5th Sunday of Lent Year B Homily

If you were to read through the Gospel of Saint John you would constantly come across Jesus making reference to His hour. We first hear of this hour at the Wedding Feast of Cana where He says to His mother, “My hour has not yet come.” We also heard of this hour today in our Gospel where He said, “Yet what should I say? Father, save me from this hour? But it was for this purpose that I came to this hour.” At the conclusion of the Last Supper He would state concerning this hour, “Father, the hour has come; glorify your Son so that the Son may glorify you.”

The use of this word “hour” does not signify the passing of a span of 60 minutes, but instead is made in reference to His Passion, His Death, His Resurrection, and His Ascension. It is all of these actions which are summed up by the term, Paschal Mystery. The Paschal Mystery is God’s plan of salvation which comes to be fulfilled by these four events. The unity of these events is summed up for us in the Roman Canon which states, “Therefore, O Lord, as we celebrate the memorial of the blessed Passion, the Resurrection from the dead, and the glorious Ascension into heaven of Christ, your Son, our Lord.”

This word, Paschal, comes from the Hebrew, Pasach, which means Passover. It was at the first Passover that the Lord passed over the homes of the Israelites and would strike down the first born Son if the household was not marked with the blood of the sacrificial lamb. So too through this hour which comes, the Blood of the Lamb is spilled upon the cross. We know Him to be without the blemish of sin. Through this life giving action we now have the hope of new and eternal life.

Next Sunday we will enter into Holy Week via Palm Sunday and this hour will become more vivid for us. The crowd will joyfully welcome the Lord into Jerusalem and just as quickly will begin to shout out, “Crucify Him!.” We will celebrate the Lord’s Supper and then anticipate the point when the Lord dies upon the cross. From here we will rejoice at the Good News of the Resurrection and 40 days later celebrate His Ascension into Heaven.

May we realize how important this hour is for without this hour we would not be saved. Seeing that we now prepare for this hour which unfolds we must ask what ways we have turned away from the Lord through sin. Let us always come to be reconciled with Him especially by making use of the Sacrament of Confession. Very soon we will arrive at Easter, but may we do so through full preparation for these sacred mysteries which will unfold. Namely the Passion, the Death, the Resurrection, and the Ascension of our Blessed Lord.

Let us be found ready to celebrate the Paschal Mystery and to fully enter into it by handing out life over to Christ Jesus and the pursuit of the Gospel. As we say in one of the options given for the Mystery of Faith, “Save us, Savior of the world, for by your Cross and Resurrection you have set us free.” In this manner we prepare to enter into this hour and from it strive for the Kingdom of Heaven above all things.