Cycle A, Palm Sunday, 20 March 2005

As Holy Week begins with the celebration of Palm Sunday, we might be asking ourselves if we can truly live out all of the aspects of Christianity. The past five weeks of Lent should have been a profound experience that produced abundant personal fruits of conversion and spiritual progress.

When we encounter Jesus and his gospel, we immediately sense that we are dealing with something that is not of this world. To be a Christian is not the same as being a member of an organization. When we join an organization, we make a commitment to the goals and objectives of the organization, but we still have our own private lives that we live outside of the meetings and activities of the organization.

Christianity is essentially different. When we embrace Jesus as the truth, the way, and the life, we are faced with the reality that Jesus encompasses our entire being. Christianity is a way of life. Jesus wants to send his Spirit through every door and window of our soul. The little Teddy Bears that we hold on to must be given up.

Pope John Paul II once wrote; “It is urgent to rediscover and to set forth once more the authentic reality of the Christian faith, which is not simply a set of propositions to be accepted with intellectual assent. Rather, faith is a lived knowledge of Christ, a living remembrance of his commandments, and a truth to be lived out. A word, in any event, is not truly received until it is put into practice. Faith is a decision involving one’s whole existence. It is an encounter, a dialogue, a communion of love and of life between the believer and Jesus Christ, the way, and the truth, and the life. It entails an act of trusting abandonment to Christ, which enables us to live as he lived, in profound love of God and of our brothers and sisters” (Veritatis Splendor, 88).

On Palm Sunday, we come face to face with Jesus. Thus, we come face to face with the reality of how we are to live our lives each day.

Jesus, the Savior of the world and the king of the universe was born in the humility of Bethlehem. All throughout the Gospels, He taught His apostles and disciples the importance of humility.

His followers had already heard His piercing words: "blessed are the meek" and "blessed are the peacemakers". But, he continued to affirm the importance of the virtue of humility when he held a child and said: "unless you become like a child, you shall not enter the Kingdom of God". The Apostles continued to struggle with pride and Jesus continued to teach the importance of the basic virtue of humility. "Anyone who wants to become great among you must be your servant, and anyone who wants to be first among you must be your slave".

When the first Palm Sunday took place, Jesus, the king of heaven and earth, once again gave a lesson of humility. He entered into Jerusalem riding upon a donkey.

Went for CL in the morning. Wow, it was totally chaotic. Plenty of technical errors and we had no idea how the procession of Palms was supposed to take place. Though it was rather disorganised, we managed to pull through. I met with the aunties from the CL adult group. We finally managed to settle the costumes. I sincerely hope that all will be well this Friday. The crew have put in so much effort.

Well, I didn’t stay for the rehearsal for Passion Play, but I heard it wasn’t too bad. In any case, I went down to St Peter and St Paul for Curia. We had the Acies after that. Basically, it is one of the most important functions in the Legion. It is modelled after Rome’s armies, where they are set in a battle array, with a speech given by a general. The purpose of the Acies is to renew our loyalty and promise to do a better job. Today we had quite a number of presidiums from junior and adult side, Mandarin speaking of course. Basically, we will go forward in pairs and place your right hand on the vexillium (flag). The vexillum is a standard that is constructed out of wood. After you place your hand, you say the words of consecration, which translated into English will be;

“I am all yours, my Queen, my Mother, and all that I have is yours.”

In Mandarin it will be;

“我的母皇，我的母亲，我全属于你，我所有的一切全属于你。”

Before that we had the Opening prayer of the Legion, followed by the Rosary. Then the priest delivered his homily. Sheesh, his accent was very strong. I was trying to decipher his words. After the consecration was the praying of the Catena. Then there was the Benediction of the Blessed Sacrament. Following was the closing prayer of the Legion, then we were dismissed.

Some of us went nearby to chill out. Went home with parents after that. Ah, I finally got my thumbdrive. Now I can get rid of all those diskettes, Muahahahh! Went to lavender with my family for dinner. Came home after that.