By Steve Barrett
Palm Sunday
Lk 19:28-40 and Is 50:4-7 | Phil 2:6-11 | Lk 22:14, 23:56
The setting: Jesus riding in to Jerusalem on a donkey and the crowds loudly shouting their hosannas. It is a time of rejoicing but at the same time, those of us who know the story realize that Jesus is on the way to his eventual execution.
The Pharisees, scandalized by the scene that Jesus’ disciples are creating, urge him to stifle their exuberance. In many passages we see the Pharisees wanting to silence Jesus and eventually to silence him permanently as they plotted his death with the religious and political authorities. In the popular sanitized Sunday School version of this account, the fact that Jesus is going to meet his death is downplayed or outright passed over.
Why are the Pharisees so eager to have Jesus silence the crowds?
It may at first appear that they just want the riffraff to calm, but we know there is much more to it. Jesus exposed the reality of his times, a reality that sadly prevails twenty centuries later: a world in which the rich and powerful live at the expense of the poor and defenseless. Jesus exposed the idolatry of the religious and political authorities of his day.
Monsignor Oscar Romero identified those idols specifically as wealth and the alter of national security. Like Jesus, Romero was killed for not only naming reality but also, in the words of the Spanish-Salvadoran theologian Ignacio Ellacuría, for bearing the burden of the reality of the people.
Like Jesus, Romero bore the burden of the reality of his people by walking with them, accompanying them in their darkest moments and by being their voice. And, like Jesus and Romero, Ellacuría would also join the list of martyrs who stood up for the truth.
What can move the stones to cry out in our current world context?
In a list that seems endless, we would have to include: human trafficking; the oppression against migrants; the silencing of women; the relentless plundering of the earth for its natural resources and the violent expulsion of people from their land so that corporations may have access to the land’s natural riches; child laborers harvesting minerals, working in life-threatening conditions so that we may have our computers and cell phones; corrupt governments that deny people basic services and that prevent nations from fully developing their potential. …
Something else that hasn’t changed since Jesus’ times are the victims of the world’s injustices — overwhelmingly the poor people of this world. This is due to what has often been referred to as structural sin that is the result of the inequitable distribution of wealth and economic policies that keep marginalizing the poor and that drive more people into poverty. Our martyred sister Jean Donovan referred to this as the social sin of the First World.
Are we willing to walk with Jesus during this Lenten season and to bear the burden of the reality of his people?
Can we say with the prophet Isaiah that God has shown us “how to speak to the weary a word that will rouse them” and that God “opens my ear that I may hear; and I have not rebelled, have not turned back?”
Maryknoll Affiliate Steve Barrett lives and works in Quetzaltenango, Guatemala. An active member of the Guatemala Affiliates chapter, he assists with immersion trips, affiliates gatherings and related activities.
The 2025 Lenten Reflection Guide from the Maryknoll Office for Global Concerns contains contributions from missioners around the world.
Featured image: Maryknoll Affiliate Steve Barrett meets with visitors and community members in Quetzaltenango, Guatemala. (Thomas Gould/Courtesy of Maryknoll Office for Global Concerns/Guatemala)
Questions for reflection
Where in your life do you find authentic exuberance? Do you feel free to express it? What holds you back?
Prayer
Lord, make me a witness to your truth.
Turn my eyes from evil.
Close my ears to falsehood.
Shield my mind from the temptation
To judge others who sin differently than I.
Seal my lips from adding to the noise
Of a world that worships power,
Rewards greed and sacrifices humanity
On the high altar of fame and success.
O Divine Master, grant that my heart
May beat stronger for love of you
In the poor, abandoned and downtrodden
Of the Earth, who cry out to Heaven
For justice tempered with mercy,
Love rooted in reality, and the light of
Faith that dares shine in the darkness.
With your Gospel as my guide, lead me
Along the ways of joy and righteousness.
Give me courage to stand on the side of
All who suffer injustice or violence,
To stand up for those whose dignity is
Damaged by indifference and
Whose worth is denied by forces of power.
As I forgive others may I find forgiveness.
As I die to myself may I rise to new life
In that kingdom where you live and reign
With all the saints, known and unknown,
Now and forever.
Amen.
— Maryknoll Father Joseph R. Veneroso
