9781644135945

The Easter Cycle
As she stands beneath the cross, suffering and offering her sacrifice with Christ, Mary
is the symbol and the type of the Church. During Passiontide the liturgy sees in Mary the
Church and each of its members. The Church, the living, trusting bride of Christ, accompanies
her bridegroom bravely and faithfully to the end. Down through the ages she shares His
ignominy and His humiliations at the hands of wicked men. She enters with her bridegroom
into His deepest sufferings and shares His death with Him. Each day in the celebration of the
Holy Sacrifice she repeats the self-immolation of Christ, and adds to it the offering of another
Mary at the foot of the cross — the offering of herself. She is joined in a most intimate union
of mind and heart with Him. The life of the Church and that of every devout Christian must
of necessity follow the via dolorosa of the Sorrowful Mother. The closer she presses to the
cross, the more fruitful is her motherhood of souls. “He that shall lose his life for Me shall
find it” (Mt 10:39).
Prayer
O God, in whose passion the sword of sorrow foretold by Simeon did pierce the most sweet
soul of Mary, the glorious Virgin and Mother: mercifully grant that we who reverently meditate
on her anguish and suffering may, through the glorious merits and prayers of all the saints
standing faithfully by Thy cross, obtain the blessed fruit of Thy passion. Who livest and reignest
forever. Amen.
Saturday
In today’s Gospel we read about the triumphant entry of our Lord into Jerusalem. “Hosanna,
blessed is He that cometh in the name of the Lord, the king of Israel.” The bringing of Lazarus
back to life had set the crowd on fire with enthusiasm for Christ. Even the pagans were flocking
to see this wonder-worker. But through this thin veil of triumph, Christ sees the truth. The Jews
will forsake Him, and the pagans will accept Him.
A group of pagans comes to the apostles Andrew and Philip, and asks to be introduced to Christ.
Jesus takes this opportunity to point out the glory that will come to Him through the conversion
of the Gentiles. “The hour is come that the Son of Man should be glorified.” But Christ must
win this glorification through His suffering and death. “Unless the grain of wheat falling into
the ground die, itself remaineth alone; but if it die, it bringeth forth much fruit” (Gospel). Jesus
is the grain of wheat. He had to die, says St. Augustine, through the infidelity of the Jews, and
rise through the faith of the pagans. “The death of the grain of wheat is therefore not its death;
it is the development of its life and the creation of a new life. We, too, together with Jesus are
the grains of wheat.” “If it die, it bringeth forth much fruit. He that loveth his life shall lose it;
and he that hateth his life in this world keepeth it unto life eternal” (Gospel). We shall obtain
the fruit of Christ’s passion and achieve glorification with Him in the measure that we are as
grains of wheat with Him: “If it die, it bringeth forth much fruit.” Without apparent death the
grain of wheat remains barren and sterile.
“Now [in the passion of the Lord] is the judgment of the world; now shall the prince of
this world be cast out. And I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all things to Myself ”
(Gospel). From the cross the crucified Savior will draw all things to Himself; He will overcome
283