Palm Sunday C - April 10, 2022

Holy Cross Monastery, West Park, NY

Br. Ephrem Arcement

Palm Sunday C - April 10, 2022

The Liturgy of the Palms:

Luke 19:28-40

The Liturgy of the Word:

Isaiah 50:4-9a

Philippians 2:5-11

Luke 23:1-49

Click here for an audio version of this sermon

Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord! Hosanna in the highest!

It has been said that the spiritual life is what one does with one’s fears, and I largely agree. Fear has a way of either making us cower and hide or, with some inspiration and faith, to stand up taller, fight harder and overcome. Ever since the ruddy, young David took down the towering Goliath, humankind loves a good underdog story.

As we know, the “greatest story ever told” is about such an underdog: how a young, simple Jewish man from Nazareth overcame the power of death and brought eternal life to all who desire it. It’s the story of the confrontation between the reign of a powerful and violent “Satan” and the reign of a hidden and unassuming God. And one of the greatest lessons followers of Jesus Christ have had to learn ever since Jesus called Peter “Satan” was that the reign of God is entered into riding on a donkey rather than a chariot.

As we find ourselves beginning our Holy Week liturgies commemorating the most pivotal and transforming events of human history, we find ourselves confronted with two primal realities: joy and sorrow. We know how the story ends…and this brings us great joy. But we also know that there is no way to resurrection joy but by way of the sorrow of the cross. We are, as St. Paul expressed, on a parabolic journey: we must descend before we ascend. Like the shape of a parabola, we move from the reign of the self to self-emptying to the reign of God, and this means that the sorrow and fear of the cross must be confronted before God can reign supreme in peace and joy over our lives.

In a previous monastic incarnation, I spent several years as a Roman Catholic Benedictine monk teaching courses on the Old and New Testaments to a group of young and often very biblically naive seminarians. One of my goals was to inspire my students to fall in love with the Sacred Scriptures while simultaneously helping them to be honest with the text. But for many young people today, being honest with the text is a direct challenge to their faith and stokes all kinds of fear…along with some stone throwing and accusations of heresy! One such occasion in fact occurred when I was teaching the Servant Songs of the Prophet Isaiah and tried to help my students get into the mind and heart of Christ who, I suggested, must have often used these Servant Songs for his own personal lectio divina. Just imagine, I offered, a young Jesus probably around their age, reading and internalizing these passages and coming to greater and greater realization of his destiny as the very Servant who was called to fulfill these prophecies.

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.

This was all too much for one student who raised his hand and said that the Church doesn’t allow us to believe that Jesus didn’t always know that he was the Messiah. I challenged him and told him he was mistaken and received an email the following day with a concession speech which he also sent to the whole class reassuring them, that after some research, Fr. Ephrem was, in fact, not a heretic after all!

I share this story because I continue to hold that our Lord did in fact come to terms with his identity and mission throughout the developing years of his life and that a significant catalyst for him was his own Sacred Scriptures, especially the Servant Songs of Isaiah, which our liturgies this week will feature in a prominent way.

This is important because it is crucial that we look to Jesus and his own parabolic journey to help us make our own. How did he face his fears? And how did he overcome them?

There was perhaps nothing clearer to Jesus, it seems to me, than the fact that his destiny of ushering in the reign of God was replete with suffering. If he did in fact see himself as the Suffering Servant of the prophet Isaiah, then Gethsemane and Golgotha came as no surprise. All four Gospels attest to the fact that Jesus knew that there was no way around the cross. So, what kind of weight he must have bourn from his first realization, probably already as a young man, that his life was to be cut short by the reign of terror and violence and that he was the one destined to be lead as a lamb to the slaughter! How did he have the grace to not cower in fear but to stand up taller and fight and overcome?

The young seminarian might reduce the answer to the fact that he was God. Yes, Jesus was fully divine but also fully human and the dread he experienced about his future was as real as yours and mine would be if we were in a similar situation. A better answer, I believe, is that he was fired with a vision of what his life was and what it meant and this vision gave him a power much greater than the power of fear. The cross became relativized in the light of his ultimate vocation and destiny. He knew that the way of the cross was somehow a part of the mysterious plan of “Abba” who would not, in the end, forsake him. And he became fully convinced that the sacrifice of his life would be the very catalyst for the final destruction of sin and death and pave the way for God’s reign of peace and justice. Every word he spoke, every lesson he taught, every miracle he performed, all poured forth from a heart fully owned by this vision.

Liturgically speaking, and, for some of us, perhaps existentially as well, we now find ourselves in Jerusalem, the city of destiny, awaiting the condemnation of Pilate and the scourge. The cross towers before us like a menacing Goliath and we hear our Lord ask, “will you follow me or will you forsake me?”

It is ultimately a question about what means the most to us: ourselves or our Lord. A question about fear or faith. Before we answer, let us not be like the impetuous Peter but let us soberly consider the stakes and the best way forward. Armed with humility, the knowledge of our own weakness, and the vision of our ultimate purpose and destiny in Christ, let us draw strength and inspiration from the pioneer and perfecter of our faith and continually watch and pray lest we too are brought to the trial. And even if we are and stumble along the way, we are assured that we have a faithful and merciful high priest who is ready to pick us up and egg us on in the fight.

Palm Sunday - March 28, 2021

Holy Cross Monastery, West Park, NY

Br. Luc Thuku, OHC

Palm Sunday  - Sunday, March 28, 2021

Mark 11:1-11

Isaiah 50:4-9a

Philippians 2:5-11

Mark 15:1-39, [40-47]

Click here for an audio version of this sermon

Today we gather to celebrate the beginning of the commemoration of Holy Week, also called the Great Week by the Eastern Churches. It is called the Great Week because great things happened during this particular week in the history and execution of our salvation. The deeds, with the exception of the resurrection, are however only GREAT when we put them in the perspective of salvation  otherwise they were horrible. A human being who is also God is betrayed by a friend and killed with the consent of religious authorities by civil authorities with the approval of the masses. It is all about pain and suffering and that is not something we would ordinarily call great! 

