Holy Thursday 2016

Homily for Holy Thursday

March 24, 2016

A Night Set Apart

 

            Every year, our Jewish brothers and sisters sit down to celebrate the Passover meal. Part of that sacred ritual involves the youngest member of the family asking the others, “Why is this night different than every other night?”

            The father then explains to all present, “This night is different because our fathers were slaves in Egypt, but the Lord has brought us out of slavery, into the Promised Land of Israel, into freedom.”

            What we do here tonight began four thousand years ago in Egypt, when the Chosen People – the Jews – had been enslaved for hundreds of years. Their cries to God were not forgotten, and God raised up the prophet Moses to set them free. Moses urged the Pharaoh to release the Jewish people, but the Pharaoh’s heart was hard, and he refused to do so.

            So to ransom His people, God struck down the first-born of all of the Egyptians on the feast of Passover. We heard the Lord’s instructions in the first reading: take a year-old lamb, without blemish, and slaughter it in the evening twilight. Take its blood and cover the doorposts with it. Eat the lamb with unleavened bread. And the destroying angel will pass over the houses of the Jews when he sees the blood covering the door, but will strike down the Egyptians, and set the Israelites free.

            But slavery in Egypt was only one, temporary problem. There is a deeper slavery that we ourselves share, a slavery not confined to any one country or any historical time. From the first moment of our existence, we were slaves to sin. Ever since our first parents turned their backs on God, the source of life and freedom, we have found ourselves enslaved to sin, corruption, and death. We find ourselves in addictions, with destructive habits, wracked with guilt and shame. Who can save us from this wretched slavery!!

            To ransom His people, God would provide another Passover. A Lamb – the Lamb of God – without blemish or sin or stain was to be slaughtered for the people. Its blood covers the wooden beams of the Cross – and covers our souls through baptism and the Eucharist. We consume this Lamb in the form of unleavened bread. Here at this altar, the one Sacrifice that frees us is offered, the Sinless One in place of the guilty, the Innocent One paying the debt that we owed but could not pay, the thrice-Holy God Whom angels bow to worship, laying down His life freely upon the altar of the Cross to rescue wretched slaves and make them sons and daughters!

            And so we gather to make present again the one Passover that saves us. This New Passover does not free our forefathers from slavery in Egypt; no, this New Passover frees you and I from our much more miserable slavery to sin. Receive now the price of our ransom – Jesus Christ, the Lamb of God.

            Why is this night different than every other night?

            Because once we were slaves, and now we are free.