Fr. Roger J. Landry
Holy Angels Catholic Church, Basehor, KS
Lenten Mini-Retreat in Preparation for Holy Week
Palm Sunday, Year B
March 25, 2018
Mark 11:1-10, Is 50:4-7, Ps 22, Phil 2:6-11, Mk 14:1-15:47
To listen to an audio recording of today’s homily, please click below:
The following text guided the homily:
The meaning of Holy Week
We have now begun the week that the Church calls “holy.” It’s holy, first, because of all Jesus Christ did during these days, from the triumphal entry into his city at the beginning of this Mass, to his teaching in the Temple, to the Last Supper, to his prayer in Gethsemane, to his arrest, torture, crucifixion, preaching and death on Good Friday, to his rest in the tomb, and his glorious resurrection on the third day. It’s also called holy because it’s meant to make us holy, if we live this week the right way, if we enter into the mysteries we celebrate, if we internalize all Jesus won for us during these most holy of days. Holy Week is supposed to be our most faith-filled week of the year, but that requires our choosing to make it the most faith-filled week of the year.
Today in the Gospel at the beginning of Mass and in the Passion we just chanted, we see five different ways we’re called to respond to Jesus with faith this week so that he through these sacred mysteries may fulfill his desire to save and sanctify us.
Welcoming Jesus
The first thing we learn is how to welcome Jesus.
There was great expectation as to whether Jesus was coming to the feast. Many thought he wouldn’t because they had heard the rumors that the chief priests and the Sanhedrin were trying to arrest Jesus and have him executed. But Jesus came anyway. And we see how the people responded. St. Matthew tells us, “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, [especially the young people,] kept crying out, ‘Hosanna to the Son of David; blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord.’” There was tremendous excitement. People came out of their homes. They laid down their clothes on the road, something they would do only for a king. They saw him riding on a donkey, just as David had Solomon do when he made him a king (1 Kings 1:33, 38). They recognized that this was the fulfillment of Zechariah’s Messianic prophecy, “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.’”
Their attitude shows us the type of exhilaration we should have to welcome Jesus this Holy Week. We should be running out of our homes. We should be praising him with our words, with our gestures like waving palms, with our clothes, and with our whole mind, heart, soul and strength. Our life should change as we seek to come out to welcome Jesus as he during this week seeks to rescue us from sin and death and make eternal life possible.
If we’re looking for an even deeper image of how we’re supposed to welcome Jesus and live this Holy Week we can turn to the donkey that Jesus used to enter into the Holy City. Jesus had sent two disciples ahead of him, saying, “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.” And that’s precisely what happened. We’re called to serve Jesus like that donkey. The Master has need of us this week.
As we were processing into the Church today, we sang together the classic Palm Sunday hymn, “All Glory, Laud and Honor, which is a 19th century translation of a hymn that has been sung by Christians on this day for 1200 years. When the Anglican translator John Neale was bringing this ancient prayer into English, however, he intentionally omitted one of the verses because he thought during the Victorian era in Britain that to mention the English typical word for “donkey” — “jackass” or “ass” for short — would have negative consequences in people’s prayer. But in excluding that verse he also left out what we all can learn from the donkey. The Latin words were, “Sis pius ascensor, tuus et nos simus asellus. Tecum nos capitat urbs veneranda Dei,” which can be translated in lyrical English as, “Be thou, O Lord, the Rider and we the little ass, that to God’s holy city, together we may pass.” Jesus wants to enter the Holy City with us. He wants us to collaborate with him in this work of his salvation.
St. Josemaria Escriva, the great 20th century apostle of the sanctification of the laity, sought to imitate and help others to emulate this donkey in welcoming Jesus and assisting his work. He wrote, “There are hundreds of animals more beautiful, more deft and strong. But it was a donkey Christ chose when he presented himself to the people as king in response to their acclamation.” Jesus wants us, like a donkey, to be a docile, diligent, steady companion. That’s the type of cooperation Jesus wants in all of us this Holy Week.
What’s Jesus worth?
