April 4, 2003
Pilgrimage to the Holy Land - Part V
Jerusalem: From day of glory through night of agony
by Jim Rygelski, Review Managing Editor


" The very large crowd spread their cloaks on the road while others cut branches from the trees and strewed them on the road. The crowds preceding Him and those following kept crying out and saying: 'Hosanna to the Son of David; blessed is He who comes in the name of the Lord; hosanna in the highest'" (Mt 21:8-9).


JERUSALEM - The observance of Holy Week commemorates the period between Jesus' triumphal entry in Jerusalem and His crucifixion and death there.

The Golden Gates that He entered through on the east wall of the Old City have long since been closed permanently. The walled city of Jerusalem during Jesus' time had about 80,000 residents and hosted about 100,000 additional worshippers during Passover (the Old City has 33,000 inhabitants today).

A Catholic pilgrim will get a panoramic view of it from the Dominus Flevit (the Lord Wept) Church on the Mount of Olives. An example of modern architecture (1955), its exterior is in the shape of a tear. It commemorates the spot where Jesus wept over the city before entering it as recorded in the Gospel of St. Luke. The designer, Antonio Barluzzi, wanted the priest to face the Golden Gates while celebrating Mass, which he did before Vatican II's changes.

The most noticeable landmark as one looks down on the Old City is the Dome of the Rock, which marks the spot Muslims believe Islam's founder Mohammed went to heaven in a fiery chariot. But the Dome also is over the spot where Jews believe that Abraham prepared to offer Isaac in sacrifice before an angel stopped him. It is also over the point of the Jewish temple that the Virgin Mary would have entered for Jesus' presentation.

Brother Leo Gonzales, originally from Santa Barbara, Calif., has been assigned to the Dominus Flevit Church for the past 14 years. He has always been moved by the story of Christ's weeping over Jerusalem, anticipating the temple's destruction.

"He knew of their stubborn heart and the consequences," Brother Gonzales said. "They (all Jerusalem's residents) still need to give their hearts to Him. As long as they believe in a military solution they won't find peace. Christ is not violent."
'Do this in memory of Me'

The Cenacle, an upstairs room outside the south wall of the Old City where Jesus and the apostles had the last supper before Christ's passion and death, shows the redesign of the room by the Crusaders in the 1100s: arches cover the wall. Muslims took control again in the 1500s and used it as a mosque, which is why it still displays symbols of Islam.

For more than 350 years no Christian was allowed into it. When the Israeli government secured the site during the Six Day War of 1967, it offered it to the Franciscans, who have custody of the Holy Land's shrines. Unsure of the political situation, they declined, fearing that a Muslim recapture of it might permanently cut off Christian access.


WHERE JESUS WEPT - The modern Dominus Flevit Church on the Mount of Olives commemorates the place where Jesus paused on Palm Sunday to weep over the city of Jerusalem before entering it. The view through the window behind the altar looks down on the Golden Gates through which Our Lord entered that day.


The government allows Christians to enter, and the Franciscans have been negotiating for permanent ownership, said Father Peter Vasko, president of the Franciscan Foundation for the Holy Land. If that happens, the site will be converted to a chapel, he said. Pope John Paul II celebrated Mass there during his visit in 2000 and later related that it was one of his most memorable experiences.

Entering the Cenacle room should be equally meaningful for any Catholic. Here, what started as an observance of Passover became the first Mass, at which Christ instituted the Sacrament of Holy Eucharist.

"Then He took the bread, said the blessing, broke it and gave it to them, saying, 'This is My body ... do this in memory of Me"

(Lk 22:19).

He also told them that He would be betrayed that evening. His betrayer, Judas, left the supper early to go about that task.
'Your will be done'

The meal was finished about 7 p.m. Jesus, accompanied by Peter, James and John, then walked to the Garden of Gethsemane, 45 minutes away on the Mount of Olives. One can walk part of the actual path when leaving the Cenacle.

The remains of the Garden are enclosed by a fence, though a pilgrim can gain entrance. The spot of the agony is, as one might expect, in the middle of a church built in 1924 with financial help from people in the United States and 14 other countries. Its alabaster windows maintain a constantly sorrowful mood.


TENDING TO THE TREES - Brother Raphael Dorado, OFM, tends to the olive trees in the Garden of Gethsemane, where Jesus prayed on Holy Thursday before His arrest.
Those who stand in the garden itself and reflect upon the gnarled appearance of trunks of the olive trees there can recapture the tension of that night of betrayal. Father Vasko said it is believed that the trees in the surviving garden were saplings at the time Jesus was there.

He found the disciples sleeping. Soon, Judas and those who had come to arrest Him arrived, scenes that are depicted in striking murals inside the Church of All Nations. The mural behind the main altar, showing Christ praying at the rock was financed by believers in Hungary; the one of Judas arriving to betray him was made possible by contributions from Ireland; the third, of Christ's arrest, was paid for by Catholics from Poland, said Father Raphael Dorado, a Spanish Franciscan who has been stationed in either Jerusalem or Nazareth for the past 41 years.

'I do not know the man'

Jesus was led to the home of Caiphas, the high priest, a short distance from the site of the Last Supper. A church, St. Peter in Gallicantu (from the Latin words for the crowing of a cock), built in 1931, stands over the site of that home as well as the holding cell that Christ would have been lowered into and chained against overnight before being taken to Pontius Pilate, said Father Vasko.

Inside the church are the remains of the stone courtyard where St. Peter, following from a distance, stopped to warm himself by a fire. St. Matthew's Gospel records Peter being asked by two different women as well as other bystanders if he had been a companion of Jesus. Fearfully, he denied it each time, cursing as he did so on the last occasion.

"And immediately a cock crowed. Then Peter remembers the words that Jesus had spoken: 'Before the cock crows you will deny me three times.' He went out and began to weep bitterly" (Mt 26:74-75).

Peter regretted his action, as did Judas. But whereas Judas ended his life in despair, Peter accepted God's forgiveness, noted Father Vasko, adding that the contrast offers an important lesson.

"Judas could have been forgiven, but his despair shows how all too often we don't believe ourselves capable of forgiveness," said Father Vasko. "God does forgive. He forgave Peter. I tell people that once you go to confession, it's (sin) forgotten. Guilt is from the devil, trying to deceive us. You live in the present for the future."
Next Friday:
Death and resurrection

The journey to the Holy Land by a Review writer and photographer was sponsored by members of the St. Louis Council/Northern Lieutenancy of the Equestrian Order of the Holy Sepulchre of Jerusalem.