It also painfully reminds us that humanity has been two faced since time in memorial… the crowds that shouted “hosanna blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord” shouted with equal enthusiasm “crucify him” before a week went by!

In the first reading from Isaiah, we heard a portion of the so called  ‘Song of the Suffering Servant’. We heard the prophet fussing or lamenting, trying to make sense of some painful realities, in this case exile. If we are able to make sense or grasp the message of this text, which is, that even righteous people suffer for no fault of theirs, then we will be able to start having an idea why Jesus had to die, and a horrible death at that, and also our own sufferings especially those that come our way for no fault of ours. However, although the idea of righteous suffering is prevalent in our passage this morning, the emphasis is on the cost of being a faithful disciple or servant, and God’s vindication of the servant’s obedience or faithfulness. 

The passage from Isaiah reminds and tries to focus us on the fact that when we were called by God, we were called to faithfuness and that the communication of God’s intention is fundamental to, or the core of, our calling. We therefore should listen attentively to God for the message and then use our tongues to convey it to support the weary. We may ask who the weary are that need a word from the servant of God…on top of the poor, the sick, the lame, the hungry, the widow, the orphan, the prisoner and the ones we know well; the weary also include people who see no purpose or meaning in their life, people who think their work is in vain, people who are in the depths of despair, people who see no reason to continue in their labor. Above all the weary are sinners…people like you and me at some point in time! They are people who see their sin and their shame, they are people who know that they are, or feel, alienated from God and exiled from His presence, people who know their unworthiness, people who admit they don't do the right they really want to do.

Although Isaiah does not tell us what the word for the weary is, Jesus, the obedient servant of the sovereign Lord does tell us that the word is REST. He tells us in Matthew 11:28 “Come to me all you who are weary and burdened and I will give you rest”. The rest he is speaking about, though, has nothing to do with relaxing in bed, or on an armchair sipping wine, or on a hammock with a book or newspaper, or soaking in the sun on a beach in Hawaii for eternity. It is believing in him and following him and as we heard in today's lengthy gospel passage, that path is rocky and may, or will, lead to death!

We should keep our ears open to both those whom we serve and to God. This is the character of obedience because we are not our own. This however will produce suffering. Prophets do advocacy work on behalf of the marginalized and at the same time try to encourage or give hope to the suffering. They find themselves sandwiched between the oppressor and the oppressed and this may lead to resistance from the powerful and even from those who suffer. Suffering in this context is a result of speaking truth to power and is therefore not passive. We are called to resist violent oppression because acting otherwise makes us and the survivors we are advocating for in the name of God, lose their human dignity.

Jesus whom we follow gave the message he has entrusted to us with boldness. He gave the message in the face of opposition and ridicule but that did not deter him from giving a word of rest to the weary, to sinners and all. Once again as servants of the Lord, like Jesus, we are called upon to speak boldy with an instructed tongue in the face of ridicule, mockery, opposition and death. We should never be afraid to speak the truth regardless of what the itching ears of our audience wants to hear, regardless of the hostility of the worldly powers and authorities! Even if death becomes our end, the God who calls and sustains us will vindicate us and our death will not be in vain. Suffering and/or shame does not have the last word. With God on our side, the expected result is victory despite how bleak a situation looks. 

Some peole are tempted to think that Jesus used his divine nature in a selfish way to escape pain but that was not the case. Like the rest of us, when he ministered here on earth, he lived by faith. By faith he humbled himself to the point of death because he trusted in God and depended on the power of the Spirit. By faith Jesus listened to God. By faith Jesus set his face resolutely towards Jerusalem. By faith he submitted to suffering and to shame. That is why Paul is urging us in our second reading today from Philippians 2:5-11, to let the same mind be in us that was in Christ who humbled himself and by so doing  God exalted him to the highest place and gave him the name that is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow in heaven and on earth and every toungue confess that He alone is Lord.

In the gospel which is long and loaded with information, We hear Peter being put into a corner by a servant girl with a very depressing question. The question posed to him which is best framed in John 18:17 is… “are you not also this man’s disciple?” 

For once let us shift our minds not to the response Peter gave or how many times the cock crowed, and take liberty to re-word the question to “are you this man’s disciple?”  I am suggesting we do so because it will put us in the picture and by that underline the importance and relevance of the question to us modern day disciples. “Am I this man’s disciple?”….“Are you this man’s disciple?… seriously, I mean to ask “Are you this man’s disciple?” 

This man’s disciples live by faith…This man’s disciples live with intergrity…This man’s disciples listen attentively for the word of God and convey it to the weary…This man’s disciples are humble and not full of themselves… this man’s disciples don't look down on others or walk on their heads… this man’s disciples are not egocentric and nothing is always about them….This man’s disciples don’t shout others down or discriminate in any way!   

Are you this Man’s disciple?…seriously “are you this man’s disciple?” This man’s disciples identify with the poor and the oppressed… This man’s disciples face oppression head on without fear of the consequences … this man’s disciple speak truth to power not worrying about what might happen to them…this man’s disciples don’t mind being associated or indentified with the nobodys of this world….This man’s disciples are themselves nobodys because like their master Jesus, they have humbled themselves even to the point of death. the death of self first and possibly physical death! 

