Palm Sunday: 2015 Updated

Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus.

The conversion of Clovis, King of the Franks, and his baptism in 496 was a decisive moment in the evangelization of Europe.  There is a legend about the conversion of Clovis. On first being told of the Crucifixion, he exclaimed: “would that I had been there to destroy all of Christ’s persecutors.” A little later he changed his mind and said: “would that I had been there at the foot of Cross to defend my Lord”. But at the time of his baptism, looking at a Crucifix, he said: “ah, that I had been there to die with my Savior”. It is only legend but it is the  pattern of the conversion  of hearts and minds in Holy Week, the pattern of every conversion.

“Would that I had been there to destroy all of Christ’s persecutors.” All that Jesus asked of his disciples that first Holy Week and all he asks of us this Holy Week is to watch and pray. But they responded by going to sleep. Fr Barron has taught us this Lent the perils of taking a nap: it is what got David in trouble with with Bathsheba: he took a nap and stopped listening to God and, well, one thing lead to another.  The passion narratives of all four gospels make it perfectly clear that the persecutors of Jesus included his followers. The open betrayal of Judas for the sake of material gain takes place with Jesus’ full knowledge.  Nor is it a betrayal confined to a single disciple, but it included the denials of Peter, the very Rock, upon which the Church is to be built. All the others simply disappear. That the betrayal takes place with a kiss will often be repeated.  Those who would destroy the persecutors of Christ must destroy themselves. Then and now. It is something  that distinguishes Christianity from all other religions: however often Christians may have fallen asleep and ignored the truth: there is no possible justification for a Christian jihad against our enemies for we are ourselves the enemy. 

“Would that I had been there at the foot of Cross to defend my Lord”. Jesus does not want us to protect him because he goes to his death freely: for this he has come into the world.  He does need us to protect him “Do you not know that I can pray to my Father, and he shall give me more than twelve legions of angels? He who ate with sinners must also  die with them and for them.  When Peter cuts off the ear of the servant of the high priest, Jesus says to him: “Put away your sword. Shall I not drink the cup which the Father has given me?” In a culture hostile to Christianity, we are anxious to defend Jesus.  But when the high priest accuses Jesus, “he answered nothing”.   Pilate asks Jesus, “how many things they witness against thee”. But Jesus answered nothing.  We cannot save Jesus but only be saved by him. All too often our apologetics, our defense of Jesus, is really a defense of ourselves. We do not want to look ridiculous to the world. But this week we cannot avoid the folly and scandal of the Cross, if we seek to know the Wisdom of the Cross.

“Ah, that I had been there to die with my Savior”. We might think that Jesus was a man whose options were quickly running out. But we are the ones whose options have run out. On the one side, there is betrayal and denial; on the other, to die with him. What can that mean? Neither more, nor less, than what St. Paul tells us in the Epistle: “Have this mind among yourselves, which was in Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself, taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. And being found in human form he humbled himself and became obedient unto death, even death on a cross.” Emptied of our endless habits of punishing others, emptied of all our elaborate strategies of self-defense, emptied finally so that Jesus alone may fill us. 

Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus.