The Cross

Holy Week Retreat-in-Place 2020 The Joy of Full Surrender

The Death of God on Good Friday is at once the most heinous act ever committed and the most splendid event in the history of the universe. To properly understand Calvary one must, with a contemplative gaze, look at Christ’s suffering, shame, abandonment, persecution, and death while at the same time looking through this event towards its culmination in the Resurrection of Easter Sunday. We cannot skip the unpleasant parts in favor of the glorious ones, nor can we get stuck on Calvary forgetting that the cross is not the final chapter. This was Jesus Christ’s own method, who for “the sake of the joy that lay before him he endured the cross, despising its shame,” (Heb 12: 2). The joy to come gave Jesus the endurance needed to embrace his cross. Also noted in the above quoted Letter to the Hebrews is the acknowledgment that Jesus despised the shame of the cross. Notice the author does not say he despised its guilt. A distinction must be made here. Guilt is traditionally understood in the phrase “I did something bad,” whereas shame sounds more like, “I am something bad.” Guilt is associated with one’s actions and behaviors. Shame touches to the core of one’s identity. To be sure, both guilt and shame are very real experiences in the event of the cross, but only one is to be despised. Even though the emotion of guilt generally carries a bad reputation (think of the derisive phrase “Catholic guilt” to indicate how the “oppressive” Catholic Church makes people feel bad for doing what they like) guilt

We must wait in the lonely silence of Good Friday with our eyes fixed on the Cross. In Eden, a tree brought about our condemnation. On Good Friday another tree – the Cross, the Tree of Life – brings about our redemption. “Behold the wood of the cross, on which hung the salvation of the world.” - Abbot James Albers Good Friday Homily

by Fr. Simon Baker

is actually a healthy person’s response to bad behavior. The complete absence of guilt in a person’s life either means they are as innocent as the Blessed Virgin Mary or, in the words of well-known author and speaker Brené Brown, borderline psychopathic. When we look with faith at our Savior hanging from the cross we should know that our sins hung him there, and this knowledge is what leads us to repentance. The work of the Holy Spirit is to “convict the world in regard to sin and righteousness For our sake and condemnation” (Jn 16:8); the sins for which we should feel guilty, the righteousness that comes from belief in Jesus, and the he made him to be sin who did not know condemnation that comes to those who refuse to repent. sin. Truly, “the Lord laid upon - Second him the guilt of us all” (Is 53:6). But he also laid Corinthians 5:21 upon him the shame of us all. In the Garden of Eden we meet our first parents, newly created by God, untouched by sin and evil, “naked and without shame” (Gn 2:25). However, once sin entered the world shame entered as well, both for Adam and Eve and all humanity descending from them. The experience of shame distorts reality and can easily trick its prey into thinking of themselves as too broken, too far gone, for even God to reach. Then we meet Jesus, the new Adam, on the hill of Calvary naked and without shame. In this vision we awaken to the knowledge that even our greatest shame was taken up by him so that absolutely nothing may be out of his redemptive reach. On the cross, Jesus took up every one of our experiences of sin, of guilt, and of our shame. First, there is the awful shame of abandonment by those who are supposed to love us. “About three o’clock Jesus cried out in a loud voice, “Eli, Eli, lema sabachthani?” which means, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” (Mt 27:46). It is, of course, impossible that God the Father could have actually abandoned Jesus. However, the Son’s experience of his Father’s abandonment was a very real experience. Jesus had to go to the depths of such an experience of abandonment, because we experience such felt abandonment by God. When we cry out “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me,” we need to have someone to look to in order to know that we are not alone in our suffering and that this experience is not the final word.