Are you seriously this man’s disciple?… This man’s disciples are currently fighting racism in all of its many forms, they are fighting oppression, inequality, corruption, sexism, and are in the forefront campaigning for an equitable distribution of the covid-19 vaccines that are being hoarded by the super wealthy nations of the world while the so called third world countries are going without! This man’s disciples are calling for gun law reforms because innocent people continue to be murdered enmasse mainly in this country and elsewhere, this man’s disciples are kneeling on the roads in Burma to create a buffer between trigger happy millitary officers and innocent unarmed protesters!… are you really this man’s disciple, or are you at least willing to try to live as per the example of the master?

On Easter morning at the vigil of the resurrection, the Church will give us a chance to renew our baptismal promises. Baptism as we well know is the outward sign of an inner commitment to being a disciple. You and I have a full week during this great week, to retreat, discern and decide to re-commit ourselves or to even commit ourselves afresh to this Man’s discipleship which leads to the death of self and at times to literal death, but our vindicator lives, praised be HE, and therefore death does not have the final word!

My brother, my sister, are you this man’s disciple?

The Sunday of the Passion: Palm Sunday - April 5, 2020

Holy Cross Monastery, West Park, NY
Br. Bernard Delcourt, OHC
The Sunday of the Passion: Palm Sunday - April 5, 2020

Isaiah 50:4-9a
Philippians 2:5-11

Matthew 27:11-54
Psalm 31:9-16

Click here for an audio version of this sermon.

In today’s short version of the passion according to Matthew we follow the last hours of Jesus of Nazareth. Throughout, he remains mostly silent and is no longer the agent of what is happening to Him. The passion cruelly completes and firmly establishes God’s sharing into the human experience. There is no suffering God doesn’t understand in God’s very own human flesh and soul.

*****

For the moment, humanity is sharing the profoundly felt fragility and precarity of the human experience. This sharing has the potential to bring us closer to ourselves and closer together as One Creation if we let it.

The Covid-19 pandemic forcefully reminds us of several realities that we need to embrace to find our true selves. They are realities we prefer to not think about. And they are realities not so different from what affected Jesus in his passion. Yes, even the Son of God, the Redeemer found out about these unpleasant but basic truths of life. The Franciscan theologian Richard Rohr says five realities need to be embraced to become fully human. In order to tame our ego and find the true self, we need to own the following statements:

1. Life is hard.
2. You are not important.
3. Your life is not about you.
4. You are not in control.
5. You are going to die.

*****

I argue today that in his passion, Jesus of Nazareth came into owning more deeply these tenets of human experience. And in doing so, the Trinity deepened its compassion for God’s Creation.

First, Life is hard. As a Galilean peasant from a little village and a travelling healer and preacher, Jesus already knew this. Yet in his passion the hardness of life took on an intensity that made him know the deepest suffering of the human condition.

Life is hard. This is true for each one of us at any time, but many of us often have the privilege of not living with our nose on this truth. But nowadays, we feel it more keenly in the medical, social, emotional and economic havoc this Covid-19 pandemic is wreaking on our world. And what’s more, we all feel it together, at the same time.

Second, You are not important. I know, I know, you are thinking “you can’t say that about our Lord and Savior.” But I am asking you to look at Jesus’ experience of his passion as the experience of a human being, not that of a self-assured god. The crowds, the priests and the scribes, the Roman authorities and soldiers were all making the human Jesus feel as scum. In that moment, it must have been difficult to hang on to the superior purpose of his life.

You are not important. Yes, I am talking to you, and me. At times, we can think and act as if we were the center of the universe, as individuals, or more often, as a country. Now, in our physical isolation and social distancing, our networks of work, ministerial, family and friendly relationships are deeply disturbed. And yet, the world continues. Maybe we are not as indispensable as we’d like to think. We are a part of the whole, but the whole is resilient enough to function without my fretful busyness.

Third, Your life is not about you. This part, Jesus seems to have known deep inside himself from a young age. His life was about God and about the all-embracing oneness of the divine. Jesus repeatedly escaped from honor and recognition while it was on offer. This life was not about boosting his ego. There was more to it than Him alone.

Your life is not about you. My life and your life don’t make sense without belonging to the whole of creation. Our life makes sense in relationship to God and one another. Our acquired capacities and knowledge, our unearned privileges are not for our self-satisfaction. We have a duty to use them for the greater good. That is what all these amazing healthcare providers are doing for the moment. God bless them. Catastrophe is striking. And we discover how keenly we need each other. We are not self-sufficient. We are not the sole purpose of all our perceived reality.

Fourth, You are not in control. Here is another truth which can be hard to apply to Jesus if we disregard his deep humanity. When you read Matthew’s account of his passion, you cannot help but see that he does not take control. The son of the Almighty experiences in a frightful manner what it means to be without privilege and power as a human being.

You are not in control. We inhabit the illusion that we do have control on a widening number of spheres in our lives. Most of us spend much of our lives and energy building systems that enable us to exert dominating influence on our living conditions. Modern life has greatly enhanced our technical capacity to do that. I can flick the thermostat up and my room swiftly becomes warmer. But fate cannot yet be controlled from a cell phone app. And in a situation like the current pandemic, whole sides of our lives fall out of our perceived control.

Finally, You are going to die. Jesus dies after crying “Eli, Eli, lema sabachthani.” My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? The human Jesus on the cross, did not seem to know about his coming resurrection. He had referred to eternal life in his ministry. But on the cross, Jesus experienced the complete finitude of human existence as we know it this side of death.

You are going to die. Human knowledge and technologies have made tremendous progress in prolonging our lives. Two centuries ago, the average person was lucky to live into her thirties or forties. Nowadays, we know lots of people who live reasonably comfortable lives well into their eighties. The temptation to forget that we are mortal and vulnerable is understandable but ill-advised. Human life finds heft and meaning in its finitude. Hurry to love because no one knows what tomorrow is made of. Hurry to love because that is the meaning of life.

