By Deborah Castellano Lubov
Pope Leo XIV presided over the liturgy of the Passion and Death of Our Lord Jesus Christ in St. Peter’s Basilica on Good Friday afternoon. Good Friday is the only day of the year on which Holy Mass is not celebrated.
The Church celebrates the Solemn Liturgy of the Passion of the Lord, consisting of three parts: the Liturgy of the Word, culminating in the chanting of the Passion according to St. John; the Adoration of the Cross; and reception of Holy Communion.
After the proclamation of the Passion, the Preacher of the Pontifical Household, Fr. Roberto Pasolini, OFM Cap, delivered the homily.
Jesus allowed Himself to be guided to the greatest love
Fr. Pasolini began by reminding that on this holy day the liturgy invites us to contemplate the Passion of the Lord, warning that the Cross of Christ risks remaining incomprehensible if we view it as an isolated fact, as a sudden and inexplicable event, but rather is the highest point of a journey.
It is in fact, he marveled, the fulfillment of a life in which Jesus learned to listen to and welcome the voice of the Father, allowing Himself to be guided to the greatest love.
He remembered that during the days of Holy Week, the liturgy has led us to listen to the so-called “Songs of the Servant of the Lord,” poetic texts in which the prophet Isaiah outlines the figure of a mysterious Servant through whom God brings salvation to the world from evil and sin. Fr. Pasolini recalled that they just listened to it.
He recalled that in the first song, the Servant is introduced as one called by the Lord to carry out “to open 'the eyes of the blind' and to bring ‘prisoners out from confinement, from the dungeon those who dwell in darkness,’" but to do so in a precise way, without violence and great gentleness.
Acknowledging that the Servant must be a seeker of life amid the darkness of evil, the Preacher pointed out that such a mission is not easy to embrace.
That feeling of all efforts being in vain
In the second song, the Servant, after striving to fulfil his mission, experiences the bitter sense that all his effort to do good has been in vain, thinking that the good that has been sown does not seem to bear fruit.
“It is a crisis that, sooner or later, reaches anyone who has chosen to follow the Lord: the feeling of going in circles, of getting nowhere, of remaining faithful to something that yields no visible result," he acknowledged.
But in reality, Fr. Pasolini insisted, it is only an impression.
In the third song, the Servant realizes that those he wishes to help respond with hostility, anger, and even violence. Yet, the preacher observed, the Servant continues along the path indicated by the Lord without fleeing.
In the fourth song, Fr. Pasolini warned, something shocking occurs. “The violence inflicted upon the Servant is so intense that it disfigures his face, rendering him unrecognizable..."
Yet precisely along this path, he said, he has learned not to return the evil he receives.
Jesus broke the chain
After reflecting on each of these songs, Fr. Pasolini gave a powerful reminder that Jesus did not merely listen to these songs, He interpreted and lived them fully.
With complete trust in the will of the Father, the Lord, the Papal Preacher said, transformed His crucifixion into an event of salvation.”
He lamented that the world when faced with evil knows only two paths, that of surrender to the evil or returning it, saying, "We see this continually: in wars, in divisions, in the wounds that mark our relationships.”
"Jesus," Fr. Pasolini noted, “broke this chain not by imposing himself with greater force," but by receiving what happened to Him, with the dramatic events of the Passion.
"Thus, by walking the Way of the Cross,” Christ, he said, "learned the most difficult obedience: that of love for the other, even when the other appears as an enemy."
The Capuchin preacher lamented that we live in a world in which the voice of God no longer guides the shared path of humanity as it once did. “Wars do not cease, injustices multiply, and the most vulnerable bear the cost.”
The choice to go against the current and follow the Lord's example
He said it is as though a unifying word or song capable of guiding humanity toward a more just and fraternal world were missing.
“And yet, precisely in this scenario,” he marveled, “something surprising can be seen: a silent multitude of people who choose to listen to a different voice, which some recognize clearly as the will of God,” while “others perceive it as a deep and inescapable call of conscience.”
He said some choose to listen to this song. “They are normal men and women who walk, sometimes without even realizing it, the same path as the Servant of the Lord.”
“They do not perform extraordinary deeds,” Fr. Pasolini said, but, “They simply rise each day and try to make their lives something that serves not only themselves but others.”
He said it is thanks to them that evil does not have the last word and history is not ending in violence.
“This multitude bears witness that the songs of that Servant, in whom God delights,” he commended, “continue to resound in the human heart, waiting only for someone willing to translate them into the concrete "score" of one’s own life, even when this means carrying the cross.”
World needs to be saved
Yesterday as today, he stressed, the world needs to be saved from the violence of evil, from injustice that kills, from divisions that humiliate.
“But this salvation will not descend from above, nor can it be guaranteed by political, economic, or military decisions,” but rather Fr. Pasolini observed, “the world is continually saved by those who are willing to embrace the songs of the Servant of the Lord as the way they live their lives.”
This, he said, is what the Lord Jesus did when He took the will of the Father seriously, embracing it as a "score" to be carried out to the end, “with loud cries and tears, and this evening, he added, “the "score" of the Cross is entrusted to us as well.”
“We can receive it freely if we accept that there is no difficult circumstance that cannot be faced, no guilty person at whom we must point the finger, no enemy who can prevent us from loving and serving,” the Papal Preacher insisted.
The Lord needs us as His instruments
Instead, we must realize, he underscored, “There is only us, who—by choosing not to return evil, by remaining patient in trials, by believing in the good even when darkness seems to swallow everything, can become those servants whom the Lord wishes to use to bring salvation to the world.”
“In a time like ours, so torn by hatred and violence, where even the name of God is invoked to justify wars and decisions of death,” he said, “we Christians are called to approach the Cross of the Lord.”
He said we are to do so without fear and with full confidence, knowing that the "throne" from which one learns to reign, is that where we placing our lives at the service of others.”
And thus Fr. Pasolini encouraged, “If we hold fast to 'our confession of faith,' our days will give voice to songs of both joy and suffering—that mysterious "score" of the Cross in which the notes of the greatest love can be recognized.”