The second thing we learn is how to value Jesus appropriately.
At the beginning of the Passion account, Judas goes to the Chief Priests and the Scribes and asks, “What are you willing to give me if I hand Jesus over to you?” They gave him 30 pieces of silver, which likely meant the 30 shekels of silver that it cost to purchase a slave. One shekel of silver was about 3 days wages. And so Judas got the equivalent of about 90 days wages, or a quarter-of-a-year’s salary. For someone making $40,000 today, that would be about $10,000 in today’s money. Judas took the deal.
It raises the question for us as to how much we value Jesus. Would we take $10,000 to betray him? What about $100,000? What about $1 billion? Do we have a price for betraying Jesus? The reality is that some people today betray Jesus not for 90 days wages but for one day’s wage, putting work above worship on the Lord’s day. Many account Jesus less valuable than an extra hour’s sleep. Some sell him out for soccer practice. We need to be candid about these betrayals.
If we’re going to live Holy Week — and life — the way God wants, we need to commit ourselves never to sell Jesus out.
We see an example of someone who would never betray Jesus in another scene in today’s passion account. Mary of Bethany came into Simon the Leper’s house and anointed Jesus with costly perfumed oil made from genuine aromatic nard and dried Jesus’ feet with her hair. Judas — who as Archbishop Fulton Sheen once said knew the price of everything and the true value of nothing — objected, “Why was this oil not sold for 300 days wages and given to the poor?” She wasted basically a full year’s salary (300 days wages plus 52 sabbath days) anointing Jesus’ feet! Jesus, however, defended her, not because he wanted such attention, but because of the love that was behind her gesture. “She has done a beautiful thing to me,” he said. “She has anointed my body beforehand for burying and wherever the Gospel is preached what she did will be told of her.”
We need to ask ourselves the question: What are we going to do in anticipation of Jesus’ burial? Are we going to “waste” our time, “waste” our money, “waste” our lives on Jesus like Mary did, or are we going to say that Jesus isn’t worth it? Mary of Bethany was willing to spend her annual salary on Jesus. What sacrifices are we willing to make for him who made the supreme sacrifice for us?
Strengthening our Weak Flesh through Prayer
The third thing the readings today teach us is how important it is to stay awake with Jesus in prayer.
We see what happened with St. Peter and the other apostles. St. Matthew describes that when they arrived in Gethsemane, Jesus said to them, “This night all of you will have your faith in me shaken, for it is written: ‘I will strike the shepherd, and the sheep of the flock will be dispersed.’” Peter said to him in reply, “Though all may have their faith in you shaken, mine will never be.” Jesus answered, “Amen, I say to you, this very night before the cock crows, you will deny me three times.” Peter forcefully retorted, “Even though I should have to die with you, I will not deny you.” St. Mark tells us all the disciples spoke likewise. But we know that within a few hours Peter three times denied knowing Jesus and all of the other disciples abandoned him as well. During the Last Supper shortly before, Jesus had said, “Amen, I say to you, one of you will betray me.” He could have save more accurately, “Amen, I say to you, all of you will betray me?”
But the question for us is why. Why did they betray the one they truly loved? We can somewhat understand why Judas treacherously betrayed Jesus. But why did Peter and the others? Jesus gave the explanation to Peter and to us in the Garden of Gethsemane. He brought Peter, James and John with him to a secluded place of the Garden to pray with him, but when he returned to where the three apostles were, he found them asleep. He said to Peter, “So you could not keep watch with me for one hour? Watch and pray that you may not undergo the test. The spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak.” Peter’s spirit would never betray the Lord, but his flesh was frail and needed to be fortified in order to remain faithful.
As we enter into this Holy Week, Jesus wants us to come away with him and pray that we may not undergo the test, that our flesh might be strengthened to be faithful like our spirit wants to be faithful. Like Peter, we who have so often professed our faith in Jesus have fallen when the temptations have struck, temptations to hide our faith in him in the front of family members, or coworkers, or fellow students or the general public. We’ve failed to remain faithful when tempted toward all types of sins. We’ll be tempted again this week to focus on all types of other things than to focus on the Lord Jesus. Jesus says to us, what he said to Peter, James and John, “Watch and pray that you may not undergo the test. For the spirit is willing but the flesh is weak.” He wants to strengthen us through prayer to remain true to him under trial, as he was faithful all the way to the end.
