Friends, in today’s Gospel Jesus asks his disciples to go into Jerusalem and prepare a Passover supper.
At
the heart of the Passover meal was the eating of a lamb, which had been
sacrificed, in remembrance of the lambs of the original Passover, whose
blood had been smeared on the doorposts of the Israelites in Egypt.
Making his Last Supper a Passover meal, Jesus was signaling the
fulfillment of
John the Baptist’s prophecy that he, Jesus, would be the Lamb of God and
the definitive sacrifice.
This
sacrifice is made sacramentally present at every Mass—not for the sake
of God, who has no need of it, but for our sake. In the Mass, we
participate in the act by which divinity and humanity are reconciled,
and we eat the sacrificed body and drink the poured-out blood of the
Lamb of God.
Reflect: Bishop Barron
has said, "In a world gone wrong, there is no communion without
sacrifice." Reflect on Christ’s sacrifice and the communion it
accomplished. What
sacrifices have you made to restore communion in one or more of your
relationships?
Wednesday of Holy Week
Lectionary: 259
The Lord GOD has given me
a well-trained tongue,
That I might know how to speak to the weary
a word that will rouse them.
Morning after morning
he opens my ear that I may hear;
And I have not rebelled,
have not turned back.
I gave my back to those who beat me,
my cheeks to those who plucked my beard;
My face I did not shield
from buffets and spitting.
The Lord GOD is my help,
therefore I am not disgraced;
I have set my face like flint,
knowing that I shall not be put to shame.
He is near who upholds my right;
if anyone wishes to oppose me,
let us appear together.
Who disputes my right?
Let him confront me.
See, the Lord GOD is my help;
who will prove me wrong?
R. (14c)
Lord, in your great love, answer me.For your sake I bear insult,
and shame covers my face.
I have become an outcast to my brothers,
a stranger to my mother's sons,
because zeal for your house consumes me,
and the insults of those who blaspheme you fall upon me.
R.
Lord, in your great love, answer me.Insult has broken my heart, and I am weak,
I looked for sympathy, but there was none;
for consolers, not one could I find.
Rather they put gall in my food,
and in my thirst they gave me vinegar to drink.
R.
Lord, in your great love, answer me.I will praise the name of God in song,
and I will glorify him with thanksgiving:
"See, you lowly ones, and be glad;
you who seek God, may your hearts revive!
For the LORD hears the poor,
and his own who are in bonds he spurns not."
R.
Lord, in your great love, answer me.
One of the Twelve, who was called Judas Iscariot,
went to the chief priests and said,
"What are you willing to give me
if I hand him over to you?"
They paid him thirty pieces of silver,
and from that time on he looked for an opportunity to hand him over.
On the first day of the Feast of Unleavened Bread,
the disciples approached Jesus and said,
"Where do you want us to prepare
for you to eat the Passover?"
He said,
"Go into the city to a certain man and tell him,
'The teacher says, "My appointed time draws near;
in your house I shall celebrate the Passover with my disciples."'"
The disciples then did as Jesus had ordered,
and prepared the Passover.
When it was evening,
he reclined at table with the Twelve.
And while they were eating, he said,
"Amen, I say to you, one of you will betray me."
Deeply distressed at this,
they began to say to him one after another,
"Surely it is not I, Lord?"
He said in reply,
"He who has dipped his hand into the dish with me
is the one who will betray me.
The Son of Man indeed goes, as it is written of him,
but woe to that man by whom the Son of Man is betrayed.
It would be better for that man if he had never been born."
Then Judas, his betrayer, said in reply,
"Surely it is not I, Rabbi?"
He answered, "You have said so."
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