Central to the story of the people of the Old Testament was their liberation from slavery and their ritual celebration of this each year at the feast of Passover. It was that occasion which Jesus used to inaugurate the new covenant He was to establish – a covenant that would completely transform our understanding as to who we are and where we are going.
Tonight we enter the Easter Triduum – the most important three days of prayer in the year for us as Christians – the days when we recall and retell our story as God’s people. On that first Maundy Thursday, as Jesus assembled the disciples for His Last Supper with them, He was very much aware of who He was, where He had come from and where He was going. St. John reminds us that: “Jesus knew that the Father had put everything into His hands, and that he had come from God and was returning to God.†But interestingly St. John, in recalling the supper event – and he spends 5 chapters on it – does not mention the institution of the Eucharist as other evangelists do or as St. Paul does when writing to the Corinthians. It is if John is presuming that we know all about that and wants us to recall other significant moments from that night, beginning with the washing of the disciples’ feet. The importance of that event should not be lost on us, for once again the story ends with a command: “I have given you an example so that you may copy what I have done to you.â€
Ironically this is the one occasion in the Church’s liturgical year when our Mass does not end with us being sent forth: “to love and serve the Lord.†Rather we are invited to accompany Him in mind and heart to the garden of Gethsemane as the Blessed Sacraments is taken to the altar of repose. There, at least for a little while this evening, it might be good for us to think about how we measure up as disciples.