Dear brothers and sisters, March 29 th, 2026 (Palm Sunday A)

Today it is Palm Sunday, Christ enters Jerusalem with the palms and people are crying out “Hosanna” to the Son of David. We also are called to enter Jerusalem with palm branches in our hands. Today we really see the “kenosis” of Jesus Christ. Christ the King, riding on an ass, enters Jerusalem. Jerusalem is each one of us. Jerusalem is this city full of contradictions, it is the Holy city that kills its prophets. Like us we are full of contradictions, we are called to be holy, yet we are full of sin. We want to do good, to love and to follow God but many times we cannot, we sin and are selfish. Christ enters today into our own contradictions. Christ today entering Jerusalem, enters the deepest reality of man. The deepest reality of man is that we kill God. Christ wants to reach the depth of the heart of you and me, this deep reality. “My kingdom does not belong to this world” Christ will say to Pilate. For Christ the victory is losing his life for us. Christ meekly accepts to be killed and rejected by us who so many times instead of choosing God choose sin. Christ today empties himself for us. Christ totally donates himself to you and to me with no reserves, he comes to fill the terrible void that sin generated in us, he fills us with his giving of himself. Christ comes today victorious like this palm branch in front of Jerusalem. Christ in front of death stands erect, by his death he destroys death for us. In front of our sins, Christ comes to love you and me. This is the real victory, the palm of victory, that we are loved by God in our sins. With Jesus Christ with his Holy Spirit, we also can go to Jerusalem, to the other, to love the other totally. The Christian carries within this form of total love, this martyrdom, that wins over sin and death. With this palm in our hand, with Christ with us, this victory is also ours, Christ gives us his spirit to love beyond death! Peace, Fr. Nicholas