Jesus asks us to come away and pray with him, however, not just to help strengthen our flesh to withstand temptations, but simply because he wants our solidarity. Back in 2012, Pope-emeritus Benedict said, Jesus “does not want to be left alone. … He wants at least three disciples to be near him, to be in a closer relationship with him. This is a spacial closeness, a plea for solidarity at the moment in which he feels death approaching, but above all it is closeness in prayer, in a certain way to express harmony with him at the moment when he is preparing to do the Father’s will to the very end; and it is an invitation to every disciple to follow him on the Way of Cross.” Pope Benedict concludes, “The Gospel accounts of Gethsemane regretfully show that the three disciples, chosen by Jesus to be close to him, were unable to watch with him, sharing in his prayer, in his adherence to the Father and they were overcome by sleep. … Let us ask the Lord to enable us to keep watch with him in prayer, to follow the will of God every day even if he speaks of the Cross, to live in ever greater intimacy with the Lord.”
Jesus wants us all to come away with him and pray during these holy days. He wants our company. He wants to strengthen us. Please make a commitment to come to be with Jesus so that he may strengthen and sanctify you this week as he wants to.
Choosing Jesus
The fourth thing today’s readings teach us is about the dramatic choice we’re called to make.
After Pontius Pilate recognized that Jesus was being framed, he wanted to set him free, but he wanted to do it in a way in which the crowd would take responsibility for his liberation rather than he take it, so that he wouldn’t be so vulnerable to retaliation if the Sanhedrin reported him to his superiors in Rome. So he proposed, according to custom at Passover time, to set free one prisoner, and he chose a “notorious” one he never could have imagined the crowds would choose over the innocent Jesus. And he asked, “Which one do you want me to release to you, Barabbas or Jesus, called Messiah?” Spurred on by the chief priests and the elders, only five days after they hailed Jesus saying “Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord,” the mob in the praetorium shouted, “Barabbas!” Pilate, shocked, said to them, “Then what shall I do with Jesus called Messiah?” And St. Matthew tells us the crowd yelled, “Let him be crucified!” Pilate was aghast, saying, “Why? What evil has he done?” They only shouted the louder, “Let him be crucified!” And so Pilate, a true coward, assented.
We’ve heard the name Barabbas so many times that the choice that was made in that courtyard doesn’t shock us as much as it startled Pontius Pilate. But to update it in today’s terms, to choose Barabbas then would be like choosing Osama bin Laden or Ted Bundy or Adolf Hitler over Jesus. Pilate nominated someone that he never thought the crowd would choose over Jesus and yet the crowd not only chose the insurrectionist, thief and murderer but clamored for Jesus’ crucifixion!
We might look back and say that we would never have done that if we were present in Pilate’s courtyard that day. But as Archbishop Sheen says in his beautiful Stations of the Cross, “How would I have answered that question had I been in the courtyard that Good Friday morning? I cannot escape answering by saying that the question belongs only to the past, for it is as actual now as ever. My conscience is the tribunal of Pilate. Daily, hourly, and every minute of the day, Christ comes before that tribunal, as virtue, honesty, and purity. Barabbas comes as vice, dishonesty, and uncleanness. As often as I choose to speak the uncharitable word, do the dishonest action, or consent to the evil thought, I say in so many words, ‘Release unto me Barabbas.’ And to choose Barabbas means to crucify Christ.”
Choosing Jesus on the most momentous occasions comes from choosing Jesus repeatedly and faithfully in small decisions, choosing to pray, choosing to receive his forgiveness and share it, choosing to love him in our neighbor, choosing to ponder his words in the Bible rather than spending our time watching or reading the news, choosing to make him in the Eucharist the source and summit of our life. To live a truly Holy Week, we must choose Jesus over all of the tempting Barabbases that will come our way. And we’ll be tempted by Barabbas in disguise this week, to put something more important than God on Holy Thursday, or Good Friday, or Holy Saturday. Stay alert!