*****
As the Apostle Paul puts it in the form of a hymn shared with the Philippians:

... (He) 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. (Philippians 2:7-8)

*****

Can we learn from Jesus’ passion and from the Covid-19 pandemic to gauge the truth of our human experience? I think that is one of the challenges of this Holy Week we are entering and of this pandemic we are in. On the other end of these time periods, we will hopefully emerge more fully ourselves than we knew before.

May you have a blessed Holy Week.
May God keep you and preserve you.

Palm Sunday, Year C - Sunday, April 14, 2019

Holy Cross Monastery, West Park, NY

Br. Robert Sevensky, OHC
Palm Sunday, Year C - Sunday, April 14, 2019

Isaiah 50:4-9a
Philippians 2:5-11
Luke 22:14-23:56

Click here for an audio version of the sermon.

“Let this mind be in you that was in Christ Jesus”

In the most recent issue of the magazine Christian Century, the publisher Peter Marty comments on the passage from St. Paul's Letter to the Philippians that is heard each year just before the dramatic reading of the Passion narrative, that awful and awe-filled story of the suffering and death of Jesus of Nazareth. Marty quotes from the famous “Christ Hymn” [Philippians 2:6-11] thought by some to be the earliest extant Christian hymn, predating even Paul. The text, so familiar, tells us that Christ humbled himself and became obedient to the point of death, even death on the cross.

Marty points out that it has become commonplace for politicians and celebrities when put in a place of  praise or public service, to say that that they are “honored and humbled.” We've all heard it and may even have said it ourselves. But as Marty points out, this is as often as not:  “... a clever method for announcing personal triumph, goodness, or happiness by using modest-sounding language intended to mitigate critique.”

Christ Jesus was humbled. But as Marty points out, no one humbled him. He humbled himself. And that's true of us as well. Others can shame us, disparage us, ostracize us, abuse us, dismiss us, ignore us, misunderstand us or even praise us. But no one can humble us. Not even God, as Marty rightly points out. Rather, as he observes: “Each of us holds the key for unlocking that otherwise invulnerable vault better known as our ego.” That is, that cluster of thoughts and memories, desires and social roles that we identify with and as our truest self and to which we hold fast by tooth and claw. 

Humility or the humbling of self is, like all the virtues, ultimately an inside job. And it's a peculiarly complicated, if essential one. The Rule of St. Benedict devotes long sections to  humility and carefully describes the signs or markers of lowliness of heart. Benedict concludes that if the life of faith and holiness is compared to a ladder, then paradoxically we descend by exaltation and ascend by humility, by lowering ourselves. Writing a century or so later, St. John Climacus in his Ladder of Divine Ascent, a text which is required Lenten reading in Eastern Christian monasteries, acknowledged just how hard it is to be truly humble:

“The sun shines on all alike, and vainglory beams on all activities. For instance I am vainglorious when I fast, and when I relax the fast to be unnoticed, I am again vainglorious by my prudence. When I am well dressed, I am quite overcome by vainglory. When I put on poor clothes, I am vainglorious again. When I talk I am defeated and when I am silent I am again defeated by it. However I throw this prickly thing, a spike stands upright.”

The mind is devious, as the Psalmist says, and our motives and best intentions are always more hidden, more complicated and perhaps more tainted than we either know or would like to admit. What to do?

Part of the answer, I think, lies in the icon that is displayed here. It is admittedly a very disturbing image. It shows Jesus, perhaps during, perhaps after his crucifixion, standing, as it were, in his grave, in his sarcophagus, with the cross of death looming up behind him. It looks to be an image of total and complete defeat. His eyes are closed or cast down, his hands are crossed meekly over the breast not in self defense but in utter surrender. The background is dark, even ominous, like the darkness of the tomb itself. And the title of this icon? In the Greek it is called Extreme Humility a name which itself is stunning. The icon illustrates the lengths to which God has gone—and will go—to bring about reconciliation and restoration, universal salvation and wholeness. Extreme—ultimate, preeminent—humility!

One Orthodox commentator remarks:

“The Humility of Christ is not meant in pietistic, psychological or moral terms. Christ is not humbled to reach moral perfection or for His own benefit. His humility is emptiness, it is the pouring out of Himself and it is understood under existential terms. He [Christ] takes the human nature...and reaches to the edge of death to heal and deify it.”  

Which is to say: to make human nature, make us, like unto God.

But Extreme Humility is not the only name of this icon. It has another title, one more common in the Slavic or Russian tradition and one even more surprising. For if you draw near you will see written here the words: The King of Glory.

Behold our king. This is the hard truth of Holy Week...which is also a deeply liberating truth. And that is that Christ's glory is not separate from, not distinct from his suffering. And nether is ours. Rather the two are one. This week reminds us in the starkest possible terms that Jesus's true glory is located not in power, miracle, grandeur, strength or control. And neither is ours. As important as power and strength can be when used wisely and rightly ordered to good ends, the root of glory and the depth of freedom lay in weakness, obedience, vulnerability, surrender, openness.

And that would be totally crazy were it not simultaneously coupled with the affirmation that God is God...and we are not. Our primal glory is rooted and grounded in the deepest truth about ourselves and our world: that we and it are God's and that in loving, willing obedience to God we find our liberty, our energy, our joy, our selves.

This of course is the paradox of Benedict's ladder. It is the paradox of today and of this whole week. It is the paradox of life. But it is true. And it, brothers and sisters, good news. We are not in control. We don't have to be in control. And yet through our loving obedience and tender submission we can become subjects and agents of liberation and justice and reconciliation and peace. And of a hope and a holiness and a joy that surpasses all human expectation and understanding.

