THE VEIL OF THE SANCTUARY
WAS TORN IN TWO
FROM TOP TO BOTTOM!

INTRODUCTION

The title of my short homily for Palm Sunday is long, “The Veil of the Sanctuary Was Torn In Two From Top to Bottom!”

TODAY’S GOSPEL

Today’s gospel – which we just heard – has 2,378 words. Most Sunday gospel readings will have from 200 to 300 words.

Today let’s look at 13 words – “The veil of the sanctuary was torn in two from top to bottom.”

Mark says near the end of his Passion Account – the one we listen to this year – the year of Mark: “Jesus gave a loud cry and breathed his last.” We then knelt and paused. Then we stood and heard the words, “The veil of the temple was torn in two from top to bottom. When the centurion who stood facing him saw how he breathed his last he said, ‘Truly this man was the Son of God.’”

WHAT IS MARK TELLING US?

What is Mark telling us?

It’s a good rule when reading scripture to say, “Nothing is in here by accident. Everything has a reason.”

Here are two possible reasons why Mark is telling us what the centurion said and why the veil of the temple was ripped in two from top to bottom.

FIRST THE CENTURION

The centurion would be a Roman – an outsider.

Christianity would start in Israel, in Jerusalem, in that Upper Room and on that cross and then spread to the Roman world which used crucifixion as their method of capital punishment.

So the first person after Jesus’ death – who recognized that this person called Jesus was different – was an outsider. He saw this before Jesus’ resurrection. He said this man was the Son of God.

It would take the Early Church years and a series of heresies and councils and creeds in an effort to articulate and formulate how someone could be both God and Man – the Mystery of Christ – but here was a start.

SECOND: THE TEMPLE

The temple in Jerusalem mentioned here in Mark 15:38 was the center of Israel’s faith and religion.

It was there in Jerusalem. It was the so called “Second Temple” which was extended very dramatically by Herod – as part of his major building projects somewhere around 19 B.C. It was finished in about 10 years – but ongoing decorations and improvements kept on being made for 46 years as we hear in the Gospel of John (Cf. John 2:20) – and wasn’t completely finished till A.D. 64. [I don’t know if every Sabbath they had a second collection – for a building and maintenance fund.] Six years later the Romans burnt it down.

Going backwards in time, this Second Temple was the temple rebuilt by Zerubbabel around 537 B.C. – after the Babylonian Captivity. It was most probably built on the spot where Solomon’s great temple, The First Temple – was built way back in 9th Century B.C. The Wailing Wall in present day Jerusalem is thought to be from the First Temple: Solomon’s Temple.

Mid-east temples – Jewish, Egyptian, Mesopotamian – were God’s house – not the worshipper’s house.

We don’t or won’t get all this. It would be like all of us were not in here right now – but outside in the narthex or lobby – or Seelos Hall or the other chapel and the corridors and the rooms – and men and women would be separated – and outsiders would be outside.

In here there would be two areas. Where you are right now would be The Holy Place with an altar and other religious fixtures. Then up here a veil would cover the entrance to the sanctuary - a place, a room, called "The Holy Of Holies" – a totally dark empty space – where God is contained. One priest, the high priest, would enter into this space, only once a year – on the day of the Atonement – the At-One-Ment.

Mark is telling us in his way what Jesus was saying in the Gospel of John, “Destroy this sanctuary” – meaning himself – “and I will raise it up in three days.” [Cf. John 2:13-22]

This gospel of Mark and the other Gospels and the rest of the New Testament is telling us that God cannot be localized or contained or kept in the dark. God fills the earth in Christ, the light of the world. Paul is going to spell it out even deeper that Christ fills the universe and fills the Christian Community – the body of Christ. As we heard in today’s Letter from Paul to the Philippians, because Jesus emptied himself, humbled himself, lowered himself, “becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on the cross…. Because of this, God greatly exalted him and bestowed on him the name which is above every name, that at the name of Jesus, every knee should bend, of those in heaven and on earth, and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.” Scholars tell us this text and this letter were written before Mark – and is probably a primitive early Christian hymn.*

CONCLUSION

There’s more, but those two items are enough for a month of Sundays and a lifetime to reflect upon. We begin Holy Week today. Take time this week to enter into this holy place and leave realizing Jesus is here – and in every place. He’s on the cross and on the donkey. He’s in bread and he’s in wine, in the tabernacle after Mass and in the brother and sister especially when she or he need our love.

Yes there is a tendency for us to nail him down – lock him in – but when Jesus cries, dies, the veil in the temple is ripped as Jesus keeps moving around in our world.

Truly this man is the Son of God.

This homily was 978 words - but the only Word we need to be with this Holy Week is The Word: Jesus.

* Cf. Brendan Byrne, S.J., "The Letter to the Philippians," in The New Jerome Biblical Commentary, p. 792 for Date, and pp. 794-795 for The Christ-Hymn; Daniel J. Harrington, S.J., "The Gospel According to Mark," also in The New Jerome Biblical Commentary, p. 596.