Dominica
II Passionis in palmis / Evening, 8 April 2017 / Church of St John
As
our Lord entered the holy city, the Hebrew children, declaring the resurrection
of life,
with
palm branches, cried out: Hosanna in the highest.[1]
Catholic
life, at various times and seasons, observes a number of liturgical
processions. Three of them happen during this sacred week: the palm-bearing
march we observed today; the Eucharistic procession after Mass on Holy
Thursday; and the solemn entrance rites during the Easter Vigil. There are
others which you can easily call to mind, and they are a noble characteristic
of Roman liturgical life.
But
processions fulfill more than simply the practical purpose of getting the
sacred ministers from point A to point B. On the contrary, there is a
theological and spiritual weightiness to our processions that we do well not to
miss. God is a mystery, a mystery that we enter by faith. This faith is a gift
and it matures over time, like a procession gradually makes its way into the
sanctuary. Similarly, God is holiness itself: weak as we are, men and women
must approach God by stages, by a gradual growth in holiness.
[Most
people seem to think of life as if it were a waiting room: a time we must spend
just waiting around until our time is up. Or we view human history as nothing
more than one event after another, leading up to we know not what. But neither
picture is the true one. As individuals we are treading a procession toward
God. Our life has a destination and a purpose. The same is true of human
history: sometimes tragic, sometimes triumphant, history is a long advance
toward the perfect completion of Divine Providence.]
When
you and I join a liturgical procession, the veil over the mystery of our lives
is draw back a little: we see ourselves as we are, advancing through life toward
God; this is the mystery that waits just beneath the surface of the humdrum and
ordinary things of life. No detail is insignificant, no moment without import:
a supernatural current runs through life incessantly, though most people seem
unable to see.
Christ
entered the holy city in procession, he did not saunter there. Ponder well the
words of today’s responsory: “As our Lord entered the holy city, the Hebrew
children, declaring the resurrection of life with palm branches, cried out,
Hosanna in the highest.” You do not need me to remind you that we hear these
very words at each holy Mass: Hosanna in
excelsis. Mark my words: when we depart this life, and if we have been
faithful to grace, then these words will be on our lips again. Hosanna in excelsis. In the presence of
God we will imitate the Hebrew children in a song of victory. And this will not
be a strange, unfamiliar thing to us: we shall have done this before. For the
resurrection of life is but a fulfillment of each and every procession of Palm
Sunday.
[1] Ingrediénte Dómino in sanctam civitátem, Hebræórum púeri resurrectiónem
vitæ pronuntiántes, cum ramis palmárum: Hosánna, clamábant, in excélsis. R/ Cum audísset pópulus, quod Jesus veníret
Jerosólymam, exiérunt óbviam ei. Cum ramis palmárum: Hosánna, clamábant, in
excélsis.
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