Gospel reflection for Palm Sunday

March 20th: ‘blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord’

As we celebrate Palm Sunday, our Lenten Pilgrimage takes a great dramatic turn. Jesus enters Jerusalem with his friends in high spirits and full of hope and the crowd on his side as they welcome with shouts of joy, ‘Hosanna in the highest, blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord’. This entrance is a very political one. At the time of Jesus, victorious generals with their armies returned home and entered the city in similar fashion as the crowds waved branches and shouted out their names.

No other Sunday in our liturgical calendar contains so much drama and tension as today. What begins with shouts of joy and the feeling of victory will quickly change as the same crowd a week later will shout, ‘Crucify him, crucify him’. His spectacular entrance into the city is also his entrance into his betrayal, denial, condemnation, suffering and death and ultimately his Resurrection.

We are part of both crowds, and as we witness his suffering, we will also experience his Resurrection. We pray that as we enter into this most sacred of weeks with Jesus, we will be drawn closer to him and each other.