Sunday Reflection with Canon Robin Gibbons - 28 March 2021

Entry into Jerusalem image RG

Palm Sunday..

Holy Week, solemn though it is can really be a muddle, there is just so much overload and none more so than the Mass on Palm Sunday where the whole tenor of the day switches from the triumphal entry into Jerusalem to an almost rehearsal of the Solemn Passion which we return to on Good Friday. The title of the Sunday is itself odd, Palm Sunday of the Lord's Passion, but one of the good things that emerges in the long Gospel is that we also dip into parts of the narrative that are not incidental but which we might miss otherwise, vignettes such as `Mark's portrayal of the woman with the alabaster jar of ointment who then pours this perfume over Jesus, a deep enriching sign that points us to his triumph over death as the Christ, that is the anointed one! This in itself and her role in the heralding of salvations story should provide us with a deep reflection this coming week. I suppose I ask myself, how do I anoint people with the Christ, how does my words, my example lead others to know and touch Christ?

I suppose that as we get older and the exigencies of human life weigh more upon us, our aches and pains become more pronounced and the sands of time sweep past us. We should not worry, for bound up in this `Sunday and also the rest of our week are memories of characters and animals that earn their place in salvation history, but also tell us that the story of Jesus as he went to death is also ours, yet it does not have an unhappy ending, we must not forget that part in the drama of the passion, all our basest traits are exposed in those surrounding Jesus, betrayal, denial, cowardice, faux bravery, stubbornness, but above all like a scarlet thread pulling this tapestry together, the eventual triumph of painful love.

We Christians are a funny bunch and the institution we call church resonates with our foibles, one of them is that we seem unable to let go of the darker edges of the story of Jesus and go back time and time again to them, images like sorrow, sin, the agony, passion, painful death of the Christ are moving and in moving us have helped make great saints out of sinners, who meditating on them were moved to compassion and sorrow. That though isn't the end, the record of this `Holy Week does not simply go round and round, it is a spiral of emotion, bitter pain, deep sin, but also redemption, love, mercy, and death, dear sister death, even for the Christ who felt abandoned, is a gate to be opened and never closed again.

To let go of the gloomier, more savage elements of our faith is essential and so as a final Palm Sunday thought, I go back to something I wrote a few years ago, the image of the animals with Jesus on that entry. Like the woman with the jar of ointment, they too are important, all the more so because of their faithfulness to us, humankind who have treated them so abominably, but Jesus did not, and here is the how and the why.

"The image of the colt and its mother is so poignant this Palm Sunday, for in my mind they represent in so many ways the unfortunates of our world, those put upon, ignored, used and abused. Yes, I can be accused of being sentimental, but I defy anybody to look at the terrible way we humans treat our animals particularly those beasts of burden, our companions in hard work, the donkeys. They have never had an easy existence for we have treated them abominably at times, some kept deep in mines all their lives, beaten, deprived of food, working until they drop even today. What an image of humble suffering they represent. And yet, on this day in the week we call Holy, their place in paradise and salvation is assured, for unlike so many of the powerful ones, this colt and this donkey are remembered with gratitude and honour down the ages.

In the ancient Middle East, rulers rode horses if they went to war, but donkeys if they came in peace. So Jesus, rather than riding to conquer, enters Jerusalem in peace. Since his colt had never been ridden, or even sat upon, its dependence upon its mother would be understandable. So Jesus' entry into Jerusalem would have been that much easier for the colt if the mother donkey were led beside him on the same road. Perhaps we can pause here, let that simple image of these animals and Christ work into our prayer and imagination this week. We are never alone for Christ travels with us, but we also need that touch of supportive love, the presence of the 'donkeys' of our lives, those on whom we are dependent, who shoulder our burdens and walk on with us too, yes animals and humans both. May our prayer this Holy Week be as this:

" Let me come with these donkeys, Lord, into your land,
These beasts who bow their heads so gently, and stand
With their small feet joined together in a fashion
Utterly gentle, asking your compassion".

Amen.

(From a poem by Francis Jammes d 1938: A Prayer to go to Heaven with the Donkeys) '

Lectio Divina

The Anointing at Bethany. When he was in Bethany reclining at table in the house of Simon the leper, a woman came with an alabaster jar of perfumed oil, costly genuine spikenard. She broke the alabaster jar and poured it on his head.There were some who were indignant. "Why has there been this waste of perfumed oil? It could have been sold for more than three hundred days' wages and the money given to the poor." They were infuriated with her. Jesus said, "Let her alone. Why do you make trouble for her? She has done a good thing for me. The poor you will always have with you, and whenever you wish you can do good to them, but you will not always have me. She has done what she could. She has anticipated anointing my body for burial. Amen, I say to you, wherever the gospel is proclaimed to the whole world, what she has done will be told in memory of her."

Lectio Divina

Zechariah 9:9-10

The Coming King of Zion

Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Zion!

Shout aloud, O daughter of Jerusalem!

Behold, your king is coming to you;

righteous and having salvation is he,

humble and mounted on a donkey,

on a colt, the foal of a donkey.

I will cut off the chariot from Ephraim

and the war horse from Jerusalem;

and the battle bow shall be cut off,

and he shall speak peace to the nations;

his rule shall be from sea to sea,

and from the River to the ends of the earth.