Palm Sunday of the Passion of the Lord is the official name of this liturgical celebration. Holy Week starts with the festive celebration when Jesus enters Jerusalem. People welcomed Him by spreading their cloaks on the road while others spread reeds they have cut in the field. Still, others got palm branches and met Jesus with a joyful cry, Hosanna! Blessed be He who comes in the name of the Lord. But the sad thing is that a few days later the same people will be shouting, Crucify him! Crucify him!

Holy Week is a week for being mindful. We must set loose the baggage of Lent, and not be deterred by the dazzling sunrise of Easter morning beckoning in the distance.

It’s okay for us to be excited for Easter. We’ve waited so long, after all. In my opinion it’s one of the best feelings there is: the yearning we have in our hearts for the Resurrection as we embark on Palm Sunday. And in a purely logical sense, many of us have Easter celebrations for which we are preparing, and practical considerations to contend with. It’s going to be a busy week, one likely full of happy distractions.

We parents know that it’s tricky, tackling the topic of fear with our kids. We want them to know that it’s okay to be scared, that it’s something we all feel from time to time. We want them to understand that bravery isn’t the absence of fear, but the choices we make in persevering despite that feeling.

Most of all, we want to model the right kind of behavior for our kids. Whatever our scary situation is illness, a job loss, life changes we want them to see us make a choice to face that fear head-on.

As we approach Holy Week, the Gospel reveals to us the things that will happen to Jesus. It does not give us all the details, but Jesus nears the fulfillment of His mission. He speaks about the whole Paschal Mystery in the image of the “grain of wheat that dies to produce much fruit.” Jesus introduces this image after some Greeks approach His disciples searching to deepen their spiritual life.

Awake, O Sleeper! This morning came a little earlier than I would have liked Daylight Savings Time always does. Sometimes that morning sunlight seems more intrusive than illuminating. You’re still half-lost in sleep, and that sun is demanding of you a lot more than you’re ready to give.

The religious leaders and the people have violated their covenant relationship with Yahweh, not respecting the Sabbath rest and desecrating the Temple. Warned before of the consequences of refusing God’s commandment, they still persisted. The conquest by King Nebuchadnezzar, the Babylonian captivity was God’s way of punishing them. Not until they have repented, restored the Sabbath-rest did they appease Yahweh. Finally, only after a decree of Cyrus, did they return to Jerusalem and restored the Temple.

The first reading talks about the Law. Following the Law constitutes true worship of God. The second reading and the Gospel are more or less related: Christ’s death on the cross, the temple of the body is destroyed but will rise again. Because the cross is the symbol of the mystery of Salvation, it made Christianity a religion of the cross. For the Jews of His time, death on the cross was a scandal of the highest level. For the pagan Greeks, it was utter foolishness. But to believers, those called: the death of Christ was part of the Divine Plan of Salvation, foretold by the prophets long ago. In an effort to offset and lessen the impact of this scandal, some of the teachings in the New Testament consist of trying to remove or transcend the scandal of the cross. Especially in the minds and the hearts of the converts.

Anybody remember the old rap song by the Fresh Prince, aka Will Smith, “Parents Just Don’t Understand?” As we grow up, it is sometimes a struggle for us to imagine that our parents understand us. It can seem impossible that Mom and Dad remember the stress of exam week or peer pressure. We never saw them as children; we never saw their disappointed faces when they weren’t invited to a party, or their dashed hopes at a bad test grade. We never saw them homesick their first week of college or nervous to ask their crush to Homecoming.