It was on a
maundy Thursday,
and all in the morning,
They planted
a crown of thorns
on our heavenly King.
And was not this
a woeful thing,
And sweet Jesus
we'll call him by name.
Today begins the Sacred Triduum. For many years, I would take this day and the next off from work. Sometimes I go to church to pray the Tenebrae of Holy Week. Some years I have served at the altar for the Mass of the Day, but nobody wants a seventy-year-old altar boy -- with one exception (more on that later).
Be that as it may, for a Catholic, as much as some try to deny it, the next three days are not business as usual. The whole of human history -- before, during, after -- turns on the events we remember this week. Our meditation is from a poem by Jalaludin Rumi. It is translated by Coleman Barks and John Moyne, with music by David Wilcox and Nance Pettit, and is produced by Bob Carlton.
It was on a Holy Wednesday,
and all in the morning
When Judas betrayed
our dear heavenly King.
And was not this
a woeful thing,
And sweet Jesus,
we'll call him by name.
This day in Holy Week is known among Western Christians by the above title (or among Christians in the East, Μεγάλη Τετάρτη), as tradition commemorates this day for when Judas Iscariot conspired with the Sanhedrin to betray Our Lord, in exchange for thirty pieces of silver (Matthew 26:15).
Was that a lot of money in those days?
The term in the original language, "arguria," simply means "silver coins." Historians disagree as to what form of currency is described. They could have been either staters from Antioch, tetradrachms from Ptolemy, or shekels from Tyre. (Nothing about Greek drachmas, which were either bronze, copper, or iron. Just so we're clear on that.)
Closer to the present, it is also when we here at man with black hat (more or less) interrupt our usual day-to-day routine (such as it is) in order to focus on the Main Event for the several days that follow.
Palm Sunday, St Luke's Parish (Anglican Use) at St Ignatius Church, Oxon Hill MD, 10 April 2022.
Let us go together to meet Christ on the Mount of Olives.
Today he returns from Bethany and proceeds of his own free will toward his holy and blessed passion, to consummate the mystery of our salvation. He who came down from heaven to raise us from the depths of sin, to raise us with himself, we are told in Scripture, above every sovereignty, authority and power, and every other name that can be named, now comes of his own free will to make his journey to Jerusalem. He comes without pomp or ostentation. As the psalmist says: He will not dispute or raise his voice to make it heard in the streets. He will be meek and humble, and he will make his entry in simplicity.
Let us run to accompany him as he hastens toward his passion, and imitate those who met him then, not by covering his path with garments, olive branches or palms, but by doing all we can to prostrate ourselves before him by being humble and by trying to live as he would wish. Then we shall be able to receive the Word at his coming, and God, whom no limits can contain, will be within us.
Palm Sunday 2009, at St John the Beloved Church, McLean, Virginia.
In his humility Christ entered the dark regions of our fallen world and he is glad that he became so humble for our sake, glad that he came and lived among us and shared in our nature in order to raise us up again to himself. And even though we are told that he has now ascended above the highest heavens – the proof, surely, of his power and godhead – his love for man will never rest until he has raised our earthbound nature from glory to glory, and made it one with his own in heaven.
A song I heard the organist play and sing in my parish church when I was a boy.
So let us spread before his feet, not garments or soulless olive branches, which delight the eye for a few hours and then wither, but ourselves, clothed in his grace, or rather, clothed completely in him. We who have been baptized into Christ must ourselves be the garments that we spread before him. Now that the crimson stains of our sins have been washed away in the saving waters of baptism and we have become white as pure wool, let us present the conqueror of death, not with mere branches of palms but with the real rewards of his victory. Let our souls take the place of the welcoming branches as we join today in the children’s holy song: Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord. Blessed is the king of Israel.
It was on a 
