September 18
Jesus On The Cross
Preparation. - After contemplating the stigmata of St. Francis of Assisi and his tender devotion to the Passion of Christ, we shall see, first, how our adorable Saviour is crucified by His enemies, and secondly, how He Himself crucifies His friends. Let us examine to which class we belong. When we offend Him, we turn against Him; when we overcome our evil inclinations, we are with Him injunction: “If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself and follow Me” (Luke 9. 23).
I. How Jesus Is Crucified By His Enemies
Nineteen centuries ago a drama was enacted on Golgotha, which never had its like in the universe. The Creator of mankind, restraining His almighty power, allowed His creatures to bind Him, to ill-treat Him, and to bring Him to the summit of Calvary, where they nailed Him to a gibbet of shame and caused Him to die thereon between two notorious criminals. Who will ever be able to understand so monstrous an ingratitude? All nature was moved by it; the earth trembled, the sun refused its light to the deicide, and never will future ages forget this cruel death, the work of sinners, the enemies of Jesus.
But are these sinners contented with having immolated Him on the cross? No, for they still daily persecuted Him. A holy old man foretold of Him when an infant, that He would be an object of contradiction (Luke 2. 34). This contradiction has not ceased. In our own times, as in the days of paganism, Jesus is attacked not only in His doctrine, but also in His Sacrament of love, in which He conceals Himself to bestow His goods upon us. And who would believe it? Men have gone so far as to tread Him under foot, to cast into water, fire, to unclean beasts even, consecrated hosts, and even to offer them as a homage to the devil. The pen refuses to write down the horrors of which this great God is the object in the adorable Eucharist. This is, indeed, a powerful motive for us to offer Him our best homages in the churches wherein He dwells night and day.
But the outrages of the faithful, when committing mortal sin, are not less than those inflicted on Him by the Jews. The latter, says St. Paul, in crucifying the Redeemer, transgressed the law of Moses, but this they did through ignorance. But what should be said of the ungrateful sinner, clearly enlightened by the Gospel, who treads under foot the only-begotten Son of God and crucifies Him afresh? “Revenge is Mine,” says the Lord, “and I will repay” (Deut. 22. 35). This horrid crime seems to partake of the malice of sacrilege, for St. Paul adds, that in banishing God from his heart, the sinner profanes the blood of the New Testament and insults the spirit of grace dwelling in him.
O Jesus, how great is my misfortune in having so many times offended and rejected Thee, my Saviour, my supreme Good and my last end! Fill me with horror for my sinful life. In order to repair it, I will often meditate on the motives that urge me to hate sin, especially the sight of a God hanging between heaven and earth, and dying in pain to expiate my sins.
II. How Jesus Crucifies His Friends
He does this, first, by His doctrine on giving up ourselves and all that is not God. He enjoins on us to take the narrow way, to do violence to our inclinations, to love our enemies, to return good for evil, to pray for those who persecute and calumniate us. He sent his apostles as sheep among wolves, commanding them to allow themselves to be torn to pieces and put to death, rather than make any resistance. “If one strike thee on thy right cheek, turn to him also the other,” said He; “and if a man will take away thy coat, let go thy cloak also unto him” (Mat. 5. 39, 40). Is not such a teaching, reduced to practice the crucifixion of our fallen nature, of the old man living us?
Our Lord preaches this to His disciples, to His friends. “If a man will come after Me.” But under an apparent austerity this language or doctrine must contain sweet and precious advantages. And, in fact, self-denial destroys in us all the obstacles to God’s reign within us; it disposes us to receive from His goodness the graces that form saints and, therefore, makes us worthy also of the richest rewards. Consequently, our divine Master gives us a mark of His love, when He reveals to us this mystery which is concealed from worldlings and the slaves of their vicious inclinations.
He manifests equal love to us by sending us afflictions. He did not spare these to His apostles and martyrs, to His most privileged saints, without excepting His Blessed Mother. Hence to complain of the cross, to murmur about it, to refuse it, is to reject clear marks of Christ’s friendship, to check His manifestations of love for us. “Life and salvation are in the cross,” says the Imitation; “outside the cross there is no progress or hope of a blissful eternity for the soul.” When we lack patience in adversity, we deprive ourselves of infinite goods, with which Jesus, in His goodness, intended to enrich us, to sanctify and save us.
O my amiable Redeemer, enlighten me as to the value of self-denial and resignation in trials, for then, instead of believing myself removed from Thy Heart on account of the difficulties and the desolation besetting me, I will esteem myself dearer to Thee, since I shall be more like unto Thee. Wherefore I am resolved, first, often to implore of Thee the love of sacrifice and the strength to renounce my eager desires, my perverse propensities, and my own will; and secondly, calmly and meekly to embrace al the annoyances of this life, by uniting them to the torments of Thy Passion and to the boundless love which induced Thee to suffer so much for my salvation.
