Remain with the Lord in His hour of agony [Holy Thursday reflection]

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Tonight, after Holy Thursday Mass, we will depart in silence, with a underlying motif that Jesus is heading for a post meal walk, a constitutional walk if you will, with His friends.
 
At the Garden of Gethsemane, Jesus tells His apostles to watch and pray. Meanwhile, He enters into an intense conversation with His Father saying, “My soul is sorrowful even to death.” St. Luke, a physician, claims Jesus’ anguish is to the point of sweating blood. He is suffering a real medical condition known as hematohidrosis where under extreme physical or emotional stress, capillary blood vessels that feed the sweat glands actually rupture, causing them to exude blood.
 
Each time He returns to His apostles, His closest friends, He finds them sleeping, and says, “So you could not keep watch with me for one hour? Watch and pray that you may not undergo the test. The spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak.”
 
At many of our campuses on Holy Thursday, we invite students to stay with us to more deeply enter into the Holy Triduum. Throughout the night, students will keep watch with Jesus during His agony in the garden through a vigil, an ancient practice in the Church. 
 
I would like to invite you, our friends to join me and many of us Brothers and students in this practice on Holy Thursday. Are we able to remain with the Lord in His hour of agony? I encourage you to place yourself in the scene with us. What was the weather like? How did Jesus look? What did He say, how can you console Him in the midst of his agony?
 
I invite you to consider joining me from 2 to 3 a.m. You can do this from your home or your parish chapel. If it would be imprudent to do that time, try staying up an extra hour, or waking up an hour early.
 
I pray you may remain watchful with the Lord, and that you gain deeper spiritual insight into His personal love for you.

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