Praised be Jesus and Mary, now and forever.
Jeremiah's experience prefigures Jesus' in many ways.
Each of them was destined to be rejected and to be in conflict with their people.
Each was likened to a sacrificial lamb.
Jeremiah said, I was like a gentle lamb led to the slaughter.
While of Jesus, Isaiah prophesied, like a lamb that is led to the slaughter, and like a sheep that before its shearers is silent, so he opened not his mouth.
Each was betrayed by someone close to him.
Jeremiah by his brothers, and Jesus by an apostle.
Each was opposed and persecuted by the chief priests, and condemned to death.
Each was condemned by a civil ruler who was somewhat sympathetic, yet weak-willed.
Finally, Jeremiah was cast into a cistern, and then later pulled out of it, foreshadowing our Lord's burial and resurrection.
So when the first reading tells us of the plot by the ungrateful people to destroy the prophet, this is also Jesus' story.
And this leads us into today's Gospel, in which Christ frankly announces for the third time what will happen to him.
Behold, we are going up to Jerusalem, and the Son of Man will be handed over to the chief priests and the scribes.
And they will condemn him to death, and hand him over to the Gentiles to be mocked and scourged and crucified.
And he will be raised on the third day.
It is not only Jeremiah and Christ who are the object of plots.
St. Jerome, commenting this passage, says that heretics make up false charges, and preempt holy people with accusations, as they plan not what truth they will speak, but what falsehoods they will invent.
For they boast that God's law, counsel, and speech, will remain with their priests, wise men, and pseudoprophets.
Ideologues today do much the same.
Unable to beat the church with the truth, they turn to lies and forth in order to prevail.
They put their trust in figures, in pundits, who promise a better future but can't deliver it.
Yet our real enemies are not so much the human ones, not so much the heretics and ideologues, as the demons who inspire them and spur them on.
All three, Jeremiah, Christ, and the church, are called by the Lord to proclaim his word for the good of all, and yet encounter only rejection, or encounter very often rejection, and even slander and deadly hatred.
For a worldly mentality is opposed to the wisdom of God, and those who do not abandon the former seek to get rid of those who proclaim the latter.
Even the apostles, for all their good will, have difficulty putting aside the worldly ideas that they have and accepting the wisdom of the cross.
They value visible things more than invisible ones, because they are more easily known and appreciated.
Yet, as St. Paul says, what is seen is transitory, but what is unseen is eternal.
James and John imagine Christ's kingdom will be like an earthly one, like David's and Solomon's, and they hope to acquire privileged positions in the kingdom by their closeness to Jesus.
They will, but the privileges of the apostles are for the service of God and the community, not for personal aggrandizement.
This greatest service is to die for souls, and those who do so are due the highest honor.
This is the service that Jesus renders.
The Son of Man came to serve and to give his life for the ransom of many.
So he tells them, you do not know what you are asking.
Can you drink the chalice that I am going to drink?
The chalice, or cup, which Christ is going to drink is that of which he already spoke three times in predicting his passion.
In the Garden of Gethsemane, he will speak of it explicitly.
My Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me.
And again, when Peter draws his sword to defend him, Jesus will say, Shall I not drink the cup that the Father has given me?
After him, the martyrs talked about this cup.
Saint Polycarp blessed God for having granted him a place among the number of the martyrs in the cup of your Christ.
However, the experience of James and John shows that one can drink this cup even without dying a martyr's death.
For, while Saint James became the first martyr among the apostles when he was beheaded in A.D. 42, Saint John lived about 60 years after his brother's death.
He did show himself ready to undergo martyrdom and was, in fact, immersed in boiling oil at Rome.
But he miraculously survived and was sent into exile on the Isle of Patmos.
The life of Jeremiah showed something of what the life of Christ would be like.
And the life of Christ shows something of what the life of a Christian will be like.
Our Lord said, A disciple is not above his teacher, nor a servant above his master.
It is enough for the disciple to be like his teacher and the servant like his master.
We too are going up to Jerusalem.
If our Master Christ was not exempted from suffering, we should not expect to be exempted from it either.
Nor should we expect to enter Heaven by seeking the most comfortable life we can have.
James and John were looking for glory and comfort in this world.
Christ showed them by his example the way to eternal glory, not here but hereafter.
May Our Lady obtain for us the strength and courage to follow Jesus on this path, so that we may share in his glory and in eternal life.
Praised be Jesus in Mary, now and forever.