Holy Thursday
March 21, 2008
John 13:1-15
Fr. Carl McCarthy

  

Before he became Archbishop, Fr. Romero was a simple priest. He was quiet pastor, who also worked in the chancery office. But seeing the cruelty perpetrated on his people of El Salvador at the hands of the National Guard Army, he knew that he could not keep quiet. He knew that he had to accept the role of servant and leader. He knew that he had to speak out for his parishioners, who were being killed, raped and tortured. He knew that he had to speak for three of his priests, who had been gunned down while serving the faithful.

So, on March 24, 1980, Archbishop Romero was shot to death by the Army while he was celebrating Mass. He had just begun the Eucharistic Prayer when his assailants entered the church and killed him.

Archbishop Romero had a tremendous love for the Eucharist and for the people, who he saw as Eucharist. He clearly showed this love in the days before his own death. The Army had entered one of his parish churches and taken it over. The church had been desecrated, and he went there to remove the Eucharist from the tabernacle. As he walked into the church, he told the officer why he had come, and as he did, the officer turned his gun towards the tabernacle and shot it up. As the tabernacle was shot, pieces of host came flying out and falling to the floor. With great courage, Romero ran to the front of the church and knelt, picking up the hosts; all the while, the soldiers shot at him as he gathered the hosts.              

Holding the hosts in his hands, he left the church and walked out onto the front steps. There he saw the many parishioners who had gathered, looking to him for leadership. There, he saw them as the Body of Christ. There, he saw them as a suffering people, who were being persecuted for their faith.

With the Eucharist in his hands, he went to his car, pulled out his alb and stole, and put them on. Then he returned to the church, and the faithful followed him up the center aisle, through the solders, and to the altar, where they gathered around and celebrated Mass. The stunned soldiers looked on, but did nothing.

In this action of celebrating the Eucharist, Romero knelt down before his people and washed their feet. He was doing what Jesus had done for Peter and the rest of the disciples when Jesus washed their feet. He humbled himself, and knelt down and served them. Jesus was a different type of Messiah, who came not to be served but to serve. He was their servant and their leader, and he was teaching them what they must do for one another.

Tonight is not so much about baring our feet and having them washed, as it is about kneeling in service to one another.  When we kneel before one another, we act as Jesus did. He is our Teacher and our Lord, and he gave us this example that we might do likewise for one another.

Kneeling before another is not new to us. We have engaged in this posture of service many times before. Fathers have done this when they knelt down in the backyard to teach their sons how to hold a bat and play baseball. Mothers have done this when they knelt down to comfort their little girls who had fallen from a swing set. Teachers have done this when they knelt at the desks of students having difficulty with a math problem. Nurses have done this when they knelt at a bedside to hold a patient’s hand before surgery.

When we kneel before another, we are acting as Archbishop Romero and Jesus did. It is there in the bending of the knee. True service, true leadership, true worship of God requires that we bend the knee before another.