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Passion Sunday, Year C
Table of Contents
Main Text
Gospel Anthropological Reading
Gospel Historical/Cultural Questions
Gospel So What?
Epistle Anthropological Reading
Epistle Historical/Cultural Questions
Epistle So What?
Lk 19:28-40
Ps 118:1-2,19-29
Liturgy Of The Passion:
Is 50:4-9a
Ps 31:9-16
Phil 2:5-11
Lk 22:14-23:56 or Lk 23:1-49
(Luke 19:28-40)
After he had said this, he went on ahead, going up to Jerusalem. When he had
come near Bethphage and Bethany, at the place called the Mount of Olives,
he sent two of the disciples, saying, "Go into the village ahead of you,
and as you enter it you will find tied there a colt that has never been ridden.
Untie it and bring it here. If anyone asks you, 'Why are you untying it?'
just say this, 'The Lord needs it.'" So those who were sent departed
and found it as he had told them. As they were untying the colt, its owners
asked them, "Why are you untying the colt?" They said, "The
Lord needs it." Then they brought it to Jesus; and after throwing their
cloaks on the colt, they set Jesus on it. As he rode along, people kept spreading
their cloaks on the road. As he was now approaching the path down from the
Mount of Olives, the whole multitude of the disciples began to praise God
joyfully with a loud voice for all the deeds of power that they had seen,
saying, "Blessed is the king who comes in the name of the Lord! Peace
in heaven, and glory in the highest heaven!" Some of the Pharisees in
the crowd said to him, "Teacher, order your disciples to stop."
He answered, "I tell you, if these were silent, the stones would shout
out."
(Isaiah 50:4-9a)
The Lord GOD has given me the tongue of a teacher, that I may know how to
sustain the weary with a word. Morning by morning he wakens-- wakens my ear
to listen as those who are taught. The Lord GOD has opened my ear, and I was
not rebellious, I did not turn backward. I gave my back to those who struck
me, and my cheeks to those who pulled out the beard; I did not hide my face
from insult and spitting. The Lord GOD helps me; therefore I have not been
disgraced; therefore I have set my face like flint, and I know that I shall
not be put to shame; he who vindicates me is near. Who will contend with me?
Let us stand up together. Who are my adversaries? Let them confront me. It
is the Lord GOD who helps me; who will declare me guilty?
(Philippians 2:5-11)
Let the same mind be in you that was in Christ Jesus, who, though he was in
the form of God, did not regard equality with God as something to be exploited,
but emptied himself, taking the form of a slave, being born in human likeness.
And being found in human form, he humbled himself and became obedient to the
point of death-- even death on a cross. Therefore God also highly exalted
him and gave him the name that is above every name, so that at the name of
Jesus every knee should bend, in heaven and on earth and under the earth,
and every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of
God the Father.
(Luke 22:14-71)
When the hour came, he took his place at the table, and the apostles with
him. He said to them, "I have eagerly desired to eat this Passover with
you before I suffer; for I tell you, I will not eat it until it is fulfilled
in the kingdom of God." Then he took a cup, and after giving thanks he
said, "Take this and divide it among yourselves; for I tell you that
from now on I will not drink of the fruit of the vine until the kingdom of
God comes." Then he took a loaf of bread, and when he had given thanks,
he broke it and gave it to them, saying, "This is my body, which is given
for you. Do this in remembrance of me." And he did the same with the
cup after supper, saying, "This cup that is poured out for you is the
new covenant in my blood. But see, the one who betrays me is with me, and
his hand is on the table. For the Son of Man is going as it has been determined,
but woe to that one by whom he is betrayed!" Then they began to ask one
another, which one of them it could be who would do this. A dispute also arose
among them as to which one of them was to be regarded as the greatest. But
he said to them, "The kings of the Gentiles lord it over them; and those
in authority over them are called benefactors. But not so with you; rather
the greatest among you must become like the youngest, and the leader like
one who serves. For who is greater, the one who is at the table or the one
who serves? Is it not the one at the table? But I am among you as one who
serves. "You are those who have stood by me in my trials; and I confer
on you, just as my Father has conferred on me, a kingdom, so that you may
eat and drink at my table in my kingdom, and you will sit on thrones judging
the twelve tribes of Israel. "Simon, Simon, listen! Satan has demanded
to sift all of you like wheat, but I have prayed for you that your own faith
may not fail; and you, when once you have turned back, strengthen your brothers."
