As the Church begins our annual observance of Holy Week, permit me to take a short break from our ongoing series of praying with the Mass. To turn our attention to these most important days of the liturgical year is actually not really a diversion from our reflections on the Mass, for the Mass itself was instituted during this sacred week on Holy Thursday. Christ’s offering of Himself on the Cross for our sins on Good Friday is the very mystery that we enter into every time we are present at the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. Therefore the events of Holy Week are intimately connected with the celebration of the Mass, regardless of when we attend these Sacred Mysteries. For our reflection as we enter this Holy Week, I would invite us to reflect on how this week was experienced by two of Jesus’s Apostles, Judas and Peter.
Let us start with Judas. In the Church’s readings for Mass on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Holy Thursday, and at Good Friday Liturgy, Judas is mentioned in all of them – the only Apostle to claim that distinction. By keeping Judas before our eyes, the Church is inviting us to see in him the example of what can happen if we fail to keep Jesus at the center of our lives. Judas was called to be a follower of Christ. Jesus said to him, as well as the others: “I have called you friends.” (Jn 15:15) Before the Last Supper, Jesus says to these closest friends: “I have eagerly desired to eat this Passover with you before I suffer.” (Lk 22:15). Judas had his feet washed, like the rest. But sadly, he was so blinded in his own greed that he continued with his plan to betray Jesus. In the Garden, Judas identifies Jesus to His captors by giving Him a kiss, to which Jesus responds: “Judas, are you betraying the Son of Man with a kiss?” (Lk 22:48) Judas eventually went away saddened at his choice to reject Christ’s love. But his sadness was not true contrition, for had he been contrite, he would have let that gaze of Jesus penetrate his heart and chose the path of repentance, a path that would have led to a much different ending for him.
The story of Peter is not terribly different. This head of the Apostles was so firm in his commitment to the Lord. He promised to never deny Him, that He would even die for Him: “Lord, I am prepared to go to prison and to die with you.” (Lk 22:33) But when the time for witnessing to Jesus came, Peter three times denied knowing Jesus, just as the Lord had predicted. Right after his third denial, Luke’s Gospel recounts the following reaction of Jesus: “the Lord turned and looked at Peter.” (Lk 22:61). Peter remembered what Jesus had said about his denying Him three times, and Luke writes: “He went out and began to weep bitterly.” (Lk 22:62). Unlike with Judas, the look of Jesus at Peter after his denial did not lead to despair. Rather, Peter’s contrition was authentic, sorrowful for having denied the Messiah. This sorrow would not be the end of his story, for he would be reconciled on the shore of the sea after the Resurrection, when Jesus asks Peter three times: “Do you love me.” Three times, Peter affirms his love for Jesus, to make up for his three-fold denial. And we know the rest of his story.
Two friends of Jesus, called to be with Him, called to share in His life, called to receive His Body and Blood at the Last Supper. Both ended up falling out of their weakness. Both were looked up with love by Jesus. One despaired, and one repented. This Holy Week, I invite us to meditate on that gaze of Jesus as He looks upon us. No matter how many times we may have denied Him or rejected Him through sin, His gaze is one of love, not one of disappointment. His gaze is an invitation to not flee and hide out of shame or despair, but to run to Him, to be embraced by Him. He invites us to stand at the foot of the Cross as He gazes down on you with His arms extended in a gesture as if to say: “This is how much I love you.” May His gaze fill us with sorrow for our sins, but may we find in Him that gift of mercy that He freely offers to us, a gift that can transform our lives this week if we let Him. For with His mercy, our sins and failures are not the end of our story, they become the places of His victory in us when we surrender those sins to Him. If you have not yet let Him win that victory over your sins lately, He will be waiting for you in the confessional to welcome you with His merciful love.
Father Alford