Thursday of the Thirty-Third Week in Ordinary Time
In today’s gospel, Jesus arrives in the city of Jerusalem and is filled with sadness. He weeps saying, “If this day you only knew what makes for peace– but now it is hidden from your eyes. For the days are coming upon you when your enemies will raise a palisade against you; they will encircle you and hem you in on all sides. They will smash you to the ground and your children within you, and they will not leave one stone upon another within you because you did not recognize the time of your visitation.” Indeed his vision comes true forty years later in 70 AD. Jerusalem was surrounded and invaded by the Roman army and completely destroyed.
In one way, I can relate to the real human feelings Jesus must have been experiencing. Last year I lost my cousin who was 44 years old to breast cancer. I witnessed a young person being diagnosed with a life-threatening illness and I felt helpless watching her suffer through an irreversible condition. When she passed, it was tempting to be consumed by the hurt and pain, and allow God’s peace to be hidden from my eyes. However, Pope Francis reminds us, “Christian hope draws from the approach that Jesus takes against human death: if death is present in creation, it is nevertheless a gash that disfigures God’s plan of love, and the savior wants to heal us of it.” God does not abandon us when we come to him with our pain and struggles. When we allow our hearts to be opened, He comes to each of us and take us by the hand with his tenderness, his meekness, his love.
Today’s Gospel should not only call to mind our struggles and pain, but should also give us a glimmer of hope. Christ poured out his blood for us, and we know that the end result is the Resurrection. Take a moment and think of all the things that are causing you to weep. Allow Christ to weep with you today in those struggles. When we receive Jesus in the Eucharist, we are reminded that, just as Jesus rose from the dead, hope and peace can come from our struggles.
-Jessica Gabrielli