The Harvest Master
Volume XXII, Number 3 – March 22, 2018
Dear CatholiCity Citizen,
I always avoid cluttering up your inbox during important holidays, so today I offer you only two brief Lent-related items and a surprisingly powerful group cyber-prayer.
“Seek ye first the Kingdom of God, and His justice, and all these things shall be given unto you.” Jesus
(Matthew 6:33)
Crown of Thorns
"Those thorns," I keep saying. As we approach Holy Week, those thorns are a way we can comprehend the agonizing suffering Jesus voluntarily endured, hour after hour, because He loved us.
Recently I was prayerfully pondering Jesus' words above in the beautiful Adoration Chapel of Saint Joseph on the campus of Belmont Abbey College (near Charlotte, North Carolina) and I gazed up at the white marble crucifix above the tabernacle to see my king—our king—the King of Kings.
What Manner of King?
I beheld a king who suffers. His crown is not merely made of thorns, but represented a garland of mockery literally heaped upon his head by the Roman soldiers with great fanfare just after his condemnation by Pontius Pilot and that brutal scourging:
The soldiers led him away inside the palace, that is, the praetorium, and assembled the whole cohort. They clothed him in purple and, weaving a crown of thorns, placed it on him. They began to salute him with, "Hail, King of the Jews!" and kept striking his head with a reed and spitting upon him.
(Mark 15:16-19)
As for the pain, take a moment to press your fingernail (or the end of a pen or pencil) into your own forehead. Apply pressure. I'll wait. Please do this.
Do you feel how painful just that little bit of pressure can be? Now imagine two dozen of those razor-sharp thorns piercing your own skin all the way down to your skull.
How could Jesus hold a coherent thought?
Every time a soldier wrapped him on the head to knock them deeper, every time those thorns jostled when he fell to the ground, every time that crown inadvertently knocked into the wood of the cross he was carrying, every time he slightly tilted his head to see forward—or pushed up with his feet on the iron nails of the cross to breathe—those thorns shifted, dug in deeper, and tore fresh lacerations into his perfect head.
As Lent draws to an end, I encourage you to take one minute or five minutes to fix your gaze upon the Crucified Christ in your church. Look at that crown. Contemplate those thorns.
Or make certain you take the time watch The Passion of the Christ movie. Marvel at your king.
That is how much you are worth to him. Yes, our king died to obey His Father, and to atone for our sins once and for all time. Yes.
Even so, those thorns. Our king suffered them because He loves you.
My Review of the Passion Movie
It's been fourteen years since Mel Gibson's masterpiece shocked the world by showing what really happened. A shaken Saint John Paul II remarked after screening it, “It is as it was.”
If you missed my movie review, which I wrote on the day of the premier, Ash Wednesday, I urge you to read (or reread) it now.
That review took a lot out of me, and is one of the best things I've ever written, and if it helps you understand what Our Lord did for us, and gives you the nudge you need to have the courage to prayerfully watch the Passion again (or for the first time)...then, Amen.
Tens of Thousands, Praying a Song
Those thorns. Let's all of us, all over the world, pray the lyrics to my favorite Lenten hymn, based upon a poem composed in the thirteen century, and put to music by a Lutheran composer in the seventeenth century, then translated into English by an Anglican pastor in 1752, beginning in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of Holy Spirit...
O Sacred Head, surrounded
by crown of piercing thorn,
O bleeding Head, so wounded,
reviled and put to scorn.
Our sins have marred the glory
of Thy most Holy Face,
yet angel hosts adore Thee,
and tremble as they gaze.
I see Thy strength and vigor
all fading in the strife,
and death with cruel rigor,
bereaving Thee of life.
O agony and dying!
O love to sinners free!
Jesus, all grace supplying,
O turn Thy face on me.
In this Thy bitter passion,
Good Shepherd, think of me,
with Thy most sweet compassion,
unworthy though I be.
Beneath Thy cross abiding
forever would I rest,
in Thy dear love confiding,
and with Thy presence blest.
But death too is my ending;
In that dread hour of need,
my friendless cause befriending,
Lord, to my rescue speed.
Thyself, O Jesus, trace me
right passage to the grave,
and from Thy cross embrace me,
with arms outstretched to save.
Amen.
If you would like to listen to a moving, beautiful version of this hymn, here is one of my favorites.
You are never alone. Jesus, now risen, is always with us. He surrounds you with angels and saints beyond counting.
I am always with you, too, praying for you, abiding with you when Jesus abides in me in the Eucharist, unto my dying breath, my friends. Thank you for being a part of our work to reach unreachable souls.
I'll meet you on the other side of Easter, my fellow subjects of our amazing King.
With Our Lady of Sorrows,
Bud Macfarlane
Founder and President
