Day3
HOLY SATURDAY
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Welcome to the third day of our Holy Week reflection and prayer.
Today we will spend some time with the Lord reflecting about his death
in preparation for the joy of Easter.
Yesterday we looked at the events and mysteries of Good Friday
through the second temptation in the desert. We saw how our Lord resisted the temptation of angels and flights not just in the desert, but especially on the cross.
Through his unconditional love on the cross, Jesus taught us to look beyond the sins and shortcomings of others and to insist on seeking the lost, frightened sheep hidden in every person – including the most wicked. He believed that love alone could coax the sheep out of its wolves’ clothing,
soften and transform the most hardened and wicked of hearts.
song: in him alone
song: in him alone
For our opening prayer today,
we place our hope in Jesus –
and in him alone.
We will contemplate scenes
from his Passion and Death on the cross,
taken from the film The Passion of the Christ. As we pray this Way of the Cross,
train your eyes on Jesus, his refusal to take any shortcut and to call for any rescue,
his insistence on “going all the way” because his is the heart of the Good Shepherd
willing to lay down his life for his sheep.
But pay attention as well to Mary as she follows her son. She has been doing that without understanding; perhaps more than ever, she who is no stranger to angels is bewildered by their conspicuous absence. She too has to learn to “drop the stone.”
Finally, the Father Who has been silent and seemingly absent all throughout
is very much present in Calvary. Appearances to the contrary notwithstanding –
including and especially to Jesus – the Father is there, watching over His son;
He too does it through tears.
The Holy Saturday Temptation
By the time our Lord was buried, his broken body hurriedly laid in a borrowed tomb,
it was pretty clear: Judging by the world’s standards, this man’s life was a failure.
He was a political failure: Contrary to the hopes of his people, he did not even try to liberate Israel
from the oppression of Rome.
He was a religious failure: From all indications, he failed to convert his people or to establish the promised Kingdom.
And he was a personal failure: He didn’t seem to have accomplished anything noteworthy with his short life. Worse, he died surrounded by enemies, abandoned by his closest friends, dying a death not only brutal but also most humiliating.
Certainly the evil one must have hovered around him those final moments as he hung on the cross,
repeating his third temptation:
“Worship me, and I will give you all the world’s kingdoms and powers.”
But once again, and until his last breath Jesus rejected this offer of crowns,
opting to keep his crown of thorns.
The dead Jesus of Holy Saturday, buried in a tomb he could not even call his own,
is the very icon of utter poverty and powerlessness.
Holy Saturday is an invitation to do what Jesus did: to discard our crown. It is a call to self-dethronement.
The Holy Saturday Invitation
We believe that on Holy Saturday, our Lord made a descent into hell, not so much the eternal damnation reserved for sinners, but where the dead were relegated prior to our redemption by Jesus.
Rejecting the third temptation, our Lord refused to worship the devil and the worldly crown it promised him.
But in his death, he made himself one with all –the best of saints as well as the very worst of sinners –
and in his lifelessness, he embraced utter poverty and powerlessness.
The Lord of Holy Saturday is an oxymoron – an absolutely powerless God.
Why is it so important to be poor and powerless?
Pope Francis has this to say: It is only by stripping ourselves of our riches –
indeed of all that we are attached to, that we find ourselves grasping –
that we can be united with the least of our brothers and sisters.
That is exactly what God has set out to do. Ours indeed is not a God Who has kept His distance,
but One Who desires to be near us and in Jesus has truly become one of us.
By embracing our humanity – including and especially its most unpleasant and painful experiences –
our Lord Jesus can now tell us:
“You are not alone. You are never alone. What you are feeling right now,
what you are experiencing, no matter how painful, no matter how dark,
I’ve been there, done that! I truly understand.”
Jesus has been able to do that only by discarding the divine crown
and dethroning himself.
Holy Saturday is an invitation to do what Jesus did:
To discard our crown. It is a call to self-dethronement.
St Paul puts it so beautifully in his letter to the Philippians: Our Lord did not count his equality with God
“a thing to be grasped.”
closing prayer-song: holy darkness
closing prayer-song: holy darkness
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