Running on Empty

Palm Sunday of the Lord’s Passion

While all generalities fall short in describing the reality of the world, we can say with decent accuracy, that there are two types of people in this world: those who fill up for gas when they’re around half a tank, and those who try to get that needle as close to E as possible before getting gas.  Being the cautious guy that I am, I usually try to fill up my Malibu when I have about half of a tank left.  But, when it comes to our life in Christ, we should mimic those who, more often than not, are running on empty.

There are so many messages that God wants to communicate to us as we enter Holy Week this year.  There are so many themes that I could preach on as we begin our pilgrimage from the triumphant entry, into which we entered at the beginning of Mass, to the Last Supper, which we enter into on Holy Thursday evening, to Calvary, in which we participate on Good Friday at the Celebration of the Lord’s Passion, to the empty tomb, proclaimed to the world at Easter.  But today, I want us to examine how God emptied Himself.

St. Paul uses that exact phrase, “emptied himself,” in our second reading today.  In this beautiful hymn which focuses on the divine kenosis, which is a Greek word which means “emptying,” St. Paul reminds us that, “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,…[and] humbled himself, becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.”  Jesus, the full revelation of the God the Father, runs on empty as He saves the world.  He leaves nothing in the tank, but abandons Himself fully to the will of God.  And in this emptying, in this kenosis, God the Father exalts Jesus and glorifies Him.  

If we were to read the chapters of the Gospels that cover the time of the triumphant entry into Jerusalem through the crucifixion, we would not find Jesus holding anything back.  He accepts the praise of the people, who acclaim Him as the Messiah; He cleanses the temple; he fights back every verbal tussle with the scribes, Pharisees, and Sadducees; He washes His apostles’ feet as He calls them to serve; He gives His very Body and Blood for His Apostles at the Last Supper; He gives so much of His strength that He begins to sweat blood in the Garden of Gethsemane; He takes the mockery and cruelty of the trials before the chief priest and Pontius Pilate; He gives His last breath on the cross, and even the blood and water that filled His sacred Body are shed for our salvation.  And this is why God exalts Jesus: because He holds nothing back for the good of His people.  And this is why God will exalt us: if we hold nothing back from God.

This is one of the many paradoxes of Christianity.  It is only by giving ourselves away that we can gain what is most lasting.  It is only by emptying ourselves that we can truly be full.  Vatican II, in the Pastoral Constitution on the Church in the Modern World, entitled Gaudium et spes, says it this way: “…man, who is the only creature on earth which God willed for itself, cannot fully find himself except through a sincere gift of himself.”

In this life we can be scared of losing; we can be afraid of having nothing left, of running out of gas.  When we do it for God, however, we do not lose anything, but gain everything.  This week I invite you to participate in Jesus’ kenosis, His emptying.  After a long, hard day of work on Thursday, give God even the fatigue by participating in the Mass of the Last Supper; empty yourself, maybe even of some of your paid time off, by participating in the Celebration of the Lord’s Passion; empty yourself even of the time that you would normally sleep and participate in the new life of the Resurrection, the new life that will be given to the newly baptized at the Easter Vigil.  The Sacred Three Days, the Sacred Triduum, is our participation in Jesus’ kenosis, so that we can understand and live in our lives the paradoxical truth of Christianity that we learn from Christ: it is only by emptying ourselves that we can truly be full; it is only by giving ourselves away to God that we can find who we are truly meant to be.

The Pilgrimage of Holy Week

Palm Sunday of the Lord’s Passion

Cathedral of
Santiago de Compostela

When I was a junior in college, I had the great opportunity to study in Rome for 5 months starting in October.  It was a beautiful experience in and of itself.  But before we settled into Rome, most of the seminarians who were also studying in Rome for those five months and I began a pilgrimage in Spain called the Camino de Santiago de Compostela.  It’s one of the oldest pilgrimages in Christianity, and the goal is the Cathedral of Santiago de Compostela, where the mortal remains of St. James the Greater are kept (for non-Spanish speakers, Santiago is James or St. James in Spanish).  We walked 111 km., the minimum to receive the plenary indulgence, but you can take a pilgrim route beginning in most major cities in Europe, and even as far away as the Holy Land.  But even in just those 111 km., I was able to experience a beautiful country, hills, valleys, injuries, friendship, distrust of other travelers, and the final joy of reaching the Cathedral and attending Mass there.  

Pilgrimages are meant to give Christians a microcosm of the life of a disciple: a long distance, beauty, hard times, easy times, injuries, friendship, distrust, and the final joy of reaching the heavenly destination with the eternal worship of God.  While we’re not going anywhere physically today, we do get to go on a spiritual pilgrimage this week, this Holy Week.  We walk with Jesus on His pilgrimage to his suffering and death, and then we will be able to rejoice in the destination of that pilgrimage: the Resurrection.  

We start that pilgrimage today in joy and triumph as the Messiah enters His city, fulfilling the prophecy of Zechariah that the Messiah would enter upon an ass’s colt.  The beginning of the pilgrimage is filled with the excitement of the crowd that all of God’s promises were about to be fulfilled, though they knew not the horrible way in which that would happen.  We just had a taste of the hills, the tough part of the pilgrimage, as we heard St. Mark’s account of the Passion.  We get a foretaste of what lies ahead of us in the days that will follow.

There is no substitution for walking a pilgrimage.  Of course, to arrive at the starting point, pilgrims these days often have to fly and/or drive.  But then there is walking–walking with Jesus.  We are not a walking people as much anymore.  We have planes, trains, and automobiles to take us wherever we want to go, and trams and subways to take us the shorter distances.  But on this pilgrimage there is no shortcut, no easy way to get there.  To truly experience Jesus’ pilgrimage, we need to walk with Him, day by day, and take in His experience.  To skip immediately past the Last Supper on Holy Thursday, past the crucifixion on Good Friday, to Easter means losing some of the power of the Resurrection, because the sweetness of new life is only accessible to those who have also known suffering and death.  

So I want to invite you this week to as many Masses and liturgies as you can attend.  We will have our usual Mass and adoration on Tuesday beginning at 5:15 p.m.; Mass Wednesday morning at 8 a.m.; the Mass of the Lord’s Supper on Holy Thursday at 7 p.m.; the celebration of the Passion on Good Friday at 3 p.m.; the sorrowful prayer of Tenebrae Good Friday at 9 p.m.; and the joy of the Resurrection at the Easter Vigil on Holy Saturday at 8:30 p.m., or the Easter Sunday Masses at 8 or 10 a.m.  Very few things are more important than the Masses this week.  Very few other things will help you prepare for Easter quite like the Masses will.  Of course, some of you can’t make it to Mass because of work, health, or other issues.  If you can’t attend Mass, at least read the daily readings either from our parish app or at usccb.org/readings.  I especially want to encourage you to attend the Easter Vigil Holy Saturday night.  The symbols of Easter speak quite loudly, and we will be there to support those becoming Catholic–the newest members of our parish.  

Walk with Jesus on His pilgrimage.  Walk the road that He walked for you.  Walk the pilgrimage from suffering, to death, to new life.