Welcome to our Rosary meditation. Let's begin in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit.

Let's call to mind all those we've promised to pray for.

When John the Baptist saw Jesus he proclaimed,

behold, the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.

And soon after, as John stood with two of his disciples, Jesus passed by, and John stared hard at him and said,

look, there is the Lamb of God. But what is the significance of Jesus being the Lamb of God? What does it really mean?

Now normally at this time of year I lead a pilgrimage to Jerusalem and we always go to the temple mount where the Jewish

temple used to be until it was destroyed by the Romans in the year 70 and never rebuilt.

The old city of Jerusalem and the temple mount are actually on top of a mountain,

Mount Moriah, the very spot where in Genesis 22, Abraham brought his son Isaac to offer

him in sacrifice. God told Abraham, take your son, your only son Isaac whom you love and go to the land

of Moriah and offer him there as a burnt offering.

So Abraham took the wood of the burnt offering and laid it on Isaac, his son,

who carried the wood up the mountain for the sacrifice.

It was then that Isaac asked a provocative question.

Father, I see the knife, the wood, and the flint for the fire,

but where is the lamb for the sacrifice?

Abraham gave a prophetic answer.

God will provide the Lamb for the sacrifice, my son.

Then the angel of the Lord stayed the hand of Abraham and a ram was offered instead not a lamb. Now

Abraham had foretold that God would provide the Lamb, and that was yet to happen.

And this is subtle but significant. So Abraham called the name of that place

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