And he said to him, "Lord, I am ready to go with you to prison and to
death!" Jesus said, "I tell you, Peter, the cock will not crow this
day, until you have denied three times that you know me." He said to
them, "When I sent you out without a purse, bag, or sandals, did you
lack anything?" They said, "No, not a thing." He said to them,
"But now, the one who has a purse must take it, and likewise a bag. And
the one who has no sword must sell his cloak and buy one. For I tell you,
this scripture must be fulfilled in me, 'And he was counted among the lawless';
and indeed what is written about me is being fulfilled." They said, "Lord,
look, here are two swords." He replied, "It is enough." He
came out and went, as was his custom, to the Mount of Olives; and the disciples
followed him. When he reached the place, he said to them, "Pray that
you may not come into the time of trial." Then he withdrew from them
about a stone's throw, knelt down, and prayed, "Father, if you are willing,
remove this cup from me; yet, not my will but yours be done." Then an
angel from heaven appeared to him and gave him strength. In his anguish he
prayed more earnestly, and his sweat became like great drops of blood falling
down on the ground. When he got up from prayer, he came to the disciples and
found them sleeping because of grief, and he said to them, "Why are you
sleeping? Get up and pray that you may not come into the time of trial."
While he was still speaking, suddenly a crowd came, and the one called Judas,
one of the twelve, was leading them. He approached Jesus to kiss him; but
Jesus said to him, "Judas, is it with a kiss that you are betraying the
Son of Man?" When those who were around him saw what was coming, they
asked, "Lord, should we strike with the sword?" Then one of them
struck
the slave of the high priest and cut off his right ear. But Jesus said, "No
more of this!" And he touched his ear and healed him. Then Jesus said
to the chief priests, the officers of the temple police, and the elders who
had come for him, "Have you come out with swords and clubs as if I were
a bandit? When I was with you day after day in the temple, you did not lay
hands on me. But this is your hour, and the power of darkness!" Then
they seized him and led him away, bringing him into the high priest's house.
But Peter was following at a distance. When they had kindled a fire in the
middle of the courtyard and sat down together, Peter sat among them. Then
a servant-girl, seeing him in the firelight, stared at him and said, "This
man also was with him." But he denied it, saying, "Woman, I do not
know him." A little later someone else, on seeing him, said, "You
also are one of them." But Peter said, "Man, I am not!" Then
about an hour later still another kept insisting, "Surely this man also
was with him; for he is a Galilean." But Peter said, "Man, I do
not know what you are talking about!" At that moment, while he was still
speaking, the cock crowed. The Lord turned and looked at Peter. Then Peter
remembered the word of the Lord, how he had said to him, "Before the
cock crows today, you will deny me three times." And he went out and
wept bitterly. Now the men who were holding Jesus began to mock him and beat
him; they also blindfolded him and kept asking him, "Prophesy! Who is
it that struck you?" They kept heaping many other insults on him. When
day came, the assembly of the elders of the people, both chief priests and
scribes, gathered together, and they brought him to their council. They said,
"If you are the Messiah, tell us." He replied, "If I tell you,
you will not believe; and if I question you, you will not answer. But from
now on the Son of Man will be seated at the right hand of the power of God."
All of them asked, "Are you, then, the Son of God?" He said to them,
"You say that I am." Then they said, "What further testimony
do we need? We have heard it ourselves from his own lips!"
(Luke 23:1-56)
Then the assembly rose as a body and brought Jesus before Pilate. They began
to accuse him, saying, "We found this man perverting our nation, forbidding
us to pay taxes to the emperor, and saying that he himself is the Messiah,
a king." Then Pilate asked him, "Are you the king of the Jews?"
He answered, "You say so." Then Pilate said to the chief priests
and the crowds, "I find no basis for an accusation against this man."
But they were insistent and said, "He stirs up the people by teaching
throughout all Judea, from Galilee where he began even to this place."
When Pilate heard this, he asked whether the man was a Galilean. And when
he learned that he was under Herod's jurisdiction, he sent him off to Herod,
who was himself in Jerusalem at that time. When Herod saw Jesus, he was very
glad, for he had been wanting to see him for a long time, because he had heard
about him and was hoping to see him perform some sign. He questioned him at
some length, but Jesus gave him no answer. The chief priests and the scribes
stood by, vehemently accusing him. Even Herod with his soldiers treated him
with contempt and mocked him; then he put an elegant robe on him, and sent
him back to Pilate. That same day Herod and Pilate became friends with each
other; before this they had been enemies. Pilate then called together the
chief priests, the leaders, and the people, and said to them, "You brought
me this man as one who was perverting the people; and here I have examined
him in your presence and have not found this man guilty of any of your charges
against him. Neither has Herod, for he sent him back to us. Indeed, he has
done nothing to deserve death. I will therefore have him flogged and release
him." Then they all shouted out together, "Away with this fellow!
