Episode Transcript
[00:00:12] Speaker A: Welcome to the Blessed Sacrament Homilies podcast where our mission is to help everyone recognize and experience the presence of God. We hope you are nourished and encouraged by the Word. Thank you for joining us.
[00:00:25] Speaker B: The Lord be with you and with your spirit. Reading from the Holy Gospel according to Matthew. Glory to you, Lord. When Jesus and the disciples drew near Jerusalem and came to Bethphage on the Mount of Olives, Jesus sent two of his 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 crowds spread their cloaks on the ground 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.
The Gospel of the Lord.
Praise to you, Lord Jesus Christ.
I have always been perplexed by the rapid swing in the attitude of the people as Jesus entered the holy city of Jerusalem.
Because this account reminds us there was something in what he said and what he did that entered into their hearts and gave them the ability to trust that salvation could be found in Him.
The very word hosanna means, save us.
And they recognized as he came into the city that they could find salvation in him.
Yet also, just a matter of day or two later, their hearts began to shift a little bit. In fact, they turned 180 degrees when things got difficult.
When they could see that he was going to the cross, they joined in with the mob.
And probably some of the same people that shouted hosanna started to shout, crucify.
And I found that so hard to get my head wrapped around until I realized that for me, there are times I have 100% faith and trust in Jesus, love and mercy.
And when I'm struggling, I shout, hosanna.
But I also recognize that there are times where I can tend to go with the crowd.
When the crowd is greedy, I become greedy.
When the crowd is vengeful, it is easy for me to become vengeful.
When the crowd is unforgiving and unloving, it's also easy for me to be unforgiving and unloving.
So in reality, I am no different than they were.
But just in the same way that Jesus went to the cross for those very people, he goes to the cross for each one of us, knowing that we are far from perfect, knowing that our hearts are far from true love.
But he loves us anyway, and he offers us mercy and healing anyway.
And that is absolutely the heart of of what we celebrate this week.
