Palm Sunday, March 28, 2021

Mark 11, 2-7

“Untie it and bring it here. If anyone should say to you, ‘Why are you doing this?’ reply, ‘The Master has need of it and will send it back here at once.’  So they went off and found a colt tethered at a gate outside on the street, and they untied it. Some of the bystanders said to them, ‘What are you doing, untying the colt?’ They answered them just as Jesus had told them to, and they permitted them to do it. So they brought the colt to Jesus and put their cloaks over it. And he sat on it. 

Palm Sunday is celebrated with two readings from the Gospel.  The second reading is that of the Passion of the Lord, while the first, given at the very beginning of Mass, is that of the Lord’s triumphal entry into Jerusalem.

In the passage quoted above, the Lord orders his disciples to bring him a colt to ride into the city.  In the ancient world, people normally entered a city on foot, leading in their pack animals if they were merchants or traders.  Only a king or a conquering general would ride in, mounted.  The Lord signifies his Kingship in this way, but by riding in on the colt of an ass, and not on a horse, shows his humility.  

We can understand the human soul as the “colt” on which Jesus rides.  The Lord desires it, as he desires a soul, and he sends his disciples to free it and lead it to him.  Thus, the human soul is tied with the bonds of sin, tethered at the gate of death.  Bystanders, that is, the demons standing before the gate of death, demand, “What are you doing, untying the colt?”  They had seen the colt, that is, this soul, as their property, although they had no title to it. The Church frees it and leads it to the Lord by the reins of the conscience, saying to the demons, “The Master has need of it.”  The demons give way in fear, and the Church leads it to the Lord.  The Church lays the “cloak” of its intercession upon the soul, and the Lord seats himself on it, that is, he enthrones himself upon it.  He then guides the soul into the holy city — not the old Jerusalem, but the New Jerusalem which comes down out of heaven from God  (cf. Revelation 21, 2).  The Lord had warned the demons through his Church that he would “send it back here at once”.  And so he does, in the form of the soul’s prayers for those still tethered at the gate of death.

During this Holy Week, let us remember to pray for the catechumens who are  preparing to enter the Catholic Church on Holy Saturday night.