Reflection for Friday of the Second Week of Lent
Today’s introit from the Missal is a prayer that reveals the tie between the two readings in today’s liturgy: “In you, O Lord, I put my trust, let me never be put to shame; release me from the snare they have hidden for me…” (Ps. 31:2,5). “Release me from the snare they have hidden” applies to our ancestor Joseph, who is the victim of the scheming of his jealous brothers in the story from Genesis 37. His brothers cannot tolerate their father’s preferential treatment for his youngest son and search for a way to be rid of him. First, they cast him into a cistern to leave him to die, and then decide on an alternate approach of selling him into slavery to make for themselves a fine profit in the process: twenty pieces of silver.
It is in the Gospel (Mt. 21) that such “hidden snares” come to full fruition: the owner of the vineyard sends his only son to deal with his wicked servants who wish to take the produce of the crop for themselves. The father reasons that the servants will surely respect his son. But they seize him, throw him out of the vineyard and kill him. They, too, attempt to turn a profit, thinking that by destroying the son, they will be able to acquire his inheritance. The thinly veiled parable alludes to Christ, the cornerstone of the new temple (the Kingdom of God), rejected by the chief priests and Pharisees. The Gospel says, “they knew he was speaking about them,” and they, like the jealous brothers and the wicked servants, began to hatch a plot to do away with Jesus that would be sealed with thirty pieces of silver.
The communion antiphon takes this image to its most profound level: “God loved us, and sent his Son as expiation for our sins” (1 Jn. 4:10). God, like Israel and the landowner, sends his only-begotten Son as atonement for our sins of murderous intent and greed. It is up to us to accept or reject the Father’s great gift.
Reflection: God has sent us his only Son. How have we received him into our life?
Reflection by Br. Michael Marcotte, OSB
Posted in Daily Reflections, Lenten Resources