Liturgy of the Palms
Liturgy of the Passion
In line with modern practice, the Sunday universally known
as Palm Sunday now has two names. Strictly, it is called ‘The Sunday of the
Passion: Palm Sunday’. This is because, uniquely, there are two Gospel readings
on one day. The first – in the Liturgy of the Palms – recounts Jesus
‘triumphal’ entry into Jerusalem, that bright moment when children waving palm
branches led him – fleetingly -- to be hailed as king. The second, the long
Gospel usually read or sung by several voices, recounts the dark sequence of
events that followed – betrayal, abandonment, intense physical pain,
humiliation and finally death.
This combination of readings frames Holy Week which is, we might say, a story of two processions.
The first is triumphant – the entry of Jesus into Jerusalem,
accompanied by cheering crowds; the second, a slow, immensely painful journey to
Golgotha and crucifixion, accompanied by shouts of condemnation. These two processions
are polar opposites of each other, and it is in their sharply contrasting character that their
meaning is to be found. The popular acclamation of the first procession reveals how
false and fickle the human attribution of royalty is. The second procession,
with its ironic ‘crown’ of thorns, reveals how radically different the reign of
divine love is.
In different ways, the Old
Testament lesson (from Isaiah) and Epistle (from Philippians) both underline
the fact that the ultimate significance of the Crucifixion is not to be
found in the terrible
suffering it involved. Many famous historical figures have died painful deaths
struggling heroically for what they believed to be right. This is not
Christ’s
Passion, which has nothing heroic about it. Jesus died in
the most shameful and humiliating way that the ancient world was able to
devise, and did nothing to defend himself.
Isaiah makes this the ultimate test of faith. ‘I shall not be put to shame’ because ‘it is the Lord GOD who helps me’. Paul finds still deeper theological significance in the ignominy of it all. It is precisely because Jesus ‘humbled himself, and became obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross’ that God so ‘highly exalted him’ and gave him ‘the name that is above every name’. This might seem like some horrible sadism on God’s part, until we connect it with the Incarnation celebrated at Christmas. ‘God was in Christ’, reconciling Himself to the world.
Astride the colt and claimed as
King
that Sunday morning in the
spring,
He passed a thornbush flowering
red
that one would plait to crown his
head.
He passed a vineyard where the
wine
was grown for one of royal line,
and where the dregs were also
brewed
into a gall for Calvary’s rood.
A purple robe was cast his way,
then caught, and kept until that
day
when, with its use, a trial would
be
profaned into a mockery.
His entourage was forced to wait
to let a timber through the gate,
a shaft that all there might have
known
would be an altar and a throne. Marie J Post (American hymn writer 1919-1990)
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