30 March 2026
A Love poured out
As we step into Holy Week, everything we have been preparing for in Lent comes into focus. The Church now invites us not just to reflect, but to enter into what God is doing—to see it from His perspective and to decide how we will respond.
And today, that invitation is given to us through two anointings.The first comes from the Prophet Isaiah. “Here is my servant whom I uphold, my chosen one with whom I am pleased, upon whom I have put my Spirit.” This is the first of the Suffering Servant songs. God is revealing what kind of Messiah He is sending—not one who conquers with force, but one who heals, restores, and suffers for His people. “A bruised reed he shall not break, and a smoldering wick he shall not quench.”
That is the mission of Christ.
And we begin to see how this plays out this week. Jesus will not shout. He will not resist. He will not overpower. Instead, He will carry the weight of sin—not just to expose it, but to remove it. He is anointed by the Father, filled with the Spirit, sent to bring justice—but not the kind of justice we expect. A justice that restores, that heals, that liberates. A justice that passes through the Cross.
But then we turn to the Gospel, and we see a second anointing—very different in form, but deeply connected in meaning.
Mary of Bethany takes a liter of costly perfumed oil—pure nard—and pours it over Jesus’ feet, wiping them with her hair. And the Gospel tells us something important: “The house was filled with the fragrance of the oil.”
This is not a small gesture. This is extravagant.
Judas immediately objects. He calculates. He measures. “This could have been sold and given to the poor.” But John tells us the truth—Judas is not concerned with the poor. He is concerned with control.
And Jesus responds: “Leave her alone.” Because what Mary is doing is not waste. It is love. It is recognition. It is a response to what God is doing.
Now just to get a sense of how extravagant this was: spikenard oil even today is incredibly expensive. If you go on Amazon, about 5 milliliters can cost around $60–$70. A liter is 1,000 milliliters—that’s about 200 of those small bottles. That puts the cost somewhere in the range of $12,000 to $14,000 today, and likely much more in Mary’s time relative to income.
And she pours it out.
All of it.
No holding back. No calculation. No concern for appearances.
Because she understands something that Judas does not. Jesus is worth everything.
This is the contrast the Church places before us at the beginning of Holy Week.
The Father anoints the Son for a mission of total self-gift. And Mary responds with a gift that mirrors it—lavish, total, poured out.
One is divine love given. The other is human love returned.
And that raises the question for us:
How do we respond to what God is doing this week?
Because it is possible to stand close to Jesus and still miss it. Judas is right there and all he sees is waste. Mary is right there and she sees everything.
Holy Week is not just about watching what happens to Jesus. It is about recognizing it. Entering into it. Responding to it.
And that response will always take the form of love that goes beyond calculation.
Time given in prayer when it would be easier not to. Silence when we want distraction. Confession when we want to avoid it. Presence at the Triduum when convenience pulls us elsewhere.
These are our ways of “pouring out” something precious.
Because the truth is, Jesus is about to pour everything out for us.
And Mary, without fully understanding how, senses that.
So she gives everything.
And the fragrance fills the house.
That is what real love does. It cannot be hidden. It cannot be contained. It fills everything around it.
And Holy Week invites us to let our response to Christ be like that.
Not measured. Not calculated.
But poured out.