Truly, this was the Son of God!

PALM SUNDAY 5 APRIL (Mt 27,33-54)

Jesus shone more light while he was on the cross than in all his public life, spent teaching and performing miracles. As the Crucifix, he gives entire fulfillment not only to the words, prophecies, oaths and promises of the Old Testament, but also to every Word of his: “You are the salt of the earth. But if salt loses its taste, with what can it be seasoned? It is no longer good for anything but to be thrown out and trampled underfoot. You are the light of the world. A city set on a mountain cannot be hidden. Nor do they light a lamp and then put it under a bushel basket; it is set on a lamp stand, where it gives light to all in the house. Just so, your light must shine before others, that they may see your good deeds and glorify your heavenly Father. “Do not think that I have come to abolish the law or the prophets. I have come not to abolish but to fulfill” (Mt 5,13-17). Paul asks of Jesus’ disciples this same light: “We cause no one to stumble in anything, in order that no fault may be found with our ministry; on the contrary, in everything we commend ourselves as ministers of God, through much endurance, in afflictions, hardships, constraints, beatings, imprisonments, riots, labors, vigils, fasts; by purity, knowledge, patience, kindness, in a holy spirit, in unfeigned love, in truthful speech, in the power of God; with weapons of righteousness at the right and at the left; through glory and dishonor, insult and praise. We are treated as deceivers and yet are truthful; as unrecognized and yet acknowledged; as dying and behold we live; as chastised and yet not put to death; as sorrowful yet always rejoicing; as poor yet enriching many; as having nothing and yet possessing all things” (2Cor 6,3-10). The centurion is a figure in the pagan world. As Christ Jesus attracted him to himself through his light of humility, patience, forgiveness, silence, love and prayer, so his disciples will attract every other pagan to Christ through their life all interwoven with evangelical virtues. The way of Christ Jesus must be the way of each of his disciples. Salvation passes through the way of that daily cross that Christians will live out of love and with love.

As they were going out, they met a Cyrenian named Simon; this man they pressed into service to carry his cross. And when they came to a place called Golgotha (which means Place of the Skull), they gave Jesus wine to drink mixed with gall. But when he had tasted it, he refused to drink. After they had crucified him, they divided his garments by casting lots; then they sat down and kept watch over him there. And they placed over his head the written charge against him: This is Jesus, the King of the Jews. Those passing by reviled him, shaking their heads and saying, “You who would destroy the temple and rebuild it in three days, save yourself, if you are the Son of God, (and) come down from the cross!” Likewise the chief priests with the scribes and elders mocked him and said, “He saved others; he cannot save himself. So he is the king of Israel! Let him come down from the cross now, and we will believe in him. He trusted in God; let him deliver him now if he wants him. For he said, ‘I am the Son of God.'” The revolutionaries who were crucified with him also kept abusing him in the same way. From noon onward, darkness came over the whole land until three in the afternoon. And about three o’clock Jesus cried out in a loud voice, “Eli, Eli, lema sabachthani?” which means, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” Some of the bystanders who heard it said, “This one is calling for Elijah.” Immediately one of them ran to get a sponge; he soaked it in wine, and putting it on a reed, gave it to him to drink. But the rest said, “Wait, let us see if Elijah comes to save him.” But Jesus cried out again in a loud voice, and gave up his spirit. And behold, the veil of the sanctuary was torn in two from top to bottom. The earth quaked, rocks were split, tombs were opened, and the bodies of many saints who had fallen asleep were raised. And coming forth from their tombs after his resurrection, they entered the holy city and appeared to many. The centurion and the men with him who were keeping watch over Jesus feared greatly when they saw the earthquake and all that was happening, and they said, “Truly, this was the Son of God!”

Today the Christian has come down from the cross, he does everything to come down from it. He undressed himself of the evangelical virtues: meekness, humility, endurance, patience, poverty in spirit, purity of heart, hunger and thirst for justice and fortitude in painful events. He  made himself world beyond the world itself. In doing so, he might no longer write books of theology. Without the evangelical virtues, he will lack the Spirit of Wisdom and Intelligence and his thought might only be worldly beyond the thought of the world. Light attracts. Darkness repels. Jesus, eternal Light in the human light of suffering, has attracted the pagan world in the person of the centurion. Sublime path of faith.

Mother of God, Angels and Saints, make us a way of attraction through our evangelical life.