Reflection on the Readings at Mass for Palm Sunday. The Liturgical Sense of the Scriptures Podcast, by Catholic Author and Theologian David L. Gray.
The Liturgy Teaches us that What Belongs to God, Stays with God
“Hosanna to the Son of David; blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord; hosanna in the highest.” All of the Gospel accounts are in harmony with each other in saying that Jesus was met by a sizeable crowd who had given Him a king’s greeting and blessing. Luke is the only one that departs from recording that this crowd said Hosanna (which means Help or Save/Give Salvation I Pray) as He entered Jerusalem. The message being conveyed here with this greeting is that as they pay homage to the Messiah King, they are also simultaneously crying out to Him for help. Psalm 188:25-26 is the source of this high greeting and it is still used today in the liturgy of Jewish Seder (Passover) ritual. The phrase “In the highest,” refers to the Most High; that is, Help, I pray in the name of YHWH. Mark’s “Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord! Blessed is the Kingdom of our Father David that is to come!” is similar to a passage found in the Didache (10:6). The Synoptic Gospels also insist that the crowd participated in welcoming the Messiah King into Jerusalem by spreading their cloaks on the ground before Him. It is worthwhile to note here that an Israelite’s cloak was probably their most valuable possession on their body. Therefore, this great sacrifice of their most valuable possession is immediately woven into their cry for help!
The one constant theme that brings all of the Gospels together into one Mystery is their emphasis on the reality that everything (every ‘thing’) belongs to God. The colt, the foal of an ass belonged to God, so He sent His disciples to go and retrieve it. The cloaks that many were wearing in the crowd when He entered the city belonged to Him, so they threw them at His feet, along with the branches that John called palms. The whole city, which was shaken, and asked, “Who is this?” belonged to God. The Temple area that He surveyed in Mark and later cleansed belonged to Him. The stones that He said “will cry out” belonged to Him. The whole world that the Pharisees said “has gone after Him” belonged to God. The blind and the lame that came to be cured belonged to Him. The reason why He can drive sellers out of the Temple area, turn over tables, make a whip out of cords, and shut down all traffic, is because everything belongs to Him. This is why He encouraged the religious leaders to study the sacred Scripture that always glorifies Him and identifies Him as God. His authority to do and say all these things begins with this truth – everything belongs to God. As Psalm 24:1 reads, “The earth is the Lord’s and all it holds, the world and those who live there.”
On a natural level, this concept is easy to grasp. For example, if you were to see a woman nursing a child, you would naturally associate nursing with parenthood, and assume that the child is being nursed by its mother and that she holds custody over the child’s welfare. Similarly, if you were to see a brand on a cow, you would naturally assume that that the owner of that brand holds property rights over that cow. Therefore, how much more do we belong to Christ who feeds us Himself and places on our soul an indelible and immutable spiritual mark at worthy reception of the Sacrament of Baptism? The true right to ownership belongs first to the one who has the right to create, not to the one who has the right to procreate, distribute, and oversee.
This illusion of ownership is one of the greatest lies that Satan has ever told. In its most extreme and dangerous form it is called possession. Parents believing that they love their children, but are only possessing them. This is why some mothers get so upset when their adult child does something that they do not agree with, like marrying someone who they do not approve of, or taking on a career that they think is beneath them. Men possessing their wives and abusing them. Women possessing their husbands and emasculating them. Men and women together, murdering their children through abortion and contraception – destroying what they believe they have possession over. This is what passes as being true love in the Circle of Hate. With great blessings from God, freedom from ownership and possession is a lifestyle that most religious still enjoy, but it all begins with a prayerful disposition in the virtues of humility and simplicity. No one should ever expect to progress in the Ascent to Perfection without some success in both giving back and acknowledging what belongs to God, which is first themselves – we belong to God. This an essential teaching of the Holy liturgy, which the Sursum Corda begs to believe with the priest saying, ‘Lift up your hearts,’ and us responding, ‘We lift them up to the Lord,’ but do we really lift up our whole heart – our whole life –and give it back to God? Do we truly make ourselves the offering that the liturgy of the Mass is teaching us to make of ourselves?
We should always examine the ‘things’ in our life and ask ourselves if there are any of them that we could not bear to part with. How close are we to becoming like Christ in this sense, who did not think so much of His own life that He did not hesitate for a moment to give it up for us? I am not just referring to our money, which belongs to God as well, but everything. If God commanded you to give up your home – could you? Do you write your name in every book that you acquire, as if it belongs to you? What about your favorite outfit or pair of shoes – could you give them to someone less fortunate or put them in the trashcan right now? What about some priests who treat the liturgy as if it is theirs to modify? Are you even capable of just reading the black and doing the red? Abram is a model patron of this type of unencumbered freedom from temporal passions, as he was even prepared to give his son back to God – the same God who later freely gave His own Son to many, who, to this day, cannot give Him a second of their time – Yes, the very same time that belongs to God.
If man could package and sell air, as he does water, oil, and every other thing that belongs to God, he would. What God loves to freely give as a gift, man loves to sell, hoard, and abuse. Selling his fellow human beings is not even beneath him, and selling God is his favorite pastime. So why should we believe that corrupt souls can properly manage God’s property? Therefore, we Cooperate with God, not only through self-examination, but also by looking without and into the world, so that we might help to correct the abuses of God’s property. Dominion to oversee the lower creation was one of humanities first assignments to Cooperate with God, right after He commanded us to be fruitful and multiply, and it remains a command to those who love God and have the audacity to reclaim their God given responsibility.
This is just one way how the readings at Mass this Sunday connect to the liturgy and how the liturgy is forming us how to live our lives in the world. Be in the world what you have received through the liturgy.