Becoming Simons of Cyrene
The last thing that the readings teach us to live Holy Week well is our need to help Jesus carry his Cross.
St. Matthew tells us, “As they were going out, they met a Cyrenian named Simon; this man they compelled into service to carry his cross.” Simon didn’t want to do it. They needed to force him. But he did it and over the course of the journey he was transformed, such that not only he became a disciple but his whole family did, such that his sons Rufus and Alexander became leading members and missionaries among the first generation of Christian disciples.
Similarly, this week, God the Father is compelling us to help his Son carry his Cross. Jesus said that we cannot be his disciples unless we deny ourselves, pick up our Cross each day and follow him. That’s a condition for the entire year, but especially in Holy Week, it’s a particularly pressing summons. Jesus wants us to be co-redeemers with him, to make up what is lacking in his sufferings for the sake of the salvation of the world. As he was dying, he was incorporating into himself all our sacrifices, all our crosses, united with his. He continues to carry his Cross through time, in all the suffering members of his body. This week is a week in which we help him carry his Cross by helping others carry theirs, by visiting and consoling the sick, by offering to drive the infirm or elderly to the services during the Triduum, by finishing well, even heroically, the Lenten call to almsgiving. The Father compels us like the Romans compelled Simon of Cyrene to help Jesus carry his Cross because if we’re carrying the Cross we Jesus we will be near him, we will be united with him, we will be collaborating with him throughout this week, which is exactly how this week will be holy and make us holy.
To welcome Jesus, to value him appropriately, to accompany him in prayer, to choose him over every Barabbas, and to help him carry his redeeming Cross, that is the means by which we will live with faith this most important week of the year. That’s the pathway by which Jesus will make us holy like he is holy during this special week of sanctification.
Living Holy Week Every Mass
There is no better place to start on those five activities than here at Palm Sunday Mass. The Mass we celebrate is in itself Palm Sunday, Holy Thursday, Good Friday and Easter Sunday altogether in one. In a few minutes we again will shout, “Hosanna! Blessed is he who comes in the Name of the Lord.” We will enter into the Upper Room. We will climb Calvary where we will be not just witnesses but participants in the very same death of the Lord once-and-for-all for us and our salvation. And through receiving his risen Body and Blood, we will leave with him from the tomb of death and get a foretaste of the eternal wedding banquet in that kingdom Jesus won for us by the very passion, death and resurrection we will be celebrating this week and celebrate now.
The readings for today’s Mass were:
At The Procession With Palms – Gospel MK 11:1-10
to Bethphage and Bethany at the Mount of Olives,
he sent two of his disciples and said to them,
“Go into the village opposite you,
and immediately on entering it,
you will find a colt tethered on which no one has ever sat.
Untie it and bring it here.
If anyone should say to you,
‘Why are you doing this?’ reply,
‘The Master has need of it
and will send it back here at once.’”
So they went off
and found a colt tethered at a gate outside on the street,
and they untied it.
Some of the bystanders said to them,
“What are you doing, untying the colt?”
They answered them just as Jesus had told them to,
and they permitted them to do it.
So they brought the colt to Jesus
and put their cloaks over it.
And he sat on it.
Many people spread their cloaks on the road,
and others spread leafy branches
that they had cut from the fields.
Those preceding him as well as those following kept crying out:
“Hosanna!
Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord!
Blessed is the kingdom of our father David that is to come!
Hosanna in the highest!”
At The Mass – Reading 1 IS 50:4-7
a well-trained tongue,
that I might know how to speak to the weary
a word that will rouse them.
Morning after morning
he opens my ear that I may hear;
and I have not rebelled,
have not turned back.
I gave my back to those who beat me,
my cheeks to those who plucked my beard;
my face I did not shield
from buffets and spitting.The Lord GOD is my help,
therefore I am not disgraced;
I have set my face like flint,
knowing that I shall not be put to shame.
