Palm Sunday | 2021 | Zion, "Behold Your King"

March 28, 2021

Therefore, with all faith and devotion, let us commemorate the Lord’s entry into the city of our salvation, following in His footsteps, so that, being made by His grace partakers of the Cross, we may share in His Resurrection and in His life.

Jesus' Entry into Jerusalem

When Jesus and the disciples drew near Jerusalem and came to Bethphage on the Mount of Olives, Jesus sent two disciples, saying to them, "Go into the village opposite you, and immediately you will find an ass tethered, and a colt with her. Untie them and bring them here to me. And if anyone should say anything to you, reply, 'The master has need of them.' Then he will send them at once." 

This happened so that what had been spoken through the prophet might be fulfilled: Say to daughter Zion, "Behold, your king comes to you, meek and riding on an ass, and on a colt, the foal of a beast of burden." 

The disciples went and did as Jesus had ordered them. They brought the ass and the colt and laid their cloaks over them, and he sat upon them. The very large crowd spread their cloaks on the road, while others cut branches from the trees and strewed them on the road. The crowds preceding him and those following kept crying out and saying: "Hosanna to the Son of David; blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord; hosanna in the highest." And when he entered Jerusalem the whole city was shaken and asked, "Who is this?" And the crowds replied, "This is Jesus the prophet, from Nazareth in Galilee."

— Matthew 21:1-11

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Once again the Book of Life is opened and the Liturgy calls us to recognize ourselves and recognize our God. Once again the Church places the Passion of our Lord before our eyes. In it we can see ourselves and see God’s only begotten Son in our humanity, this time in man’s inhumanity toward man. The same roles are there; the same actors, the same forces at work in our world just as they were in the year 33A.D. Finally there is the Son of Man — the infinitely patient victim who looks up with loving and sorrow-filled eyes and shames His persecutors. He exists now in a new body. He confronts us in His corporate body, in His Mystical Body, and conquers sin and death — the culmination of His earthly ministry. 

Almighty ever-living God, who as an example of humility for the human race to follow caused our Savior to take flesh and submit to the Cross, graciously grant that we may heed His lesson of patient suffering and so merit a share in His Resurrection. We ask this of your Son, Christ our King and Redeemer, Who lives and reigns with You, and with the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.