The word “passion” connotes deep, focused engagement. It also relates to passivity, interestingly. The deeply passionate person in the Gospel narrative from Luke is Jesus. He appears passive, but He is not. He is wholly self-possessed and wholly present for the one day that begins on Thursday evening at His last meal with His apostles and ends with His burial before sunset the next day. Then follows the long Sabbath silence.
The narrative of the Passion is read whole and without pause on the Palm Sunday of the Passion. This story, found in each of the Gospels, is unchanging. We are the ones who change. Each year, we bring ourselves with another year’s history to hear and heed the story we so badly need. Life has its way with us, and we look again to the Passion narratives to learn to follow.
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