Responsorial Psalm PS 22:8-9, 17-18, 19-20, 23-24.
R. (2a) My God, my God, why have you abandoned me?
All who see me scoff at me;
they mock me with parted lips, they wag their heads:
“He relied on the LORD; let him deliver him,
let him rescue him, if he loves him.”
R. My God, my God, why have you abandoned me?
Indeed, many dogs surround me,
a pack of evildoers closes in upon me;
They have pierced my hands and my feet;
I can count all my bones.
R. My God, my God, why have you abandoned me?
They divide my garments among them,
and for my vesture they cast lots.
But you, O LORD, be not far from me;
O my help, hasten to aid me.
R. My God, my God, why have you abandoned me?
I will proclaim your name to my brethren;
in the midst of the assembly I will praise you:
“You who fear the LORD, praise him;
all you descendants of Jacob, give glory to him;
revere him, all you descendants of Israel!”
R. My God, my God, why have you abandoned me?
Reading 2 PHIL 2:6-11
Christ Jesus, though he was in the form of God,
did not regard equality with God
something to be grasped.
Rather, he emptied himself,
taking the form of a slave,
coming in human likeness;
and found human in appearance,
he humbled himself,
becoming obedient to the point of death,
even death on a cross.
Because of this, God greatly exalted him
and bestowed on him the name
which is above every name,
that at the name of Jesus
every knee should bend,
of those in heaven and on earth and under the earth,
and every tongue confess that
Jesus Christ is Lord,
to the glory of God the Father.
Verse Before The Gospel PHIL 2:8-9
Christ became obedient to the point of death,
even death on a cross.
Because of this, God greatly exalted him
and bestowed on him the name which is above every name.
Gospel MK 14:1—15:47
were to take place in two days’ time.
So the chief priests and the scribes were seeking a way
to arrest him by treachery and put him to death.
They said, “Not during the festival,
for fear that there may be a riot among the people.”
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.”Then Judas Iscariot, one of the Twelve,
went off to the chief priests to hand him over to them.
When they heard him they were pleased and promised to pay him money.
Then he looked for an opportunity to hand him over.On the first day of the Feast of Unleavened Bread,
when they sacrificed the Passover lamb,
his disciples said to him,
“Where do you want us to go
and prepare for you to eat the Passover?”
He sent two of his disciples and said to them,
“Go into the city and a man will meet you,
carrying a jar of water.
Follow him.
Wherever he enters, say to the master of the house,
‘The Teacher says, “Where is my guest room
where I may eat the Passover with my disciples?”‘
Then he will show you a large upper room furnished and ready.
Make the preparations for us there.”
The disciples then went off, entered the city,
and found it just as he had told them;
and they prepared the Passover.
When it was evening, he came with the Twelve.
And as they reclined at table and were eating, Jesus said,
“Amen, I say to you, one of you will betray me,
one who is eating with me.”
They began to be distressed and to say to him, one by one,
“Surely it is not I?”
He said to them,
“One of the Twelve, the one who dips with me into the dish.
For the Son of Man indeed goes, as it is written of him,
but woe to that man by whom the Son of Man is betrayed.
It would be better for that man if he had never been born.”
While they were eating,
he took bread, said the blessing,
broke it, and gave it to them, and said,
“Take it; this is my body.”
Then he took a cup, gave thanks, and gave it to them,
and they all drank from it.
He said to them,
“This is my blood of the covenant,
which will be shed for many.
Amen, I say to you,
I shall not drink again the fruit of the vine
until the day when I drink it new in the kingdom of God.”
Then, after singing a hymn,
they went out to the Mount of Olives.
Then Jesus said to them,
“All of you will have your faith shaken, for it is written:
I will strike the shepherd,
and the sheep will be dispersed.
But after I have been raised up,
I shall go before you to Galilee.”
Peter said to him,
“Even though all should have their faith shaken,
mine will not be.”
Then Jesus said to him,
“Amen, I say to you,
this very night before the cock crows twice
you will deny me three times.”
But he vehemently replied,
“Even though I should have to die with you,
I will not deny you.”
And they all spoke similarly.
Then they came to a place named Gethsemane,
and he said to his disciples,
“Sit here while I pray.”
He took with him Peter, James, and John,
and began to be troubled and distressed.
Then he said to them, “My soul is sorrowful even to death.
Remain here and keep watch.”
He advanced a little and fell to the ground and prayed
that if it were possible the hour might pass by him;
he said, “Abba, Father, all things are possible to you.
Take this cup away from me,
but not what I will but what you will.”
When he returned he found them asleep.
He said to Peter, “Simon, are you asleep?
Could you not keep watch for one hour?
Watch and pray that you may not undergo the test.
The spirit is willing but the flesh is weak.”
Withdrawing again, he prayed, saying the same thing.
Then he returned once more and found them asleep,
for they could not keep their eyes open
and did not know what to answer him.
He returned a third time and said to them,
“Are you still sleeping and taking your rest?
It is enough. The hour has come.
Behold, the Son of Man is to be handed over to sinners.
Get up, let us go.
See, my betrayer is at hand.”
Then, while he was still speaking,
Judas, one of the Twelve, arrived,
accompanied by a crowd with swords and clubs
who had come from the chief priests,
the scribes, and the elders.
His betrayer had arranged a signal with them, saying,
“The man I shall kiss is the one;
arrest him and lead him away securely.”
He came and immediately went over to him and said,
“Rabbi.” And he kissed him.
At this they laid hands on him and arrested him.
One of the bystanders drew his sword,
struck the high priest’s servant, and cut off his ear.
Jesus said to them in reply,
“Have you come out as against a robber,
with swords and clubs, to seize me?
Day after day I was with you teaching in the temple area,
yet you did not arrest me;
but that the Scriptures may be fulfilled.”
And they all left him and fled.
Now a young man followed him
wearing nothing but a linen cloth about his body.
They seized him,
but he left the cloth behind and ran off naked.
They led Jesus away to the high priest,
and all the chief priests and the elders and the scribes came together.
Peter followed him at a distance into the high priest’s courtyard
and was seated with the guards, warming himself at the fire.
The chief priests and the entire Sanhedrin
kept trying to obtain testimony against Jesus
in order to put him to death, but they found none.
Many gave false witness against him,
but their testimony did not agree.
Some took the stand and testified falsely against him,
alleging, “We heard him say,
‘I will destroy this temple made with hands
and within three days I will build another
not made with hands.’”
Even so their testimony did not agree.
The high priest rose before the assembly and questioned Jesus,
saying, “Have you no answer?
What are these men testifying against you?”
But he was silent and answered nothing.
Again the high priest asked him and said to him,
“Are you the Christ, the son of the Blessed One?”
Then Jesus answered, “I am;
and ‘you will see the Son of Man
seated at the right hand of the Power
and coming with the clouds of heaven.’”
At that the high priest tore his garments and said,
“What further need have we of witnesses?
You have heard the blasphemy.
What do you think?”
They all condemned him as deserving to die.
Some began to spit on him.
They blindfolded him and struck him and said to him, “Prophesy!”
And the guards greeted him with blows.
While Peter was below in the courtyard,
one of the high priest’s maids came along.
Seeing Peter warming himself,
she looked intently at him and said,
“You too were with the Nazarene, Jesus.”
But he denied it saying,
“I neither know nor understand what you are talking about.”
So he went out into the outer court.
Then the cock crowed.
The maid saw him and began again to say to the bystanders,
“This man is one of them.”
Once again he denied it.
A little later the bystanders said to Peter once more,
“Surely you are one of them; for you too are a Galilean.”
He began to curse and to swear,
“I do not know this man about whom you are talking.”
And immediately a cock crowed a second time.
Then Peter remembered the word that Jesus had said to him,
“Before the cock crows twice you will deny me three times.”
He broke down and wept.
As soon as morning came,
the chief priests with the elders and the scribes,
that is, the whole Sanhedrin held a council.
