March 24, 2024
St. Anthony of Padua Church
Phil 2:6-11; Mark 14:1-15:47
(Baltimore City Peace Walk, Highlandtown)
“Today we gather together
to herald with the whole Church
the beginning of the celebration
of our Lord’s Paschal Mystery,
that is to say,
of his Passion and Resurrection.
For it was to accomplish this mystery
that he entered his own city of Jerusalem.”[1]
Our second reading from Paul’s letter to the Philippians, known as the “Christ hymn,” is a complete catechesis on the Paschal Mystery in brief, our road map through Holy Week. This is our story.[2]
“Christ Jesus, though he was in the form of God,
did not regard equality with God
something to be grasped.”
Holy Week begins on Palm Sunday with the triumphal entry of Jesus into the Holy City of Jerusalem, heralded as a king, rolling out the red carpet with their cloaks, waving palm fronds to shouts of Hosanna! This is it. This is the day we’ve been waiting for. The Messiah, the one to set us free. Moses, Elijah, and David all rolled into one.
But wait. Why is he riding a colt rather than a chariot? Why this ragtag army of Apostles rather than armed insurrectionists? How does he expect to save the city? And why is he weeping?
“Rather,” on Holy Thursday,
“he emptied himself,
taking the form of a slave,
coming in human likeness.”
Jesus washes his disciples’ feet, a task beneath the dignity even of slaves. Jesus institutes the Eucharist as the memorial of his suffering and death. Jesus empties himself—kenosis—poured out as water in service, poured out as blood in sacrifice.
On Good Friday “he humbled himself,
becoming obedient to the point of death,
even death on a cross.”
Where we expect greatness, grandiosity, instead, there is disappointment, disillusionment, denial, defeat. What are you here to see? What did you think following Jesus was all about? The cross has become the source and shape of our salvation, the new form of life for his disciples, a “cruciform” existence.[3]
“Because of this,” on Easter Sunday,
“God greatly exalted him
and bestowed on him the name
which is above every name,
that at the name of Jesus
every knee should bend,
of those in heaven and on earth and under the earth,
and every tongue confess
that Jesus Christ is Lord,
to the glory of God the Father.”
This is Holy Week: Beginning in the form of God and king on Palm Sunday, Jesus willingly takes the form of a slave on Holy Thursday, accepting even death on a cross on Good Friday, descending to those under the earth on Holy Saturday, only to be raised up and exalted on Easter Sunday. This is our story, every step of the way.
For the city Church of Baltimore, this Lent and Easter season is indelibly marked by the process of Seek the City to Come. Seek the City to Come means the form of the church will change. We are being anointed, like Jesus’ body for burial, for the kenosis, self-emptying of the Church in the city of Baltimore. Theologian Romano Guardini said, “the Church has always been the cross upon which Christ is crucified.”
Palm Sunday reminds us that the city we seek, the city to come, is not Baltimore, the earthly city of man, but the new and eternal Jerusalem, the heavenly city of God. Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord!
“Therefore, with all faith and devotion,
let us commemorate the Lord’s entry
into the city for our salvation,
following in his footsteps,
so that, being made by his grace
partakers of the Cross,
we may have a share also
in his Resurrection and in his life.”[4]
This Holy Week, take up the cross and join the pilgrim Church on earth who “seek the city to come” (Heb 13:14),
“that we, who follow Christ the King in exultation,
may reach the eternal Jerusalem through him.”[5]
Let us go forth in peace.
[1] “The Commemoration of the Lord’s Entrance into Jerusalem,” The Roman Missal. Third Typical Edition. (Washington D.C.: United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, 2011), 274.
[2] On “Paul’s master story,” see especially Michael J. Gorman, Inhabiting the Cruciform God: Kenosis, Justification, and Theosis in Paul’s Narrative Soteriology (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2009), 9-39.
[3] See Michael J. Gorman, Cruciformity: Paul’s Narrative Spirituality of the Cross (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2001). “Cruciformity is an ongoing pattern of living in Christ and of dying with him that produces a Christ-like (cruciform) person. Cruciform existence is what becoming Christ’s servant, indwelling him and being indwelt by him, living with and for ‘according to’ him, is all about, for both individuals and communities” (48-9). On cruciformity in the Gospel of Mark, see Richard B. Hays, “The Crucified One: Jesus’ Death and Discipleship in the Gospel of Mark,” in Cruciform Scripture: Cross, Participation, and Mission (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2021), 22-36.
[4] “The Commemoration of the Lord’s Entrance into Jerusalem,” The Roman Missal, 274.
[5] “The Commemoration of the Lord’s Entrance into Jerusalem,” The Roman Missal, 274.
This is such a beautiful reflection -- I love the comparison between Jesus' entry into Jerusalem and the inevitability of his suffering and death. Thank you for this, Fr. Ponton!