Imagine yourself on a subway car. You are looking around at those who are traveling with you. Some are sitting, some are standing. Some are listening to music devices. There are the well dressed rich executives and the homeless. Men, woman, children, drug addicts and saints and they all surround you.

I will return to that scene in a minute. Let us first go to the point of today’s gospel.

We just finished listening to the whole passion of the Christ. What did we listen to? We listened to an account of a spiritual battle. It is one that we can relate well to a form of a war. This war is not fought with guns, knives or even swords. It is more like a chess game. As you know in such a competition, in order to win, the move you make now was planned seven or so moves ahead of time. We know how the game ends. Right now it looks like the Devil wins in a form of check-mate. The Devil makes sure that Jesus dies on the cross using the pawns that are the people whose action we see here. We see the religious leaders and the secular leaders, pawns in the hands of the chess player. We see Jesus responding to every move, every step of the way and it looks like He was boxed in and defeated. However, as I said, we all know how the game ends with the surprise move that puts the Devil in check and mate.

The battle ends and Jesus won. Next comes clean-up.

The battle was for the salvation of souls, those in the kingdom are saved, those outside the kingdom are not.

So now is the next part of this battle, the clean-up. Like Stalin, Churchill and FDR dividing up Europe so it is that the two kingdoms divide up the spoils. How are they divided up? Through the new battleground, the human heart. Every person must now make the choice of which kingdom they will be part of for all eternity. It is a simple choice except that both sides have their agents trying to increase their ultimate population. One side offers total life and freedom, the other promises the same but ultimately actually offers slavery and death.

So is the battle which choice will each person make. It is clear that we have made our choice, but remember Jesus says it is not we that have chosen Him, but He has chosen us. You see we are ambassadors in the kingdom, We are agents of that kingdom and our call is to be part of the kingdom.

This brings us back to that subway car. Remember all the people who are around you? Many have yet to make the choice for which Kingdom they will belong;  to whom will they swear allegiance. We are on the frontlines of their battle calling them to be in the Kingdom that gives life and not  that which that offers it but promises death. Your choice to be faithful to the Christ who gave his life for you is the weapon we use against the other kingdom. As you can see there is a lot more at stake than your soul. but the soul of many who surround us.

Remember, without you living your faith as Ambassadors for Christ, they make the uninformed choice based on what they see of this world. Without you, as we see in the gospel that situation leads people to choose Barrabas over Jesus every time.

God Bless You,

Fr. Robert J Carr
Fr. Carr is an alliance member of the Canção Nova Community (Canção Nova). He is the pastor of St. Benedict Parish in Somerville, MA and is the editor of this blog. You may also find his videos in English at Gloria.tv. He also has a regular radio program on WebRadio Canção Nova.