Homily: Palm Sunday 2014 - Sounds of Holy Week

Today, Palm Sunday begins Holy Week.  And this week is filled with many sounds and voices.  We hear the crowds singing praises to Jesus as he enters Jerusalem as Messiah, and how those praises all too quickly turned into jeering and mocking and calling for crucifixion. 

Throughout the week, we’ll hear the sounds of crying, whipping, hammering.  The cries of crucifixion, the prayers to the Father, and the deafening silence of the tomb.

The sounds of Holy Week are piercing and thunderous. Jesus cries out in a loud voice as he gives up His spirit. The curtain of the sanctuary is ripped in two from top to bottom. The earth quaked, boulders split, tombs opened.

There is a betrayal with a kiss, a rooster crowing at the occasion of Peter’s denial, the sound of a mother weeping. 

Since this  week is filled with so much sound, we are called to do a lot of listening.  Listening to the narratives of Jesus’ final days and hours and moments this week, we incline our ears to hear God’s Word of love for each of us. 

If you’ve never attended the liturgies of Holy Thursday, Good Friday or the Easter Vigil you might consider attending this year.  I’m told that the candlelight Taize service on Tuesday evening is particularly moving.  Each of these are opportunities for us to listen.  In such a noisy world, with so many distractions we need these moments to listen to the Word.

It was the practice of many homes to turn off all the radios and televisions on Good Friday, as a way of saying this is not a day for entertainment, but a day of turning my heart to what matters most.

If all we listen to are the sounds of the world: the bitterness, the resentment, the violence, and the lust, our lives will soon only echo the values of the world. 

We listen to God’s Word—the sounds of self-sacrifice and outpoured love, so that our lives may echo and resound with his life.  For, the way of Jesus is different than the way of the world.  The way of Christ, the pattern of Jesus’ life, is the way of sacrificial love.

This week, I encourage you to make time to read through the passion narratives again.  Perhaps pick the part of the passion that resonates with you most.  A day shouldn’t go by during this Holiest Week of the Church year, without spending quality time in prayerful reflection upon Jesus’ Passion.

Where will you incline your ear this week?  To the sounds of the world, or to the beating heart of the Word?

The saving event of Christ’s passion and death is meant to change us and transform us.  As he is broken, offered and poured out, may our Holy Week practices help us to be broken, offered, and poured out for others for the glory of God and salvation of souls.