by John Jelinek Director of Religious Education and Formation
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When I was in college, I had a good friend who loved to debate all things religion. One of his charges against Catholics was the prominence of the crucifix in our churches. He asserted that true Christians should focus on the triumphant Christ and not the suffering Christ. The cross, and most especially a crucifix, with the wounded body of Jesus, diminished Christ’s glory. I can only imagine his scorn as the Church celebrates the Feast of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross this month.
So why revere the cross? There is no lack of extraordinary events in the Gospels. From His miraculous conception to the Last Supper, Jesus is astounding. He heals the sick, raises the dead, turns water into wine, multiplies food, controls weather, walks on water, and is transfigured before the apostles. All of these manifest His glory and divinity. However, apart from the cross, they remain somewhat incomplete. As a good teacher, everything Jesus does builds on what came before and points towards what is to come. All of Jesus’ teachings and actions are preparing us for His most extraordinary act, the cross. It is through the cross that Jesus accomplishes the work of salvation and enables us to have eternal life with God.
It is also in the cross that the heart and nature of God are so plainly revealed. St. Paul tells us that, “God proves His love for us in that while we were still sinners Christ died for us.” (Rm 5:8). In the midst of our selfishness and depravity, God does not condemn us but chooses to rescue us through a total gift-of-self. For prideful man, this is an absurdity. It is almost incompressible that God, the transcendent and all-powerful creator, would subject Himself to such humiliation and suffering. And yet, He does. St. Paul says God “emptied himself, taking the form of a slave… humbled himself, becoming obedient to death, even death on a cross.” (Phil 2:7-8).
Even in the Old Testament, David pondered God’s humility and love when he asked God, “What is man that you are mindful of him…” (Ps 8:5). He understood there is nothing about mankind that merits God’s steadfast love. David is really asking about the nature of God. He could have equally asked “Who are you, God, that you should care for such an insignificant and wayward creature as man?”
The cross not only tells us about the nature of God. It tells us about the nature of what it is to be a Christian. Jesus says, “Whoever does not carry his own cross and come after me cannot be my disciple” (Lk 14:27). Through our unique vocation and circumstances of life, we each have a cross. As a parent and spouse, I am regularly called to die to myself for the sake of my children and wife. Daily I am asked to surrender my desires, time, energy, and ego so that they may have life.
A Christ like gift-of-self for others is at the core of all Christian vocations: single, married, or priestly. Our vocation is both a cross and yet joyful. This is because in living the way of the cross, we love others as God loves us. This bestows our life with meaning, purpose, and lasting joy. A failure to embrace the suffering of Jesus on the cross will certainly result in a failure to understand and embrace the suffering in our own life.
St. Paul goes so far as to say, “may I never boast except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, through which the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world” (Gal 6:14). The cross does not dimmish God’s glory; it reveals it. We witness the infinite depths of His love and humility and are invited to imitate them, a glorious vocation that is made possible by the grace Jesus gains for us on the cross.
