Fr Michael provides a reflection on the Passion of Christ according the Gospel of Matthew.
Yet it was our infirmities that he bore,
our sufferings that he endured,
while we thought of him as stricken,
as one smitten by God and afflicted.
But he was pierced for our offenses,
crushed for our sins;
upon him was the chastisement that makes us whole,
by his wounds we are healed.
We had all gone astray like sheep,
each following his own way;
but the LORD laid upon him
the guilt of us all (Isaiah 53: 4-5).
These are the prophetic words of Isaiah with which we begin the Liturgy of the Word today. The account of the passion that follows gives a name and a face to this mysterious man of sorrows who was despised and rejected by all men: the name and the face of Jesus of Nazareth. Today we want to contemplate the Crucified One specifically in his capacity as the prototype and representative of all the rejected, the disinherited, and the “discarded” of the earth, those from whom we turn aside our faces so as not to see them. Jesus, the pierced one, and the crucified one, does truly fulfil God’s promises to the people of Israel. Despite the unexpectedness of his ministry, suffering, and death, Jesus is the culminating point for God’s saving action, which God began long before, at the time of the Exodus, and earlier with Abraham. To make this point, the Gospel rarely misses an opportunity to draw our attention to how the Good Friday event in Jesus’ life was prophesied hundreds of years before. He does this not only to show that Jesus is the Messiah but also to help us understand what kind of Messiah he is. As the antiphon in the Liturgy of the Hours says, “the plan of the Father” is now fulfilled in “making Christ the heart of the world.” And the Latin motto of the Carthusian Order states strongly; Stat Crux dum volvitur orbis: The Cross stands firm while the world turns. The Meditation on the Passion of Christ today ought to move us to repent of our sins, to turn our backs on sin and walk from the cross as new people. A new people who are ready to let heaven shine on earth, a new people who are ready to build heaven here through an active participation in fellowship of our parish community and active roles in our broken world. Below is an extended video-recorded meditation on the Passion of Christ according to the Gospel of Matthew: