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Dear Parish Faithful,
GREAT AND HOLY TUESDAY
"O faithless generation, how long am I to be with you? How long am I to bear with you?" (MK. 9:19)
When reading the Gospels carefully, it is difficult not to be bewildered by the (spiritual) blindness - if not sheer obtuseness - of the disciples of Christ. It is in St. Mark's Gospel that this blindness is presented in its most stark and unrelieved manner. (In the other two Synoptic Gospels of Sts. Matthew and Luke, you can find a certain "softening" of this effect).
This is more than a problem of the disciples simply "not getting it." We can be certain that we are on solid historical ground here, because it is incomprehensible that this embarrassing characteristic of the key followers of Jesus would be some sort of literary convention/invention. For what purpose would be fulfilled in casting the very men charged with proclaiming the Gospel in such an unattractive light? These are the closest followers of Christ and their words are meant to convey certainty and trust in the Gospel message that they are bringing to others. We can only imagine to what extent the disciples-turned-apostles may have agonized over this even after having been reconciled to Christ following His Resurrection. Thus, we have to accept the unresponsiveness of the disciples - an unresponsiveness that devolves into open betrayal in the end - as a troubling feature of the Gospels.
Yet, perhaps it should not be so baffling after all when we realize what their Master was teaching them to accept as the very will of God. Instead of a glorious and victorious Messiah who would restore the glory of Israel by banishing the hated Roman occupiers from the sacred soil of the Promised Land, they were hearing words of a humble and suffering Messiah who would have to die an ignominious death for Israel - and through Israel for the whole world/cosmos - to be redeemed:
"Behold, we are going up to Jerusalem; and the Son of Man will be delivered to the chief priests and the scribes, and they will condemn him to death, and deliver him to the Gentiles; and they will mock him, and spit upon him, and scourge him, and kill him; and after three days he will rise." (Mk. 10:33-34)
Jesus openly told the twelve disciples that, "If any man would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me" (MK. 8:34). Following the Last Supper, the agony of Gethsemane, and the arrest of Jesus, that is precisely what the disciples did not do! They did not deny themselves, and they did not take up their respective crosses in order to follow Christ to the end. They scattered in fear of their lives and essentially betrayed their Lord, after swearing that that is what they would never do!
The chief of the apostles, Peter, "vehemently" told Jesus: "Even though they all fall away, I will not; and "If I must die with you, I will not deny you." (MK. 14:29, 31) Peter was incapable of fulfilling these bold protestations of undying loyalty. Rather, the prophetic words of Jesus: "Truly, I say to you, this very night, before the cock crows twice, you will deny me three times" (MK. 14:30) were awaiting their fulfillment. Little wonder, indeed, that when these words were actually fulfilled just a few hours later, Peter "broke down and wept." (MK. 14:72)
We can go back further into the ministry of Jesus, to already see the "seeds" of this betrayal in the parable of the Sower. One of the negative reactions to the Gospel message would be of those "who, when they hear the word, immediately receive it with joy and they have no root in themselves, but endure for a while; then, when tribulation or persecution arises on account of the word, immediately they fall away." (MK. 4:16-17) This was a devastatingly accurate portrait of the disciples actions once "tribulation" and "persecution" arose before their vision as deadly realities. When the possibility of the Cross started to dawn on them, and that they may also be implicated with Jesus and actually have to co-suffer with Him, then they instinctively reacted in the way Christ warned about in the parable. (Mk. 10:37)
On the way to Jerusalem there was the incident, almost "comic" on one level, of the disciples James and John, sons of Zebedee, requesting of Jesus "Grant us to sit, one at your right hand and one at your left, in your glory." (MK. 10:37) Who would want to miss out on an opportunity that would promise eschatological glorification? This is why Jesus had to answer: "You do not know what you are asking. Are you able to drink the chalice that I drink, or to be baptized with the baptism with which I am baptized? (MK. 10:38). The "chalice" offered by Christ is filled with suffering before the glory. And the "baptism" referred to here by Christ will include shed blood. In due time, these disciples will have to rethink their bold affirmation that they would gladly drink from such a chalice; or be baptized with such a baptism.
Further, it is also ironic that Jesus heals blind Bartimaeus by the roadside (MK. 10:46-52) on the way to Jerusalem and the Cross, accompanied by the words, "Go your way; your faith has made you well;" (MK. 10:52) when in contrast to blind Bartimaeus, who now "sees," the disciples who are following Jesus up to Jerusalem have a crisis of faith, conveyed as a certain spiritual blindness when everything that Jesus prepared them for comes to pass.
Even though they were Galilean fishermen, peasants or artisans, we all share the identical temptations to this day.
The disciples were men of flesh and blood, as we all are. They were sinful people in need of salvation. This implies weakness, wavering and wandering away from that which is challenging, let alone from that which threatens our very lives. Jesus acknowledged this during His agony in Gethsemane, a time of the most intense emotional distress on His part: "Watch and pray that you may not enter into temptation; the spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak" (MK. 14:38).
This insight of Christ's is one reason among others that we, too, betray Christ far too often - if not on a daily basis. The rather mundane and "everyday" nature of our betrayal lacks drama, and may thus escape our notice as we seemingly "sail" through the days of our lives. It may take a very special moment when we can honestly confess before to Lord with the very words of the Apostle Peter: "Depart from me, for I am a sinful man, O Lord" (LK. 5:8). And yet, the very weakness of the disciples is a consolation and comfort for us.
Thus, we can "feel their pain," and deeply sympathize with their all-too human failings. We now know, however, through the example of the disciples, that we too can repent and be restored to fellowship with Christ. That will depend to a great extent on just how committed we are to the Apostle Peter's confession of faith (one of his better moments!): "You are the Christ, the Son of the living God!" (MATT. 16:16).
