Tuesday In Holy Week.

 

Text from “The Liturgical Year”.
By: Abbot Guéranger, O.S.B.
   Volume 6.
   Passion-Tide & Holy Week.

Today, again, Our Saviour sets out in the morning for Jerusalem. His intention is to repair to the Temple, and continue His teachings of yesterday. It is evident that His mission on Earth is fast drawing to its close.

He says to his Disciples: “You know that after two days shall be the Pasch, and The Son of Man shall be delivered up to be crucified”.

On the road from Bethania to Jerusalem, the Disciples are surprised at seeing the Fig-Tree, which their Divine Master had yesterday cursed, now dead. Addressing himself to Jesus, Peter says: “Rabbi, behold, the Fig-Tree, which Thou didst curse, is withered away”. In order to teach us that the whole of material nature is subservient to the spiritual element when this last is united to God by Faith, Jesus replies: “Have the Faith of God. Amen I say to you, that whosoever shall say to this mountain: Be thou removed and cast into the sea ! And shall not stagger in his heart, but believe that whatsoever he saith shall be done, it shall be done unto him”.

Having entered the City, Jesus directs His steps towards the Temple. No sooner has He entered, than the Chief Priests, the Scribes, and the ancients of the people, accost Him with these words: “By what authority dost Thou these things ? And who has given Thee this authority, that Thou shouldst to these things ?” We shall find Our Lord’s answer given in the Gospel. Our object is to mention the leading events of the last days of Our Redeemer on Earth;  the Holy Volume will supply the details.

As on the two preceding days, Jesus leaves the City towards evening: He passes over Mount Olivet, and returns to Bethania, where He finds His Blessed Mother and His devoted friends.

In today’s Mass, The Church reads the history of The Passion according to Saint Mark, who wrote his Gospel the next after Saint Matthew; hence, it is that the second place is assigned to him [Editor: Matthew; Mark; Luke; John].

His account of The Passion is shorter than Saint Matthew’s, of which it would seem to be a summary; and yet certain details peculiar to this Evangelist were evidently furnished by an eye-witness. Our Readers are aware that Saint Mark was a Disciple of Saint Peter, and that his Gospel was written under the very eye of The Prince of The Apostles..

In Rome, the Station for today is in the Church of Saint Prisca, which is said to have been the house of Aquila and his wife, Prisca, to whom Saint Paul sends his salutations in his Epistle to the Romans. In the 3rd-Century A.D., Pope Saint Eutychian had translated thither, on account of the sameness of the name, the body of Saint Prisca, a Virgin and Martyr of Rome.

Three days hence, the Cross will be lifted up on Calvary bearing upon itself the Author of our salvation.

The Church, in the Introit of today’s Mass, bids us at once pay our homage to this trophy of our victory, and “Glory” in it.

In the Collect of the Mass, The Church Prays that the Sacred Anniversaries of Our Saviour’s Passion may be to us a source of pardon; and that they may work in us a full reconciliation with the Divine Justice.

In today’s Epistle, Jeremias the Prophet tells us that Jesus’s Divine Flesh is the True Bread that came down from Heaven. This Bread, this Body of the Man-God, is bruised, torn, and wounded; the Jews nail it to the Wood of The Cross; so that, it is, in a manner, made one with the Wood, and the Wood is all covered with Jesus’s Blood.

This Lamb of God was immolated on the Wood of The Cross: It is by His immolation, that we have had given to us a Sacrifice which is worthy of God; and it is by this Sacrifice that we participate in the Bread of Heaven, the Flesh of The Lamb, our true Pasch.

The Gradual in the Mass, today, which is taken from Psalm xxxiv, shows us the humility and meekness of Jesus under His sufferings. How they contrast  with the haughty pride of His enemies !

After the Gradual, is sung The Passion according to Saint Mark. The same ceremonies are observed as during The Passion which was read to us on Sunday, excepting only what regarded the Palms.