. The kingly line of David was in fact unsevered, and now the full meaning of God’s promise would be revealed. Bishop Robert Barron

Thoughts on power

 

God's Power Calls Us Close

From: Finding My Way Home: Pathways to Life and the Spirit

People with power do not invite intimacy. We fear people with power. They can control us and force us to do what we don't want to do. We look up to people with power. They have what we do not have and can give or refuse to give, according to their will. We envy people with power. They can afford to go where we cannot go and do what we cannot do. But God's power is something entirely opposite. God does not want us to be afraid, distant, or envious. God wants to come close, very close, so close that we can rest in the intimacy of God as children in their mother's arms.

Reflection Question: How might I invite God's closeness into moments when I feel fear, distance, or inadequacy?

“For since in the wisdom of God the world through its wisdom did not know him, God was pleased through the foolishness of what was preached to save those who believe.”   - 1 Corinthians 1: 21