They bound Jesus, led him away, and handed him over to Pilate.
Pilate questioned him,
“Are you the king of the Jews?”
He said to him in reply, “You say so.”
The chief priests accused him of many things.
Again Pilate questioned him,
“Have you no answer?
See how many things they accuse you of.”
Jesus gave him no further answer, so that Pilate was amazed.
Now on the occasion of the feast he used to release to them
one prisoner whom they requested.
A man called Barabbas was then in prison
along with the rebels who had committed murder in a rebellion.
The crowd came forward and began to ask him
to do for them as he was accustomed.
Pilate answered,
“Do you want me to release to you the king of the Jews?”
For he knew that it was out of envy
that the chief priests had handed him over.
But the chief priests stirred up the crowd
to have him release Barabbas for them instead.
Pilate again said to them in reply,
“Then what do you want me to do
with the man you call the king of the Jews?”
They shouted again, “Crucify him.”
Pilate said to them, “Why? What evil has he done?”
They only shouted the louder, “Crucify him.”
So Pilate, wishing to satisfy the crowd,
released Barabbas to them and, after he had Jesus scourged,
handed him over to be crucified.
The soldiers led him away inside the palace,
that is, the praetorium, and assembled the whole cohort.
They clothed him in purple and,
weaving a crown of thorns, placed it on him.
They began to salute him with, “Hail, King of the Jews!”
and kept striking his head with a reed and spitting upon him.
They knelt before him in homage.
And when they had mocked him,
they stripped him of the purple cloak,
dressed him in his own clothes,
and led him out to crucify him.
They pressed into service a passer-by, Simon,
a Cyrenian, who was coming in from the country,
the father of Alexander and Rufus,
to carry his cross.
They brought him to the place of Golgotha
— which is translated Place of the Skull —
They gave him wine drugged with myrrh,
but he did not take it.
Then they crucified him and divided his garments
by casting lots for them to see what each should take.
It was nine o’clock in the morning when they crucified him.
The inscription of the charge against him read,
“The King of the Jews.”
With him they crucified two revolutionaries,
one on his right and one on his left.
Those passing by reviled him,
shaking their heads and saying,
“Aha! You who would destroy the temple
and rebuild it in three days,
save yourself by coming down from the cross.”
Likewise the chief priests, with the scribes,
mocked him among themselves and said,
“He saved others; he cannot save himself.
Let the Christ, the King of Israel,
come down now from the cross
that we may see and believe.”
Those who were crucified with him also kept abusing him.
At noon darkness came over the whole land
until three in the afternoon.
And at three o’clock Jesus cried out in a loud voice,
“Eloi, Eloi, lema sabachthani?”
which is translated,
“My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”
Some of the bystanders who heard it said,
“Look, he is calling Elijah.”
One of them ran, soaked a sponge with wine, put it on a reed
and gave it to him to drink saying,
“Wait, let us see if Elijah comes to take him down.”
Jesus gave a loud cry and breathed his last.
Here all kneel and pause for a short time.
The veil of the sanctuary was torn in two from top to bottom.
When the centurion who stood facing him
saw how he breathed his last he said,
“Truly this man was the Son of God!”
There were also women looking on from a distance.
Among them were Mary Magdalene,
Mary the mother of the younger James and of Joses, and Salome.
These women had followed him when he was in Galilee
and ministered to him.
There were also many other women
who had come up with him to Jerusalem.
When it was already evening,
since it was the day of preparation,
the day before the sabbath, Joseph of Arimathea,
a distinguished member of the council,
who was himself awaiting the kingdom of God,
came and courageously went to Pilate
and asked for the body of Jesus.
Pilate was amazed that he was already dead.
He summoned the centurion
and asked him if Jesus had already died.
And when he learned of it from the centurion,
he gave the body to Joseph.
Having bought a linen cloth, he took him down,
wrapped him in the linen cloth,
and laid him in a tomb that had been hewn out of the rock.
Then he rolled a stone against the entrance to the tomb.
Mary Magdalene and Mary the mother of Joses
watched where he was laid.