I'll be the first to admit that can't get my head around this nor my heart. How can the man of Extreme Humility also be the King of Glory? How can the Crucified One also be the Glorified One? How can true freedom be found in lowly service? How can my own self-emptying become a doorway to fullness of life? I don't know.

But I do know that this is the work and the message and the mystery of this Sunday of the Passion and of this Holy Week. May God in mercy lead each of us deeper and deeper into this mystery, the mystery of the loving Heart which beats at the center the whole universe. May God bring us all to the joy of a holy Easter, which we taste even now, even today.

Palm Sunday: March 25 ,2018

Holy Cross Monastery, West Park, NY
Br. Josép R. Martínez-Cubero, OHC
PALM SUNDAY - Sunday, March 25, 2018

To hear the sermon in its fullness click here.

Br. Josép Martínez-Cubero,OHC

Judas betrayed him. The other disciples would not keep awake and wait with him. Peter, despite his promises, denied him when confronted. So, Jesus died because he was betrayed, deserted, and denied by his followers.

But Jesus also died because of the scheming of his enemies. His ever-escalating conflict with the powerful reached its final stage. The chief priests and scribes looked for an opportunity to kill him. His encounter with Pilate proved that empire is more interested in keeping peace and order, than pursuing justice. So, Jesus died because his message and his way of being provoked powerful enemies.  

But Jesus also died because of his self-giving love. The same Jesus who at the beginning of the gospel account performs remarkable healings, feedings, exorcisms, and authoritative teachings is, in these chapters, a victim placed under arrest, mocked, beaten and crucified. It is, however, clear that Jesus’ life was not taken from him, but given by him. This is shown with his offering of bread and wine that signifies the offering of his own body and blood, and firmly stated when he says he came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life, and all in obedience to the one he called “Abba”. So, Jesus died because he chose to give his life for others.

And, so in this Holy Week we are invited to experience the interplay that takes us from celebration to desolation, from joy to sorrow, from affirmation to betrayal. It is the interplay that reminds us of our inability to commit ourselves fully to the will of God, especially when our self-interest is at stake. It is the interplay that reminds us that those who claim to follow Jesus are capable of betrayal. It is the interplay that reminds us of the paranoid violence of empire, the greed of corrupt governments, and the dangers of self-interest among the religious elite.

The crowd who shouted: “Hosanna” is the same crowd that later shouted: “crucify him”, and we are that crowd. We cannot distance ourselves from the shouts of praise or the shouts of insults and rage. And the unfathomable thing is that we who through our actions shout “Hosanna, and then “Crucify him”; we can still come to the table time and time again and in the breaking of bread meet Jesus, who suffered, so that when we are suffering we know God is with us through our suffering; meet Jesus, who was utterly alone by the end of the story, so that when we feel alone we know God is with us in our aloneness; meet Jesus, who cried out in despair, so that when feel ready to give up, we know that God holds onto us; meet Jesus, who died, so that we know God understands death, and the fear of death, and reminds us that death does not have the last word; meet Jesus, who meets us exactly where we are, just the way we are, with open arms just like the father of the prodigal son.

And why? Because we are known by God, whose love is the only unconditional love we will ever have; a love that surpasses all understanding, a God who came into humanity in the form of Jesus and humbled himself, and became obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross, so that we might be exalted, and live in hope and courage, and love. Can we comprehend it? We don’t have to. All we need to do is celebrate the mystery, ponder it, bear witness to it, proclaim it, and submit ourselves to it. ~¡Que así sea! Amen+ 
 
 _______________References:
·      Thomas Jay Ord, The Uncontrolling Love of God: An Open and Relational Account of Providence (AVP Academic, 2015)
·      Bruce Epperly, Process Theology: Embracing Adventure with God (Energion Publications, 2014)
·      Br. Robert Sevensky, Sermon for Palm Sunday/ Passion Sunday – April 5, 2009

Palm Sunday Year A - April 9, 2017

Holy Cross Monastery, West Park, NY
Br. Robert James Magliula, OHC

Palm Sunday -Year A  - Sunday April 9,2017 

Br. Robert James Magliula

Palm Sunday is a day of high emotion, teetering on the edge between happiness and heartbreak. The Christological hymn in Philippians, which predates all the Gospels, provides a way of entering into this contradiction. From his prison cell, Paul takes the story of the cross and transforms it into an exhortation to Christian discipleship: “Let the same mind be in you that was in Christ Jesus”. Paul urges us to let Christ’s way of thinking and acting serve as a template for our own lives. His poetic reflection challenges conventional understandings of both divine and human power.

Western Christianity has long operated with a static image of God as a Supreme Monarch and a distant Critical Spectator, whose love is perceived as unstable and preferential. To human beings caught up in envy and selfish ambition, equality with such a God sounds like a great deal, something to be exploited for our own purposes. We admire strength, importance, self-sufficiency, and autonomy. This is the American way and we, unfortunately, become the god we worship.

The God whom Jesus loves and relies on, by whose power he heals and forgives sin, is not a political tyrant or an aloof authority figure. The God of Jesus Christ is overflowing with mercy and justice. Unlike us, God has no position to defend, no personal interests to protect. There is no envy or selfish ambition in the Godhead. In the Trinity the divine life is found in dispossession, in an eternal circle of unrestricted giving to the other. God’s mystery rests in mutuality: three “persons” perfectly handing over, emptying themselves out, and then fully receiving what has been handed over. The mystery of Trinity is about letting go, which looks like weakness. This “kenosis” or self-emptying, as Paul calls it, is what we see in Jesus who is the incarnation of God’s love and power.

