A paradox occurs when two facts that are both true and conflict are nevertheless true at the same time. Scripture starts with a paradox: God who is a power beyond description creates all things out of nothing, and God who is described like one of us, shaping man out of clay, breathing life into his nostrils. Both images are true. Wherever we come across a paradox, we are entering into the realm of mystery. We celebrate a paradox this week: a juncture of two facts that are both true but which conflict with one another. Jesus is God, therefore he says, I AM, which in Hebrew is the name for God (YHWH). And yet Jesus is also fully human, otherwise he could not effect salvation for us.
Paradoxes begin to pile up this week – all to emphasize the fact that this week is a mystery that we are a part of. In Isaiah, the Suffering Servant speaks of the cruelties that are happening to him – his beard his plucked, his face is buffeted and spit upon, and so on. All of these could bring disgrace and shame upon him and yet he claims tht he will not be disgraced, he will not be shamed, because he has confidence in God’s ability to save him. He stands for the truth that God has sent him to stand for, and so all of this will be temporary. It will pass, but God’s love for him will not. Jesus stands at this juncture.
In the Passion narrative, Jesus says little in the second half, once he reveals who he is, once he knows his death will be certain because he declares himself to be God’s Son – a blasphemy to the high priest found only in Mark’s Gospel. The people do not recognize the Messiah God has sent; they struggle with the paradox that God has sent a human being to effect salvation, because it’s only through our humanity, our brokenness, that salvation can come. This is part of the truth that we celebrate this week.
Pilate releases Barabbas to the crowds; he is bar (son of) Abbas (father) – the same term Jesus uses in his prayer during his agony in the Garden. Pilate releases one whose name is son of the father instead of one who is Son of the Father. We, through baptism, are made God’s children, Bar-Abbas in truth. We have to choose whether we live it as if it were truth or if we live it as if it were just a name. It’s easy to wear the name of Christian without living as if it meant something. Does Barabbas learn anything? Do we? Does the Passion of Jesus change how we see ourselves – as those who are subject to his mercy?
As we celebrate this week, we gather together in this paradox, in this mystery that is our faith in salvation, that through sin, we have been redeemed. For our own sin, Christ forgives us and we find mercy, so that we might be mercy – a paradox we are asked to live every day.
This post is based on Fr. Pat’s 2021 Homily on Palm Sunday of the Lord’s Passion.
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