As Jesus drew near Jerusalem, he saw the city and wept over it, saying, "If this day you only knew what makes for peace–but now it is hidden from your eyes. Lk 19:41-42
Friends, God is good, all the time.
There were only two recorded instances in the scriptures when our blessed Lord Jesus wept. Lazarus's death occasioned his first human tears; it expressed the intensity of personal friendship with Jesus.
Today's gospel passage narrates the second instance, which expressed the intensity of love for the city of Jerusalem. These tearful moments that the Lord experienced reflect only one thing: Jesus loves us as persons and our nations intensely; he is willing to express this intense love in human tears to tell us how much we need him for the peace we seek.
It was the city's failure and the people of Jerusalem to recognize our blessed Lord as their savior and the irreparable ramification that would accompany such rejection that moved the tears. And indeed, they missed the peace that comes through Jesus.
The Lord's prophesy regarding the city's attack and its destruction occurred in AD 70, and since then, there has been no Jewish temple in Jerusalem. Imagine all the hundreds of thousands of pilgrims who visit the Holy Land; they mainly go see the places associated with Jesus. They go to see where he was born, died, and was buried. They go to see the places he walked and made performed those astonishing miracles. And you know why? Because they find peace at these places; they experience God's visitation time at those holy places on account of Jesus.
As practicing Catholic Christians, it is now our task that we use not tears or even words but honest prayers to God as an expression of the intensity of our love for our children, grandchildren, friends, and nation and our hope that they return to a relationship with Jesus, and not to turn their back on him.
Prayer blessings:Prayer blessings: Today, try and pray The Angelus at 12 Noon and 6:pm. The Angel of the Lord declared to Mary: And she conceived of the Holy Spirit. Hail Mary, full of grace… Behold the handmaid of the Lord: Be it done unto me according to Thy word. Hail Mary... And the Word was made Flesh: And dwelt among us. Hail Mary... Pray for us, O Holy Mother of God, that we may be made worthy of the promises of Christ. Let us pray: Pour forth, we beseech Thee, O Lord, Thy grace into our hearts; that we, to whom the incarnation of Christ, Thy Son, was made known by the message of an angel, may by His Passion and Cross be brought to the glory of His Resurrection, through the same Christ Our Lord. Amen.