Sacred Stones, Sacred Stories

When he had gone out, Jesus said, “Now the Son of Man has been glorified, and God has been glorified in him. If God has been glorified in him, God will also glorify him in himself and will glorify him at once. Little children, I am with you only a little longer. You will look for me; and as I said to the Jews so now I say to you, ‘Where I am going, you cannot come.’ I give you a new commandment, that you love one another. Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another. By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.”

Simon Peter said to him, “Lord, where are you going?” Jesus answered, “Where I am going, you cannot follow me now; but you will follow afterward.” Peter said to him, “Lord, why can I not follow you now? I will lay down my life for you.”  Jesus answered, “Will you lay down your life for me? Very truly, I tell you, before the cock crows, you will have denied me three times. (John 13:31-38)

Last Supper mosaic, Adoration Chapel – Clyde

Today St. Matthew shares his account of Jesus’s Last Supper with his followers.

In this pericope, the disciples approach Jesus and ask him where he wants them to prepare for the Passover meal (Mt 26: 17). Jesus instructs his disciples, and off they go to do as he has said.

When we are looking forward to some event, whether with joy and excitement or fear and sadness, we have to prepare. We have to plan. This comes naturally to some of us and not so naturally to others.

Whatever camp we fall into, preparing to enter into the Holy Triduum is more about interior preparations than external plans. We have been putting into order our heart and mind for these 40 days of Lent. We have been doing this through fasting, prayers and alms. We have been trying to align our consciences and our actions with our role model, Jesus Christ, keeping the commandments of loving God and neighbor as ourselves.

May we find ourselves at the banquet table of the Lord with hearts filled with truth and peace and love, knowing that we have been called and justified by grace to take a seat with the disciples.

This is God’s plan. This is Jesus’s labor. This is our instruction. Let us, as disciples, do as Jesus orders and prepare for the Paschal Meal of Love.

Today’s gospel reading portrays Jesus in the midst of many people. We focus on two – Mary, the sister to Lazarus, and Judas Iscariot, one of Jesus’s disciples.

Mary breaks open an expensive jar of aromatic spikenard (an aromatic plant) and pours it over the feet of Jesus. Its aroma fills the home. Judas becomes indignant over the “waste” because of what he sees as a way to fill the moneybags for the poor. In Mary’s poorness, her richness outshines Judas’s self-righteous and richness. These two characters’ deeds are the antithesis of the other.

We can offer Jesus our poorness, our inability to save ourselves, and in doing so, become rich in salvation. Or, we can become blind by greed, distrust or self-righteous piety and overlook the gift of eternal life that is ours only in our humble poorness. Whatever our choice, our actions will fill our homes with the sweet aroma of love or the stench of selfishness.

May our thoughts, words and deeds fill our homes and the world with the sweet smells of salvation that Jesus offers and delivers.