Release Barabbas for us!" (This was a man who had been put in prison
for an insurrection that had taken place in the city, and for murder.) Pilate,
wanting to release Jesus, addressed them again; but they kept shouting, "Crucify,
crucify him!" A third time he said to them, "Why, what evil has
he done? I have found in him no ground for the sentence of death; I will therefore
have him flogged and then release him." But they kept urgently demanding
with loud shouts that he should be crucified; and their voices prevailed.
So Pilate gave his verdict that their demand should be granted. He released
the man they asked for, the one who had been put in prison for insurrection
and murder, and he handed Jesus over as they wished. As they led him away,
they seized a man, Simon of Cyrene, who was coming from the country, and they
laid the cross on him, and made him carry it behind Jesus. A great number
of the people followed him, and among them were women who were beating their
breasts and wailing for him. But Jesus turned to them and said, "Daughters
of Jerusalem, do not weep for me, but weep for yourselves and for your children.
For the days are surely coming when they will say, 'Blessed are the barren,
and the wombs that never bore, and the breasts that never nursed.' Then they
will begin to say to the mountains, 'Fall on us'; and to the hills, 'Cover
us.' For if they do this when the wood is green, what will happen when it
is dry?" Two others also, who were criminals, were led away to be put
to death with him. When they came to the place that is called The Skull, they
crucified Jesus there with the criminals, one on his right and one on his
left. Then Jesus said, "Father, forgive them; for they do not know what
they are doing." And they cast lots to divide his clothing. And the people
stood by, watching; but the leaders scoffed at him, saying, "He saved
others; let him save himself if he is the Messiah of God, his chosen one!"
The soldiers also mocked him, coming up and offering him sour wine, and saying,
"If you are the King of the Jews, save yourself!" There was also
an inscription over him, "This is the King of the Jews." One of
the criminals who were hanged there kept deriding him and saying, "Are
you not the Messiah? Save yourself and us!" But the other rebuked him,
saying, "Do you not fear God, since you are under the same sentence of
condemnation? And we indeed have been condemned justly, for we are getting
what we deserve for our deeds, but this man has done nothing wrong."
Then he said, "Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom."
He replied, "Truly I tell you, today you will be with me in Paradise."
It was now about noon, and darkness came over the whole land until three in
the afternoon, while the sun's light failed; and the curtain of the temple
was torn in two. Then Jesus, crying with a loud voice, said, "Father,
into your hands I commend my spirit." Having said this, he breathed his
last. When the centurion saw what had taken place, he praised God and said,
"Certainly this man was innocent." And when all the crowds who had
gathered there for this spectacle saw what had taken place, they returned
home, beating their breasts. But all his acquaintances, including the women
who had followed him from Galilee, stood at a distance, watching these things.
Now there was a good and righteous man named Joseph, who, though a member
of the council, had not agreed to their plan and action. He came from the
Jewish town of Arimathea, and he was waiting expectantly for the kingdom of
God. This man went to Pilate and asked for the body of Jesus. Then he took
it down, wrapped it in a linen cloth, and laid it in a rock-hewn tomb where
no one had ever been laid. It was the day of Preparation, and the sabbath
was beginning. The women who had come with him from Galilee followed, and
they saw the tomb and how his body was laid. Then they returned, and prepared
spices and ointments. On the sabbath they rested according to the commandment.
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Gospel Anthropological Reading
When the Church participates in the Eucharist, there are almost always several invariables whether one is Protestant or Catholic. These invariables include the passing of the peace, the words of institution and the act of communal eating. Each of these has an important role to play in the ritual process.
We recall that ritual is one of the pillars upon which human culture depends (along with prohibition and myth). We are all quite familiar with the value of rituals and are quite annoyed when anyone tinkers with them. For example, most of us have a '‘morning ritual,” things we do in a certain order every morning. Occasionally this order is interrupted and it usually frustrating or upsetting. Many of us have office rituals or eating rituals. There are dating rituals, community rituals, national rituals, religious rituals, even couples develop their own rituals. Bowling leagues and boyscouts, political conventions and baseball games have rituals. Life is suffused with rituals. Most rituals have one thing in common though, there is a hidden scapegoat.
When the church engages the ritual of the Lord’s Supper it is effectively radicalizing ritual, deconstructing it and transforming it. The Eucharist radicalizes ritual by explicitly exposing the innocence of the victim, it deconstructs it by shifting our perspective and it transforms all rituals in its four fold action (see Dom Gregory Dix The Shape of the Liturgy).
