Presence of the Passion

By Deacon Thomas Stephenson

April 19, 2019

Every year, we come together on Good Friday to remember the Lord’s death by crucifixion. And we are here because we really want to be; we made the effort and choice to come here instead of doing something else. We come because we understand, at the deepest level, that this – Jesus’ willing submission to death on the cross – is the ultimate sign of God’s love for us.

At Mass last evening, one thing Father Robert spoke about was anamnesis, that in the Mass what is done, as Jesus instructed, is not just in memory of something that happened, but that it makes it present to us, here and now. As the Catechism says, “It is the celebrations that are repeated, and in each celebration there is an outpouring of the Holy Spirit that makes the unique mystery present.” In a different way, we recognize today that the mystery of the crucifixion is present to us. Not that Jesus is being re-crucified, but that we recall it in a way that makes it real in our lives. This is not an event from the distant past; it is not an abstract concept; it is present to us now, particularly on this day, during this time when it should affect us most profoundly.

We should never lose sight of the fact that this sacrifice was necessary. God is both merciful and just; His loving mercy and His justice are inseparable. If there is nothing that offends God and requires forgiveness; if there is no eternal punishment for the unrepentant; if we are not in need of redemption; then the crucifixion becomes irrelevant. But we know that is not the case. There is a divine, an eternal purpose to the crucifixion. That purpose is our salvation. This is God’s love for us, lifted up for us to behold, for us to never forget, and for us to therefore love Him in return.

Part of loving Him is for us to embrace the cross – the cross of Christ, and our own individual crosses as well. On Palm Sunday, Pope Francis said: “There is no negotiating with the cross: one either embraces it or rejects it”. He also asked people not to be ashamed to show enthusiasm for Jesus, and to not be afraid to follow Him on the way of the cross.

It can be easy to say we accept our own crosses, but do we actually do so willingly, even joyfully? We all have challenges in our lives, illness, financial strains, broken relationships – the list is endless. In these trials, we should be turning to the Lord in prayer, placing ourselves in His care, uniting our sufferings with His. As we may share in His Resurrection, we are also called to share in the suffering He endured in His Passion. Saint Paul says: “Now I rejoice in my sufferings for your sake, and in my flesh I complete what is lacking in Christ’s afflictions for the sake of His body, that is, the Church.” Through our suffering, we can intensify our relationship with the Lord.

We must always keep in mind that Jesus did this for all of us, for each of us, every individual one of us. When we say God loves us, when we say Jesus died for us, what we should be saying is God loves me; Jesus was crucified for me.

In His humility, Jesus lowered Himself to become human like us. In His infinite love, He willingly suffered and died, offering Himself for the forgiveness of our sins. Let us recollect and make present Christ’s Passion and Resurrection in our lives and in our hearts, today and always.