Those who orchestrated Jesus’ death were preoccupied with power and fearful of change. Their actions are both distressing and instructive, affording us an opportunity to reflect more deeply on our own lives, as we begin Holy Week. Our present times can try our capacity to hear Paul’s exhortation to put on the mind of Christ. Whether 1st or 21st century Christians, we must ask ourselves how we exemplify selflessness and regard for others, particularly in times of controversy. If the mind of Christ is in us, how is this manifest in our character, our grappling with our internal conflicts, in the new thing God may be trying to birth in us?

As those who seek the mind of Christ, we should beware of triumphant processions that exalt rivalry and selfish ambition, knowing that Christ has emptied those human spectacles of their power. By taking the human form of a slave, the heart of God is revealed in a willingness to identify with the least. Jesus’ triumphant entry points ahead of itself to his death when the subversive character of his kingship is revealed. The self-serving, violent forces that did their worst toward Jesus are emptied of their power. In confessing and imitating Jesus Christ, we subvert the authority of the lords of privilege and violence. Matthew’s Passion narrative affirms that whatever lies ahead for Jesus’ followers has already happened to Jesus. Whatever we might suffer, he has suffered already; the death we face is the death he already endured.

In each of our lives the time will come, if it hasn’t already, when we are driven to our knees. The question at that time is not, are we strong enough to bear it. The question is, are we pliant enough to accept the circumstance and give our lives and our wills to God when our own resources are inadequate and we are utterly defeated? This is the moment of grace and decision. Faith is demonstrated in relying upon God in the lowest moments of our lives. In the liturgy of this day we meet Jesus, not as a charismatic teacher but as the one betrayed, abandoned, and facing the inevitability of death.

The people who can handle power well are those who can equally let go of it and share it. They have made journeys through powerlessness. If we haven’t touched the vulnerable place within us, we project seeming invulnerability outside and judge others for their weakness. Human strength projects and protects a clear sense of self-identity and autonomy rather than relationship. Vulnerability, surrender, trusting don’t come easily and are never going to appeal to the ego. We must reclaim relationship as the foundation and ground of everything.

We like control; God, it seems, loves vulnerability. Vulnerability is the birthplace of love, belonging, joy, courage, empathy, and creativity. It is the source of hope, accountability, and authenticity. If we want deeper spiritual lives, vulnerability is the path.

In the Trinity God has forever redefined power. The Christian God is properly called all vulnerable as much as all mighty. Jesus’ Passion incarnates this deep wisdom. As he was stripped naked, we’re reminded not to cling to the trappings we use to make ourselves feel powerful and important. It keeps us from our True Self and gets in the way of honesty, vulnerability, and community. As he emptied himself, so he says to his disciples: “If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross, and follow me.” Between happiness and heartbreak, this day calls us to let go, and give our fears, sorrows, and burdens over to Christ.

When we do, we allow ourselves to see God in all moments, and recognize that nothing is ever wasted, that God is in the business of generating life from every situation. +Amen.

Palm Sunday - Mar 20, 2016

Holy Cross Monastery, West Park, NY
Br. Will Owen, n/OHC
Palm Sunday - Sunday, March 20, 2016

The Liturgy of the Palms
Luke 19:28-40
Psalm 118:1-2, 19-29

The Liturgy of the Word
Isaiah 50:4-9a
Philippians 2:5-11
Luke 22:14-23:56

Br. Will preaching on the Passion

⧾ In the name of the Crucified One. Amen. ⧾

As I was preparing this sermon, I found myself at a loss for words or images to speak of the Passion. I’ve had that struggle, I think, because before and beyond all images of the Cross, the Cross is the shattering of images. And before and beyond all language about the Cross, the Cross is the silencing of language. To stand before the Cross and gaze on the crucified body of Our Lord is to seek annihilation—the burning away of all our assumptions and stories about ourselves, God, and the world in which we live. To pray the Cross is to consent to God’s desire to empty us entirely so that we may be filled with her life.

Dorothee Sölle, a German liberation theologian, says that we need “to learn to be empty in a world of surplus.” We need to learn to be empty in a world of surplus. What an elegant way of stating the dilemma we face as we encounter Christ’s Passion. How many of us pray this way, pray to be emptied?

I know that there is not a person in this room who does not have, encoded in their body, the effects of trauma, small or large T trauma. To live life and to love other people means to be hurt. These traumas are the gateway to emptiness. They are signposts pointing to the road that leads to the Cross, and, therefore, to Life. When these pains tap at our consciousness, we have a choice. We can choose to fill ourselves—really overstuff ourselves, which is a kind of numbing—with pills, or a drink, or food, or whatever it is that we turn to to numb the pain. Or we can choose the way of the Cross, which is the way of emptiness. We can allow God to move us deeper into our pain, to guide us into a deeper encounter with our trauma.

When we make this second choice, we find something astonishing. When we move further and further down the road of our traumas, we find Christ there, on the Cross, crucified on the Golgotha of our broken hearts, our broken lives. And when we draw even closer to Christ on the Cross in our hearts, there we are, too, hidden away in Christ’s own broken heart. When we draw that close to Christ on the Cross, we find a piece of ourselves that was never harmed, never touched by all the hurts that have afflicted us. There is a part of us that was never wounded, that remained whole and in union with God, hidden away, shielded in Christ’s heart as he hangs upon the Cross in the center of our broken, battered lives.

This Holy Week, I leave us all with the invitation to allow God to empty us out, so that we become a kind of new-hewn tomb in which to lay the body of our crucified Lord, which is our own body and the body of the world we live in. And from that place of emptiness, we will, in God’s time, know the power of her Resurrection.

Amen.

Palm Sunday - Mar 29, 2015

Holy Cross Monastery, West Park, NY

Br. Bernard Jean Delcourt, OHC

Palm Sunday B – Sunday, March 29, 2015

Mark 11:1-11 Philippians 2:5-11 Mark 14:1-15:47

An alabaster jar to hold perfumed balms

We stand today at the threshold of Holy Week when the Church remembers and relives the events of Jesus’ passion and resurrection.

