Saturday - March 27, 2021
“There are ways of being crucified that do not involve rough wood or heavy nails, but a love beyond our capacity to love, which means a love that has been given to us by God…”
-Catherine Doherty
TODAY'S READINGS
March 27, 2021
Saturday of the Fifth Week of Lent
Lectionary: 256
Reading 1 Ez 37:21-28
Thus says the Lord GOD:
I will take the children of Israel from among the nations
to which they have come,
and gather them from all sides to bring them back to their land.
I will make them one nation upon the land,
in the mountains of Israel,
and there shall be one prince for them all.
Never again shall they be two nations,
and never again shall they be divided into two kingdoms.
No longer shall they defile themselves with their idols,
their abominations, and all their transgressions.
I will deliver them from all their sins of apostasy,
and cleanse them so that they may be my people
and I may be their God.
My servant David shall be prince over them,
and there shall be one shepherd for them all;
they shall live by my statutes and carefully observe my decrees.
They shall live on the land that I gave to my servant Jacob,
the land where their fathers lived;
they shall live on it forever,
they, and their children, and their children’s children,
with my servant David their prince forever.
I will make with them a covenant of peace;
it shall be an everlasting covenant with them,
and I will multiply them, and put my sanctuary among them forever.
My dwelling shall be with them;
I will be their God, and they shall be my people.
Thus the nations shall know that it is I, the LORD,
who make Israel holy,
when my sanctuary shall be set up among them forever.
Responsorial Psalm Jeremiah 31:10, 11-12abcd, 13
R. (see 10d) The Lord will guard us, as a shepherd guards his flock.
Hear the word of the LORD, O nations,
proclaim it on distant isles, and say:
He who scattered Israel, now gathers them together,
he guards them as a shepherd his flock.
R. The Lord will guard us, as a shepherd guards his flock.
The LORD shall ransom Jacob,
he shall redeem him from the hand of his conqueror.
Shouting, they shall mount the heights of Zion,
they shall come streaming to the LORD’s blessings:
The grain, the wine, and the oil,
the sheep and the oxen.
R. The Lord will guard us, as a shepherd guards his flock.
Then the virgins shall make merry and dance,
and young men and old as well.
I will turn their mourning into joy,
I will console and gladden them after their sorrows.
R. The Lord will guard us, as a shepherd guards his flock.
Verse before the Gospel Ez 18:31
Cast away from you all the crimes you have committed, says the LORD,
and make for yourselves a new heart and a new spirit.
Gospel Jn 11:45-56
Many of the Jews who had come to Mary
and seen what Jesus had done began to believe in him.
But some of them went to the Pharisees
and told them what Jesus had done.
So the chief priests and the Pharisees
convened the Sanhedrin and said,
“What are we going to do?
This man is performing many signs.
If we leave him alone, all will believe in him,
and the Romans will come
and take away both our land and our nation.”
But one of them, Caiaphas,
who was high priest that year, said to them,
“You know nothing,
nor do you consider that it is better for you
that one man should die instead of the people,
so that the whole nation may not perish.”
He did not say this on his own,
but since he was high priest for that year,
he prophesied that Jesus was going to die for the nation,
and not only for the nation,
but also to gather into one the dispersed children of God.
So from that day on they planned to kill him.
So Jesus no longer walked about in public among the Jews,
but he left for the region near the desert,
to a town called Ephraim,
and there he remained with his disciples.
Now the Passover of the Jews was near,
and many went up from the country to Jerusalem
before Passover to purify themselves.
They looked for Jesus and said to one another
as they were in the temple area, “What do you think?
That he will not come to the feast?”
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The dark night of the soul of Jesus
In a meditation given to Pope Saint John Paul II on March 15, 2002, Capuchin Father Raniero Cantalamessa, Preacher to the Papal Household since 1980, has described what happened in the Garden of Gethsemane as Jesus' dark night of the soul.
Perhaps the dark night of Jesus' soul began in the Gospel reading that we use on this final day before Holy Week, that is, the moment he could no longer walk around in public. How difficult and sad that must have been for him! His hands were already being tied and his feet were being shackled, in a sense, because he was no longer free to minister to everyone or to reach out to and offer healing and salvation to those who needed it most.
Have you ever been constrained from doing good for others? How did you feel about it? Did your soul cry out from a deep love for those you could not reach?
The hatred and fear that many people felt toward Jesus and the resulting persecutions reached a climactic intensity when the chief priests and Pharisees convened the Sanhedrin and asked, "What are we going to do?"
Has anyone wondered what they could do to stop you from continuing your calling, your God-given dream, your ministry?
We are reaching Palm Sunday. The whole of Holy Week is wrapped inside this special feast day, which is why it's also called Passion Sunday. This is a week like no other week, and now is the time to ready ourselves to enter into it in such a way that we are transformed by it.
By next Saturday, we should be different than we are today: Our lives, or our relationship with Jesus, or the wounds in our hearts should somehow be changed between now and then. To live this week like it's any other week is to waste a very precious gift.
Unite your sufferings to the Passion of Christ. Allow yourself to experience Christ's passionate love for you more than you normally do.
Today's Prayer
Beloved Lord, I want to discover behind every blessing Your love that embraces and holds me in Your hands every day. I want to thank You all my life. Amen.
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The mother of Jesus promised St. Dominic that, “one day through the rosary & the scapular I shall save the world!”
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