The cries of the people, the weapons and torches, the thorns and purple cloak, the bitter wine, that poignant moment between Jesus and his mother, Christ’s pierced side, the flowing of blood and water – all these details paint a lasting picture in our minds, yet these images only begin to scratch the surface of our understanding of the reality of our salvation... to understand how our sin ravaged Christ’s body – that we might have life. - Abbot James Albers • Good Friday Homily

Second, there is the shame of an unwanted identity, a powerful shame trigger. Jesus, the perfect sinless one, “was counted among the transgressors” (Is 53:12), and “for our sake he made him to be sin who did not know sin (2 Cor 5:21 – emphasis added). For a sinless one, there is no unwanted identity more abhorrent than that of a sinner. Jesus, a spotless unblemished lamb, allowed Himself to be identified with sinners to ransom us by his precious blood (1 Pt 1:18-19). Third, there is the shame of uselessness, of not being good enough. The cross of Calvary comes after three years of countless miracles, exorcisms, resurrection, and Jesus’ bold proclamation of the Good News such that “never before has anyone spoken like this one” (Jn 7:46). The experience of the cross is seemingly Jesus’ most useless moment. On Calvary he is doing none of the good activity that gained him so many admirers during his apostolic labors. Yet, as the author Frank Sheed says in his work, To Know Christ Jesus, the complete offering of the Son to the Father on the cross is the most active moment of Christ’s priesthood. We are not saved by his teachings or even his miracles. We are saved by his cross. Fourth, there is the shame of failure. Christ was sent by his Father to accomplish a mission. However, on Calvary all but a handful of his disciples deserted; instead of giving life to others, he loses his own; instead of building a glorious body (of the Church), he wore a lacerated one; instead of leading others to faith, he was denounced and mocked by even a lowly criminal. The image of failure looms large over Christ’s thorn-crowned head. Yet it was precisely the cross of Christ that St. Andrew of Crete calls Christ’s trophy. Rather than a sign of his failure, the cross becomes the literal instrument of victory and the memory of the battle won. If Jesus kept a trophy case of his victories, his cross would feature front and center. On the cross, Jesus undid the knot tied by our first parents in the garden. Every element of their tying the knot of sin was employed This is God’s strength: turning to the good everything that happens to us, even the bad things. He brings serenity into our storms, because with God life never dies. - Pope Francis Extraordinary Urbi et Orbi

by Jesus to untie the knot to set us free. Our sins, our guilt, and our shame are all wiped away by the priestly activity of his cross. Thus, the cross of Christ is his victory, and it can be our victory too if only we accept it. The requirement of this acceptance is total surrender, to lose our life in order to find it (Mt 10:39). Surrender does not work in half measures. Anything less than complete surrender will often have the opposite effect than what he desires for us. Life with Christ is the greatest adventure a person can have. Adventure is not about planning every small detail of a trip and then executing the itinerary to perfection. That has nothing of the excitement and wonder of adventure. A life of adventure with Christ demands that we trust in him as the best of guides and surrender ourselves completely to following his plan. He will take us to places we could never have imagined. It may not always be fun or pleasant – no adventure can be without the cross – but it will definitely be glorious. “Where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom. All of us, gazing with unveiled face on the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory (2 Cor 3:17-18).

Retreatant Question: How do I find the Cross of Christ in the midst of my son’s suicide?

Fr. Simon: I’m sorry... There is no pain like that. I would invite you to enter into the experience of Mary. While Christ didn’t commit suicide, he willed his own death; he said “yes” to it. Mary, knowing that Jesus could have done something to prevent the Cross on Calvary, had to willingly watch her Son walk toward death. Ask Mary to walk with you. There’s a beautiful pamphlet by Fr. Chris Alar, MIC, of the Marian Helpers, Divine Mercy After Suicide; in it he points out that God is outside of time, while we are in it. While this is difficult to wrap our minds around, this means we can pray for mercy for both what will happen and what has happened. We have to trust that God can bring good from even the most difficult and confusing of circumstances... I know that God’s mercy is bigger than whatever our sufferings are. Thank you for your question and know that we are praying for you.

Watch Fr. Simon’s full talk with Q&A at Kansasmonks.org/simontalk Have questions? Email us at info@kasnsasmonks.org