But for today, we heard of the passing glory of Jesus’ entry into Jerusalem on a donkey and we dwelt on some of the events preceding and leading to his passion on the cross.

Throughout this Holy Week, we’ll be invited to remember what Jesus did for the love of God and the love of us, his followers.

I offer you two suggestions for you to consider in your meditations this week:

• First, Jesus’ utter humility
• And second, the women who supported Jesus’ ministry and surrounded him up to the time of his death.

*****

In Mark’s telling of Jesus’ passion, both religious and political authorities collaborate, if uneasily, to get a rebel executed. In the eyes of the religious authorities, Jesus is guilty of identifying himself too closely with God.

In the eyes of the political authorities, Jesus is a troublemaker who has claims to kingship over the Jews. These claims are enough to make Pilate condescend in the end to the religious authorities’ request that Jesus be executed. Despite his doubts, he doesn’t want to be seen as the governor who’s soft on enemies of the state (whether averred or suspected).

Due process was important to Romans when they prosecuted one of their own.  It had little importance when they prosecuted subjects of a far-flung province of the empire.

In having Jesus identified as an enemy of the Roman state, by allegedly claiming that Jesus wants kingship over the Jews, the religious authorities get Pilate to endorse their plan for an execution.

*****

No matter whom it came from, Romans took political opposition to the state seriously and made sure that a gruesome example was made of whomever dared to challenge the state. It was important for the Romans to make a public display of how political opponents were treated. The opponent would be made utterly helpless, would be made to suffer gruesomely and would be completely humiliated.

Crucifixion victims were often first vigorously flogged with whips that included pieces of rock or metal in order to cause deep wounds and extensive bleeding. Many victims would already be in a state of shock by the time the flogging was over. By then, some would be unable to carry their cross to the place of their execution.

At the place of crucifixion, the victim would be stripped of all clothing and nailed naked to the cross for maximum humiliation. Once hung from the cross, death would come painfully and slowly in a state of radical helplessness. As Bart Ehrman puts it, crucifixion for the Romans was a symbolic statement that WE are Roman power and YOU are nothing.

I won’t dwell in any more details on how horrible and humiliating a death this was. But it is important for us Christians to realize how utterly awful and desolating this would be for the victim and for the victim’s loved ones. Christian glorification of Jesus’ death on a Roman cross can tend to make us overlook the humiliation, the pain and the complete helplessness of such a death.

*****

Jesus and his contemporaries would have known of crucifixion. They would have witnessed it themselves, probably a few times. Crucifixion was not uncommon and the Romans intended it to be a spectacle for all to see of what happened to those who crossed Rome. They did want the populace to witness what happened to those who were crucified.

So when the gospel tells us of how Jesus predicted his death on the cross and yet deliberately journeyed towards Jerusalem anyway, we are not speaking of death as a remote and abstract concept. Jesus also knew the gory specifics of what risk he was exposing himself to.

Nonetheless, Jesus decided to continue his announcing the good news of the Kingdom of God well into the domain of his known adversaries, well into Judea and Jerusalem. He considered his peaceful message of announcing the good news important enough to not skirt the risk of a painful and humiliating end.

*****

Mark‘s account of Jesus’ passion shows us extreme humility. Despite his being one with God, Jesus chose to embrace his humanity fully and regardless of the cost in obedience to God’s will. Jesus tried to ask for God’s help to keep his martyrdom away if that was God’s will. The prayers of agony in the Garden of Gethsemane tell us that Jesus fully understood what awaited for him and yet fully trusted God’s will for him to be what he needed to embrace. And what Jesus willingly embraces was the fullness of human suffering up to and including death.

It is this type of humility that we are called to in our own lives. Luckily we are faced with less trying circumstances for most of us, most of the time. But we are called to discern God’s call and answer it even when it displeases or frightens us. We are to pray for the strength to accept God’s will. We can particularly pray to Jesus for such prayer. We can draw strength from the type of humility Jesus models for us throughout the events of the last week of his life. It is a costly humility, no doubt. But humility is part of our call.

*****

And in parallel to Jesus’ absolute humility and abandon to God’s will, I ask you to consider the complete commitment of female disciples to accompany his life, ministry and death.

Because of the prevalent biases of those who wrote the New Testament, we have only glimpses of how women were involved in Jesus’ ministry and life, and they often go unnamed. Mark tells us there were many women at the crucifixion even though he names but three of them.

*****

In Mark’s gospel, the account of Jesus’ passion is preceded by the episode of a woman who comes in the Bethany house where Jesus stays and anoints his head with a jarful of costly ointment. It is a gesture of adoration and abandonment to love. And Jesus himself commends this woman for having anointed his body for burial. He understands what’s upcoming for him and sees the loving beauty of the woman’s gesture.

In Mark’s gospel, after the crucifixion, Jesus’ body is precipitously wrapped in a linen cloth and buried, probably just in time for sundown and the beginning of sabbath. There is no time to wash and anoint his body before the sabbath.

But Mark’s readers remember that a loving female disciple anointed Jesus for burial beforehand. She is to be remembered for her love and her uncanny intuition of what was right and meet to do for her rabbi.

*****

In contrast, the crucifixion is a time of utter helplessness and dereliction for Jesus. Did he perceive the presence of his female disciples at a safe distance from the haggling and torment of the crowd and the soldiers? I hope so.

In any case, those women disciples were the only loved ones who were near. Can you imagine their courage in braving the opprobrium heaped on an enemy of the state at the time of his shameful death? They were Jesus’ only human support though his agony. They knew what was right and meet to do for their rabbi and they dared to do it.

