By The Rev. John Kennedy
Palm Sunday and Easter are just around the corner. In the Episcopal Church, as well as in other Christian communions who share our liturgical practices, Palm Sunday has perhaps the strangest and most disjointed liturgy in the whole church year.
It begins with a crowd joyfully praising God, and shouting, “Blessed is the king who comes in the name of the Lord.” It ends with another crowd crying “Crucify, crucify him!” It begins with Jesus triumphantly riding into Jerusalem. It ends with Jesus being led to the bloody hill of Calvary. It begins with the blessing of palm branches, declared to be signs of Jesus’ victory. It ends with Jesus’ death on the cross; the apparent sign of his defeat. It begins with a lively, if somewhat chaotic, procession. It ends with solemn silence as Jesus’ body is laid to rest.
Why does a story, and a liturgy, that begins with triumph and exuberance end in desolation, anguish, and death? And why is this part of our story? And not just part of it, but at the very center? Why is it that, as a prayer for Palm Sunday in the Book of Common Prayer says, “[God’s] most dear Son went not up to joy but first he suffered pain, and entered not into glory before he was crucified”?
As a matter of historical circumstance, Jesus was crucified because he challenged (or at least was perceived to challenge) the established order: political, religious, and social. This reveals that there is something wrong — something broken — in humanly established orders and hierarchies; that is, our ways of arranging our lives and societies. This is just as true now as it was in Jesus’ time, because we’re really not all that different than the people in the Bible. At the heart of what is broken in our world and in our political and personal lives is human pride, or an inordinate sense of self, leading to an attitude of superiority.
Pride is seen in the arrogance of Caesar, Pilate, and Herod. It is apparent in the anxious self-importance of the religious leaders, and in contemptuousness of the crowd that repeatedly calls for Jesus to be crucified. Pride leads to indifference, insensitivity, cruelty, harmful speech, the severing of relationships, and injustice and violence on every level, from to domestic violence here in New Canaan to war in Ukraine and the Holy Land. Pride also reliably separates us from God, and God is life.
Pride is in no short supply in our world today: in our politicians, in our social media feeds, in too many of our interactions with friends and neighbors, and yes, in our churches.
But Christians called to humility. Saint Augustine wrote that, “Humility is the foundation of all the other virtues.” Thomas Merton said, “Pride makes us artificial. Humility makes us real.”
On Palm Sunday, Jesus rides into Jerusalem on a donkey — a humble, gentle, quiet animal. These are qualities of a creature that can carry Christ. Donkeys actually have crosses on their backs. It’s in the pattern of their hair; it’s in their DNA.
The first time I noticed this was in 2020 at the Trinity Retreat Center in West Cornwall, Connecticut. I was there for a spring time blessing of the bees and farm land, and they had a group of donkeys, all of whom had a cross on their back. I later learned that all donkeys possess this trait. So donkeys are literally bearing a cross — the symbol of Christ — at all times. I was deeply moved by the gentleness, vulnerability, and quietness of these animals, and I encountered Christ powerfully in them.
Christ, who boldly confronted and challenged the corrupt powers and pride of his time, was also humble. In Saint Paul’s letter to the Philippians, it says that Jesus “though in the form of God, did not regard equality with God as something to be exploited, but rather emptied [and] humbled himself” (Philippians 2:6).
Humility makes us real. It takes us out of the center of the universe and reorients us around God, the true center. It “right-sizes” us, to use a brilliant Alcoholics Anonymous phrase. It opens our hearts. It makes us sensitive and compassionate toward others and, yes, toward ourselves. It makes us more like Jesus.
So: as we approach Holy Week, may those of us who observe it do so with a posture of humility. Like the donkey in this story, may we carry Christ with us into the days ahead. Let us take time to be quiet and humble before God and to gather together in our sacred spaces, resisting the noise and agitation of the world around us. Let us offer to God all that is broken in our hearts, in our communities, and in our world, and let us offer ourselves to be agents of God’s healing, reconciling, and redeeming love.
The Rev. John Kennedy serves Associate Rector at St. Mark’s in New Canaan and is married to Emma Kennedy. In addition to the life of the spirit and of the church, John loves to play guitar, read, work out, and enjoy the natural beauty of New Canaan and the surrounding areas.
