On Palm Sunday, archbishop says Jesus’ triumph a powerful grace amid pandemic

Suffering savior allows the faithful to proclaim ‘hosanna’ more fully than ever before, chief shepherd says as Holy Week begins

DETROIT — The archbishop of Detroit held a large palm frond with both hands as he processed into the Cathedral of the Most Blessed Sacrament, flanked by just two priests.

In the choir loft, four singers and an organist — performing double duty as both cantors and lectors — sang hymns of penance and praise, as two camera operators stood by.

That was the extent of the congregation at the cathedral, as parishes across the Archdiocese of Detroit celebrated Palm Sunday Mass in the midst of a global pandemic.

“It has been five weeks that we have been keeping this sacred time of Lent,” Archbishop Allen H. Vigneron said in his prayer to begin Mass. “And as we began Lent, surely no one of us thought or expected that we would be keeping Holy Week in the midst of this health emergency. And yet, by God’s providence, we have come to this day, this week, in order to celebrate in our time, in this place, the death and resurrection of Christ.”

The archbishop blessed a handful of palms on a nearby table — a symbol of the palms laid at the feet of Jesus as he entered the city of Jerusalem to jubilant cries of “hosanna” — but none were distributed to the faithful this year.

Instead, the archbishop addressed thousands of viewers via livestream and TV broadcasts amid the suspension of public Masses, now in its fourth week.

After the reading from the Gospel account of Jesus’ passion, Archbishop Vigneron reflected upon the meaning of the word “hosanna.”

While scholars debate over the word’s Hebrew origin, “whatever it means, in its use on Palm Sunday, it was tied to an acclamation of Jesus of Nazareth as the expected king of David’s line,” Archbishop Vigneron said.

“The crowd is saying, ‘Come into the city and be our messiah,’” Archbishop Vigneron said. “‘Fulfill the prophecies we have been expecting.’”

Archbishop Vigneron blesses palm fronds as Fr. Jim Grau, his priest-secretary, holds the crucifix during Palm Sunday Mass from the Cathedral of the Most Blessed Sacrament.

The crowd’s cry was unknowingly prophetic, the archbishop said, because they certainly did not expect their king to be crucified just one week later.

“They were, by God’s providence on that Palm Sunday, proclaiming Jesus as the paschal messiah, the suffering messiah — the messiah who had to die to save the world and come into his glory,” Archbishop Vigneron said.

This mystery of Christ’s suffering mission “is our mystery as well,” the archbishop said, turning to the reality of 2020 and the worldwide coronavirus pandemic.

“He told us that, ‘Unless you take up your cross and come after me, you cannot be my disciple,” Archbishop Vigneron said. “If you would save your life, you will lose it. But if you lose your life for my sake, you will save it.’”

When the faithful today proclaim “hosanna” on Palm Sunday, they do so knowing the significance of what Jesus did on Good Friday and Easter Sunday, Archbishop Vigneron said.

During a Palm Sunday unlike any other in living memory, Archbishop Vigneron said the faithful await with even greater hope the triumph of Jesus as the suffering messiah.

That expectation of the triumph of the suffering king is a powerful hope during a pandemic in which much seems lost, he said.

“There has, for most of us, never yet been a Holy Week like this one in which we have been called to such a profound abandonment into the hands of God’s providence — to trust him in this time of crisis, this time of epidemic, of uncertainty,” Archbishop Vigneron said. “Let us resolve to take hold of the grace God offers us this week.”

“Yes, it’s the same grace we’ve been offered every year during Holy Week — to die with Christ and to rise with him — but this year, this grace is offered with a stark clarity,” Archbishop Vigneron added, “the clarity of what it really means to be stripped with Jesus, to die with Jesus, to be abandoned with Jesus and to be sure we will live with Jesus.”

As Holy Week begins, each of the faithful is being given the grace to proclaim “hosanna,” and “to really mean it,” the archbishop said.

“This is not an easy grace. It hasn’t been for me, and I know it’s not an easy grace for you. But it is, by God’s will, the grace He offers us,” Archbishop Vigneron said.

Archbishop Vigneron directly addresses viewers via livestream during his homily from the Cathedral of the Most Blessed Sacrament.

However, Archbishop Vigneron said, if the faithful embrace the grace of such an extraordinary Holy Week, “I’m confident that all of us in this Church of the Archdiocese of Detroit will spend all of the rest of our Holy Weeks able to say ‘hosanna’ at every Mass with a deeper and renewed conviction.

“We will be ready to greet Jesus when he comes at last, and with all our heart and all our mind and all our soul, say, ‘Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord: the king, the son of David. Hosanna in the highest.’”

Holy Week Home Retreat

In addition to participating in the remaining Holy Week liturgies broadcast from the Cathedral of the Most Blessed Sacrament, Fr. J.J. Mech, the cathedral’s rector, invited those watching to take part in the archdiocese’s “Holy Week Home Retreat,” which begins tonight at 7 p.m.

All liturgies and retreat talks will be livestreamed from the Archdiocese of Detroit’s Facebook page.

Fr. Mech noted Easter Sunday Mass will be broadcast from the cathedral at 11 a.m. — an hour earlier than the usual noon time. After Mass, Archbishop Vigneron will bless the city and the Archdiocese of Detroit from the open doors of the cathedral, and the faithful will be invited to pray the Divine Mercy Chaplet, which carries with it a plenary indulgence.