This one is epic. This weekend’s Gospel reading in celebration of Palm Sunday and the Passion of Our Lord is the longest reading of the year. I know it solicits eye rolls from us since most Catholics stand through the whole reading, but as a theater director and amateur playwright I can’t help but love that the entire community participates in telling this most important of stories—and what a story it is! It feels large; you can grasp the scale of it—can hear and feel the cheers and excitements from the palm-wielding crowd or the silence of the garden, perhaps you can smell the rain falling onto Calvary.
Having directed a dozen or so productions of Passion plays, medieval mystery plays and meditations of Christ’s last words, I’ve spent my fair share of time with this narrative. It wasn’t until recently when I read the long passage in church that I realized the narrative serves as a pretty serious reflection of ourselves and our own relationship with our God. Aren’t we the ones who promise not to betray?Aren’t we the ones who cry out in support? Aren’t we the first to abandon our promises? I’m sure that’s what the Church Fathers intended when writing the liturgy.
So, with a heart full of hope I cry, “Hosanna to the Son of David; blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord; hosanna in the highest.” Keeping hosanna in my heart, knowing that like our beloved Holy Week, it may only be a moment or two until I’m the one shouting “Crucify him!” Happy Holy Week.
I’ll be seeing you,
Elliot