It's Easter but there are still tears to shed.
From
Benoit et Moi is an article from
Roberto de Mattei .
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Easter Jesus weeps over Jerusalem by Roberto de Mattei
This is a moment that should be of supreme joy. Jesus enters Jerusalem greeted by cheers and enthusiasm of the crowd. Today He is the most popular man in Jerusalem. But Jesus does not let himself be deceived by flattery. The world applauded, but He does not praise himself, nor revel in that success. While the triumphal procession down to the Temple, along the western slope of the Mount of Olives, Jesus contemplates high Jerusalem, where the places of his impending Passion: the dazzling mass of the Temple, the glittering palace Herod; austere quadrilateral Antonine tower, headquarters of the Roman garrison.
And ut appropinquavit, videns civitatem Flevit super illam (Lk 19, 41) [As he approached the city, seeing her, he wept over it].
Unexpectedly, seeing the city of Jerusalem, Jesus weeps over her.
The crying is not just any man, and not even a supreme earthly authority: this is the second person of the Holy Trinity, the Word made flesh, the God-man, in which all the history is summarized. His tears have meaning throughout the history of all ages. Jesus wept, child in the manger in Bethlehem and Bethany had witnessed the tears that had welled in the death of Lazarus. Tears accompany his Passion. But this time it's a different cry. He weeps for the city that is before him; This is not a city like any other: it is Jerusalem, the holy city of the chosen people, the spiritual center of the world. Jesus weeps for the punishment which threatens Jerusalem, but the cause of His tears, it is mainly sins, offenses against God are the cause of the death penalty. The smoke of Satan has entered the temple of God and obscures the eyes of the High Priests. And Jesus in the midst of tears and sobs, cries: "O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, if you too had recognized this day which gives peace! But now it is hidden from thine eyes."
It's like saying if you knew the things that I know, you probably will cry like I cry now. But all that is hidden from you as punishment for your sins. And that's why you do not cry, you do not repent, and thou shalt not repent of your errings and your pain.
The hosannas of the crowd, Jesus then responds with the prophecy of the inevitable punishment of the unfaithful city: "There will come upon you when your enemies trench about thee, thee round, and keep thee in on every side; they will dash you and your children within you, and they shall not leave in thee one stone upon another, because thou hast not known the time when you were seen "(Lk. 19, 42-44).
Jesus knows the terrible trials ahead. But this is not the reason for his tears. He does not cry for himself, for the pain he knows he must face for the passion that awaits, but for the fate of the holy city. What greater proof of his love for Jerusalem? However, this immense love can not reverse the infinite justice of God. God is not only infinitely merciful, but he is infinitely just, because He is infinitely holy. And Jerusalem will not be spared because of his sins.
Today, there is another city to cry. It is the city that we speak of in the third secret of Fatima. This "big city half in ruins" through which the Pope, "half trembling, with halting step, afflicted with pain and sorrow," praying "for the souls of the corpses he met on his way" What. Repeprésente the mysterious ruined city? Is it a city, a civilization, or Church of Christ? Only the future will reveal the dramatic mystery. Today is the time for tears.
Tears involve gravity and interpenetration of the dramatic situation in which the world pays. This is not the time of euphoria and illusions, but this is not the time for sarcasm or irreverent sterile polemics between Christians. This is the time of sadness and tears. Tears born of pain. And if tears are a gift, pain is a feeling that must be supplied by the knowledge of the things that concern us, so do not fail to exercise our reason, but support our faith with reason and enlighten our reason with faith .
Mary, grant us this grace at the time of the Passion of Christ and the Church.