These women question me. Am I willing to do what it takes to abandon myself fully to the love and the will of God? Jesus did it and these women kept following him to the bitter end. Do I have that courage and that stamina?

*****

In this most Holy Week, I invite you to keep at heart Jesus’ utter humility and the women’s indomitable courage and perseverance in the love of God. Have a blessed Holy Week.

Amen.

Palm Sunday - Apr 13, 2014

Holy Cross Monastery, West Park, NY 
Br. James Rostron, n/OHC
Year A - Palm Sunday - April 13, 2014

Isaiah 50:4-9a 
Matthew 21:1-11 

Jesus enters Jerusalem

And so today we begin Holy Week, the most sacred week of the Christian year. It is a
week of profound contrasts and great tension, for us, here and now in the present, just as it was for Jesus and his followers and the citizens of Jerusalem. The week begins with the triumphal and provocative entry of Jesus into Jerusalem, with a crowd of people laying their cloaks and palms before him, shouting “Hosanna!” Yet within days, Jesus is hanging, virtually abandoned, dead on a cross. A few days later, though, he is gloriously risen and the world knows that indeed he was, and is, God’s son. His deliberately humble entry on a donkey through an eastern gate into the city contrasts greatly with the grand and militaristic entry, on horses, that some say was made by Roman troops through a western gate on the same day. We see Jesus himself experiencing a wide range of emotions throughout the week, from dramatic anger at the money changers in the Temple on Monday, to a poignant and loving Passover meal on Thursday, to despair and doubt in the garden at Gethsemane early Friday morning. And most extreme of all, and really, I think, impossible for us to fathom, are, on the one hand, the wrenching agony Jesus must have felt being tortured and crucified, and, on the other hand, the ecstatic, otherworldly joy
of resurrection and union with God, the one he called Abba.

I find that this week can be quite overwhelming. I can try to make some meaningful sense
of the great swirl of political, social, and religious issues and events from Jesus’s day all mixed together with the theological, liturgical, and spiritual implications that reverberate into the present. But it’s almost as if Matthew’s description of turmoil in the city applies to my own mind, also. It’s difficult for me to know how I want to receive, and “be in,” this week. How do I balance the extreme sadness and joy of this week? How do I take in and process the stream of events of this week while avoiding sensory overload? The conclusion I’ve come to is that I don’t, I can’t. There is too much for the “planner, achiever” me to organize and interpret and understand. I am reminded of a practice I learned while studying engineering in college. When faced with a complex problem, go back to the beginning and walk through the sequence of fundamental concepts that leads up to the current scenario, no matter how rudimentary those steps seem and how well you think you know them.

So, as I’ve been thinking about the notion of going back to the beginning, I find myself
being drawn to a recent turning point in my life, the beginning of my monastic call. About seven years ago, while I was teaching high school in Washington, DC, I began to sense that some kind of big change was coming, and I was trying to figure out what that change might be. I was also getting deeply involved in parish life at St. Columba’s Episcopal Church. One aspect of that was participation in a very rich offering of adult formation classes on topics such as forgiveness, wisdom literature in the Bible, and forms of prayer. It was in that class on prayer that I learned, or perhaps finally understood, that prayer is more about listening than about talking. Now, I don’t believe that I hadn’t heard God before, but I did become a better listener. I learned to listen to God in prayer and in nature, in other people, and in events happening around me and in the world. Being a better listener ultimately brought me into this community at Holy Cross.

And now here, as I begin to absorb the wisdom of the Rule of St. Benedict, which, by the
way, begins with the word “listen,” I am becoming aware of an equally important practice, or state of being: humility. It is the starting point for a life in Christ. Humility means knowing and accepting and being true to who you are, good and bad, as a child of God and as a child of the earth, or humus. It means letting go of all falseness and pretense and defensiveness in order to be fully open to Christ. It means acknowledging your mistakes and knowing that you can’t save yourself; only Christ can do that. It means following God’s will for you, not your own will. Without humility, there is no room for Christ.

So, if I apply this principle to Holy Week it means I might try just to humbly listen. Good
things have already come from doing so, and perhaps they will again. This message echoes in the readings we heard today. Isaiah told us, “Morning by morning [the Lord God] wakens my ear ... to listen as those who are taught. The Lord God has opened my ear.” Matthew’s description of Jesus riding into Jerusalem on the backs of a donkey and a colt quotes the prophet Zechariah: “Look, your king is approaching ... humble and riding on a donkey.” And Jesus himself speaks to us, too, through his actions. His humble ride on a donkey did not happen by chance. He arranged for the animals to be available, and he coordinated a password for them to be released. He prepared an entry into the city that would be a humble protest of Roman imperialism. He is reminding us of his own humble birth, on the road to poor parents, and then being raised in a dusty nowhere town, and earning a living as a skilled laborer.

This week is, in a way, a concentrated microcosm of Jesus’s life, and we are being
prompted in words and actions and symbols to listen to Christ’s message of justice and peace and to humbly walk in his way, even if it leads to suffering and death, but knowing that it ultimately leads to resurrected life. As the week unfolds then, my advice to myself, and to you if you think it might be helpful, is to try not to think too much, or expect too much, or plan too much, or be too overwhelmed. Simply be present. Lay palms on the road in front of Jesus, shouting “Hosanna!” Share a final meal with Jesus as he bids farewell and washes your feet. Sit with him for an hour in the garden late into the night. Stand by him in his suffering on the cross. Be greeted by him at the tomb on Sunday morning. Let these things happen, let them sink in, and let yourself respond. Let go of your own will and listen to God’s will for you. Accompany Jesus on his journey. There is indeed a lot going during these tumultuous eight days, but let us simply and humbly listen – and have a blessed Holy Week. Amen.