We have just hear Matthew go to great pains to show us that every event, every happening, every person involved in the passion and death of Jesus fulfills a passage from the Hebrew Scriptures.
The betrayal and abandonment of Jesus by his special friends, the innocent Jesus becoming the victim of religious and political conniving, the darkness and the skies and the dramatic ripping of the Temple veil - all are seen in light of the sacred scriptures of the Jewish people.
The proclamation of the centurion who has witnessed all these events is the surprised recognition from all the clues: “Clearly this was the Son of God.”
With that recognition, Matthew turns our attention back to the fidelity of the women who have been following Jesus from Galilee. They alone remained to witness the fulfillment. All the others had scattered in fear.
We are among the faithful who attend Jesus and will follow him through His passion and death. St. Paul tells us what we must be doing as we journey. We are to learn to live with the attitude that Jesus had toward life and its varied events. Suffering and glory will be so intertwined as to be inseparable. Learning to accept whatever comes as coming from God’s hand and doing it in obedience to the will of the God who is my Father, being willing to put aside any position so as to better love God and my neighbor - all of this is having the attitude of Christ.
May we all be open to learning more about life from Jesus this week.
