Man of Sorrows,
Cristoforo Solari, c.1500

Readings:
Zechariah 9:9-10
Psalm 145:1-2, 8-11, 13-14
Romans 8:9, 11-13
Matthew 11:25-30

Chants

Jesus is portrayed in this week’s Gospel as a new and greater Moses.

Moses, the meekest man on earth (see Numbers 12:3), was God’s friend (see Exodus 34:12,17). Only he knew God “face to face” (see Deuteronomy 34:10). And Moses gave Israel the yoke of the Law, through which God first revealed himself and how we are to live (see Jeremiah 2:20; 5:5).

Jesus too is meek and humble. But He is more than God’s friend. He is the Son who alone knows the Father. He is more also than a law-giver, presenting himself today as the yoke of a new Law, and as the revealed Wisdom of God.

As Wisdom, Jesus was present before creation as the firstborn of God, the Father and Lord of heaven and earth (see Proverbs 8:22; Wisdom 9:9). And He gives knowledge of the holy things of the kingdom of God (see Wisdom 10:10).

In the gracious will of the Father, Jesus reveals these things only to the “childlike”—those who humble themselves before Him as little children (see Sirach 2:17). These alone can recognize and receive Jesus as the just savior and meek king promised to daughter Zion, Israel, in this Sunday’s First Reading.

We too are called to childlike faith in the Father’s goodness, as sons and daughters of the new kingdom, the Church.

We are to live by the Spirit we received in baptism (see Galatians 5:16), putting to death our old ways of thinking and acting, as Paul exhorts in the Epistle for Sunday. Our “yoke” is to be His new law of love (see John 13:34), by which we enter into the “rest” of His kingdom.

As we sing in Sunday’s Psalm, we joyously await the day when we will praise His name forever in the kingdom that lasts for all ages. This is the sabbath rest promised by Jesus—first anticipated by Moses (see Exodus 20:8-11), but which still awaits the people of God (see Hebrews 4:9).

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St. Augustine
from Confessions, I, (1-5)

"You are great, O Lord, and highly to be praised," (Ps 145[144],3). "Great is your power, and your wisdom is infinite," (Ps 147[146],5. And man, who being a part of what you have created, desires to praise you; this man, bearing his own mortality about with him, carrying with him a testimony of his own sin, (even this testimony, that "God resists the proud," (Jas 4,6)) yet this man, this part of what you have created, is desirous of praising you; you so stir him up, that he even delights to praise you.

For you have created us for yourself, and our heart is restless until it finds its rest in you...

"Those who seek the Lord shall praise him," (Ps 22[21],27). For they that seek shall find; and finding they shall praise him. I will seek you, O Lord, calling upon you; and I will call upon you, believing in you: for you have been preached to us.

My faith, O Lord, calls to you: the faith you have given me and inspired within me by the humanity of your Son and the ministry of your preacher. And how shall I call upon my God, my Lord and God? Because when I invoke him, I call him into myself: and what place is there in me fit for my God to come into me, by which God may come into me; even the God who made heaven and earth? Is it so, my Lord God?

Is there anything in me that can contain you? No, indeed, can the "heaven and earth which you have made," (Gn 1,1) and in which you have made me, in any way contain you?... Since, therefore, I am, how can I entreat you to enter me, who could not have been unless you were first of all in me?...

Who shall grant me to repose in you? By whose gift will you enter my heart; and so inebriate it that I may forget my own evils and embrace you, my only good? What are you to me? Let me find grace to speak to you. What am I to you, that you should command me to love you...

What you are to me, answer me for your mercy's sake, O Lord my God: say to my soul: "I am your salvation," (Ps. 35[34],3). Speak it aloud so that I may hear you. Behold, the ears of my heart are before you, O Lord: open them, and say to my soul, "I am your salvation." I will run after that voice, and take hold of you.

St. Aelred of Rielvaux
from The Mirror of Charity, I, 20

People who complain about the roughness of the Lord's yoke may not, perhaps, have cast aside entirely the heavy yoke of worldly lusts... But tell me, what could be sweeter or more restful than no longer to be tossed about by the uncontrolled stirrings of the flesh?...

We come close to sharing the tranquil rest of God when insults have no effect on us, when persecutions or penalties have no terror for us, when prosperity or adversity have no influence on us, and when friend and enemy share the same measure of our consideration. This is indeed to resemble closely «Him who makes His sun to rise upon the good and bad, and rains upon the just and the unjust» (Mt 5,45).

All these things are rooted and done in charity, and in charity only, which brings with it true peace and delight, since charity is the Lord's yoke. And we know that if we answer our Lord's call and bear his yoke, our souls will find rest, since: «His yoke is sweet and his burden light.» Saint Paul describes charity as «patient and kind; it is not pompous or inflated; it does not seek its own interests and is not ambitious» (cf. 1Cor 13,4-5).

The other virtues help us as a carriage bears the weary traveler upon his way, as marching rations strengthen the tired soldier, as a light shows the road by night, or as arms help in winning a battle. But charity, which we must have in conjunction with the other virtues, is in a special way the tired man's rest, the traveler's shelter, the voyager's destination, and the victor's trophy.

Pope Benedict XVI
from Angelus Address, July 3, 2011

In today's Gospel the Lord Jesus repeats to us those words we know well, but which always move us: "Come to me, all you who labor and are burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am meek and humble of heart; and you will find rest for yourselves. For my yoke is easy, and my burden light" (Matthew 11:28-30).

When Jesus went about the roads of Galilee proclaiming the Kingdom of God and curing many sick, he felt compassion for the crowds "because they were troubled and abandoned, like sheep without a shepherd" (cf. Matthew 9:35-36).

That gaze of Jesus seems to extend to today, to our world. Even today it rests on so many people oppressed by difficult conditions of life, but also deprived of valid points of reference to find a meaning and aim to their existence.

Many of the weak are found in the poorest countries, tested by poverty; and even in the richest countries there are so many dissatisfied men and women, in fact sick with depression. Then we think of the numerous dispersed peoples and refugees, and all those who emigrate putting their own life at risk. Christ's look pauses on all these people, rather on each one of these children of the Father who is in Heaven and repeats: "Come to me, all you ..."

Jesus promises to give all "rest," but he puts a condition: "Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am meek and humble of heart." What is this "yoke," which instead of weighing is light, and instead of crushing lifts? The "yoke" of Christ is the law of love, it is his commandment, which he left to his disciples (cf. John 13:34; 15:12).

The true remedy for the wounds of humanity -- whether they are material, such as hunger and injustice, or psychological and moral, caused by a false sense of well being -- is a rule of life based on fraternal love, which has its source in the love of God.

It is therefore necessary to abandon the path of arrogance and violence that is used to procure positions of greater power, so as to ensure success at any cost. Also, out of respect for the environment, it is necessary to give up the aggressive lifestyle that has become prevalent in the last centuries and to adopt a reasonable "meekness." But above all in human, interpersonal and social relations, the rule of respect and of nonviolence, that is, the force of truth against any abuse is what can ensure a future worthy of man.