First, the radicalization of ritual. When the Eucharist is performed it is done in the context of victimage. The words of institution begin ‘On the night he was betrayed…’ Innocent blood was betrayed. A victim had been selected by ‘the system’ and it would be one of Jesus’ followers who would betray him. Not only the Synoptics and Paul report this, but the Fourth Gospel bears witness to this as well. This is a meal explicitly about human sacrifice. It doesn’t let us get away with just going through the motions in some churchly pious fashion. It pushes us to examine our own life, our own betrayals, to acknowledge our own scapegoats. Rather than turning us away from violence, it forces us to acknowledge ourselves as persecutors. The Eucharist is not a ‘fun’ meal. It is not a birthday party or a wedding feast. The Eucharist strips away the mythology that encrusts cultural rituals and faces us with the originary event of victimage. It ‘radicalizes’ or thus re-centers us.
The Lord’s Supper also deconstructs ritual. When we share in this meal, we are sharing as the community who kills. We are acknowledging that we kill Jesus. The proof lies in the ‘killing’ we do every day with our thoughts and words. Most of us will never actually kill someone physically, but we condone the deaths of others or we wish the deaths of others and so justify the killing rituals we engage as a culture. The Eucharist forces this to our attention. This is not a clean meal, it is a bloody and gruesome event we share. If our thoughts, wishes and hate were to show themselves in our flesh, how many of us would have clean hands? The Eucharist makes our hands unclean, it bloodies them, it forces us to accept that we spend way too much of our time and energy as persecutors, as haters and vengeful people. If we come to the Eucharist and think we walk away with clean hands, we deceive ourselves, for we do not acknowledge our mimetic tendencies to jealousy, rivalry and hate. We, you and me, are the betrayers of Jesus, we have all spilled innocent blood in our lifetime.
Third, the Eucharist transforms ritual by pointing up the self-giving nature of God as victim. When the community thinks it has taken Jesus’ life from him, they do not yet understand that his life was something he chose to lay down. He did not have to do that. He certainly could have escaped or gone into hiding or called legions of angels to conduct a holy war. He did none of the above. He did surrender his life. The only thing that stops a fight is surrender; it takes two to fight. Surrender eliminates rivalry. It is thus the true antidote to negative mimesis and its consequences. The Lord’s Supper is the institutionalizing of the principle of surrender. This should gall many and make many choke who see the Eucharist as a justification for their satisfaction views of the atonement. But surrender is the key principle enunciated in the gospels, “unless you lay down your life”, “unless you take up your cross.” Surrender is the truly ‘divine’ principle which underlies not only Christian theology but also Christian ritual. Surrender is a facet of love.
When we acknowledge together that we
killed Jesus, we form the community who also stands under his word of forgiveness.
“This blood is shed..for the forgiveness of sins.” He lets his
blood be shed by us expressly so that he may demonstrate the extent of his
forgiveness. Even to the point of death and a cross death at that (Phil 2:5-11).
In our gratitude for this forgiveness we also extend our forgiveness to those
who have hurt us in like imitation of Jesus. This is why we pass the peace,
but we should pass it after the meal, not before. Before the meal we are full
of conflict and strife. After the meal we may indeed forgive and seek forgiveness.
If this was all we did as a Christian community it would shine so much brighter
than our biggest ministries.
Gospel Historical/Cultural Questions
We do not have the time to delve into the problem of the Lord’s Supper as a Passover meal. Perhaps at a later date we shall set forth our exegetical arguments, but for now we shall simply assert that a) we follow the Fourth Gospel chronology which makes the Last Supper definitely not a Passover meal and b) that the Synoptic/Pauline trajectory which does make the Last Supper a Passover meal can be explained as stemming from the Jerusalem community around the apostles. This does not mean that the Synoptic/Pauline tradition viewed the meal ‘sacrificially,’ note especially the absence of the lamb (contra to Jeremias The Eucharistic Words of Jesus).
The Lukan addition of the second (= the
first cup) indicates that by the end of the second century the question of
the relation of the Last Supper to the Passover meal had become a problem
for the early church. This simple historical conundrum would erupt in the
next century as the Quatrodecimian controversy. The East still celebrates
their Eucharist with leavened bread.
Mimetic theory has quite a lot to say about the church’s rituals. By framing the question in terms of the roles played in the violence done to Jesus rather than focusing on the metaphysical (= dualistic) question the Eucharist may once again transform us as we believe the body and the bread are transformed. Of what use is it to dispute the question of the transformation of the bread and wine when we are ourselves remain substantially unchanged? When we engage the Eucharist metaphysically we fool ourselves into thinking magically. We become nothing other than manipulators of God’s grace (or so we think).
The implied sociology of the Eucharist
demands from us a corresponding obedience, that is, to become the people who
forgive one another, who love one another and who lay down their lives for
one another. Which after all is the point of both the Lukan and Johannine
stories, Jesus serves this meal as the Son of Man who will be rejected and
as the Son of God who will be vindicated.
Epistle Anthropological Reading
Epistle Historical/Cultural Questions