Kenosis

 

 Palm Sunday of the Lord's Passion

10 April 2022

 

First Reading: IS 50:4-7

Responsorial Psalm: PS 22:8-9, 17-18, 19-20, 23-24

Second Reading: PHIL 2:6-11

Gospel: LK 23:1-49

 

Reflection

By: Sem. Carlo Alexis Malaluan

 

Our Lenten preparation has led us to the climax of Christ's redemptive work. In a way, the whole week from today until Easter Sunday should be seen as one event – the Paschal Mystery. In the Philippines, we call it "Mga Mahal na Araw". True enough, these days present to us the greatest love expressed by God for humanity. Also, this is an opportune time to examine our lenten journey and to scrutinize how much we are able to give love like Jesus.

If you were able to attend the Holy Mass today, you will witness the dramatization of Christ's Passion. In all honesty, this is my favorite part of the liturgical celebration for filled with emotions, the Gospel stirs the hearts of the faithful and evokes me to question: Whose side am I? Which voices do I belong to?

For the reading from the Gospel in this first part recalls the entry of Jesus into Jerusalem as King. He gets a rapturous reception from the crowd who acclaim him with words "Holy! Holy! Holy!". This scene is important for, in a few days’ time, the same triumphant Jesus will be reduced to a battered wreck of humanity. The voices that acclaimed Jesus was then turned into shouts of blasphemy and accusations - seeking for his own very death. What you hear instead are the loud cries of the detractors who shout in unison, “Crucify him!” All these loud voices are employed well by Satan.

This remains true until this very day. We are not set apart from the events two thousand years ago. Evil remains loud and at times, could become aggressive. It has a way of making its voice dominate the world - calling attention to itself, deliberately shocking our sensibilities with expletives that we normally would not hear in ordinary circumstances.

What is God's response to all of these noise? Silence. The Messiah comes not adorned with robe of majesty and glory but as a lowly servant. Today, we are invited to walk with a selfless, self-giving and self-sacrificing Redeemer who offered his life for the salvation of all. The antidote for the loudness of evil is the silence of God. We too are called to this very silence - to unnoticed and hidden works of love and charity, to fight for the oppressed and unheard members of the society and to remain with those who suffer silently until evil vanquishes forever.

How could we become truly "silent"? Simply to put ourselves in the Kenosis of Christ. In a way the real key to Holy Week is given in today’s Second Reading. It expresses the “mind,” the thinking of Jesus, a “mind” which Paul urges us to have also if we want to identify fully with Jesus as disciples. “Let the same mind be in you that was in Christ Jesus.” The key word in the passage is “emptied.” This kenosis, or emptying, is at the heart of Jesus’ experience during his Passion. FIrst of all took on himself in the fullest sense our human nature – “like us in all things, but sin”. But, even more, he reached down to the lowest level, the lowest class of human beings – the servant, the slave. That was still not the end. He let go of all human dignity, all human rights, let go of life itself to die, not to any “respectable” form of death, but the death of a convicted criminal in shame and nakedness and total abandonment.

Our silence should be like that of Christ's self-emptying. As evil points towards itself, we must have the courage to "strip" ourselves from worldly vanities and selfishness in order to point others to the Divine love - the very offering of Jesus in the cross.

My dear friends, what we have just heard was not simply a narration of an event in the past. The passion and death of Jesus is love seen at its best. What he went through was the result of his obedience to the Father. Rather, Jesus’ obedience even unto death is obedience to Divine Love. Since love is about assuring the other that he/she is not alone, then, Jesus had to undergo every kind of human misery and endure every human suffering except sin in order to prove to us that he is in love with us, the worst of sinners!

Prayer

Lord Jesus, as we enter the Holy Week, help us to reflect on Your passion and lead us in the humbling of self and in loving our neighbors. May this week becomes a reminder of Your unconditional love for us so to stir us in asking for forgiveness in the sacrament of reconciliation. May we have a meaningful Holy Week and become new persons on Easter. All these we ask in Your Most Holy Name, Amen.