Passion of Christ, Passion of the World

Good Friday of the Lord’s Passion: April 15, 2022 

Readings:  Isaiah 52:13-53:12 | Hebrews 4:14-16, 5:7-9 | John 18:1-19:42

To listen to my audio-video reflections on YouTube, please click on this link

Leonardo Boff, a Franciscan priest from Brazil wrote a book titled "Passion of Christ, Passion of the World" in 1977 interpreting the facts and their meaning for yesterday and today of the person of Jesus Christ found in the Bible. The book basically speaks about the death of Jesus and its meaning in today's context. On this Good Friday, we indeed not only commemorate the event of the death of our Lord but also try to make sense of it especially to see how the violent death of our Lord changed the world and continues to change even today. Fr Boff says, "Christ died so that we might know that not everything is permitted." Perhaps no other person's death is commemorated in such a passionate way as the death of Jesus in the world today. This means truly, we are not only overwhelmed by the death of our Lord with penance and mourning but also try to gather meaning and sense in our life. Because after all, Jesus is our definite Saviour.

1. The Cross of Jesus spoke loudly and speaks louder today

The death of Jesus on the cross closes one chapter of his life on this earth as a preacher, teacher, healer and liberator. However, his death on the cross leaves us a lot of answered and unanswerable questions in our minds. The Cross of the Lord spoke loudly when Jesus died in an agonizing state. The whole cosmos was filled with turmoil with signs of an earthquake and getting dark at three o'clock in the afternoon. The "curtain of the temple was torn in two, from top to bottom; and the earth shook, and rocks were split; the tombs also were opened, and many bodies of the saints who had fallen asleep were raised, and coming out of the tombs after his resurrection they went into the holy city and appeared to many. When the centurion and those who were with him, keeping watch over Jesus, saw the earthquake and what took place, they were filled with awe, and said, "Truly this was the Son of God!" (Matthew 27:51-54).  

The soldiers who were under the foot of the Cross saw that something terribly changed. In other words, these signs showed that there is something particularly special of the person of Jesus. Moreover, Jesus through his humanity revealed to us the face of God, a surprising face, the face of a lowly sufferer, tortured, smeared with blood, crowned with thorns, and dying after a mysterious, piercing cry hurled at the heavens but not against the heavens! 

2. Good Friday enlarges the concept of Cross and Death

The death of Christ on the cross enlarges the concept of the cross and death. Even though we may agree that death is the last moment of our lives, yet, we die all our lives. Death is the final point of our lives here on earth. Our earthly body dies and vanishes away. When we ask how Christ died then we must answer how Christ lived; how he took up the conflicts and confrontations in life; how he journeyed his life that comes to an end only when his death is complete. Jesus Christ embraced death just as he embraced whatever life brought him: its joys and sorrows, its conflicts and consolations, anxiety and fears, passions and problems. All this because of the message that he wanted to deliver and the way he was called to live. 

What is that cross then? The cross is more than just a piece of wood. The cross is the embodiment of human hatred, violence, criminality, lust, power, pride, ego, jealousy, envy, grudge, rage, animosity, impatience, brutality, corruption, and evil. The Cross is anything that limits or curtails life, everything that makes us suffer, everything that makes our journey hard. In today's context, we can say all those life's crosses, indeed daily crosses from illness to the consequences of war, from corrupt bureaucracy to political mismanagement,  atrocities of the majority over the minorities, age-old superstitions to religious fundamentalism and fanaticism. The list goes on...

3. Crosses come on our way in need of liberation

How did Jesus carry the cross then? Jesus neither invented the cross nor looked for it. He opposed crosses in the lives of people. In fact, the cross came on his way because of his love to take away the crosses from the lives of people. When one loves and serves then it does not create crosses for others. The proclamation of Christ was to take away the crosses from his people. His commitment to this kind of life is opposed to the ways of the world. That is where the world created the cross for him. In other words, the cross came on his way as a consequence of the message of liberation. 

Christ accepted the cross as he lived his life with boldness and courage. He refused to flee, refused to abandon the message of love and justice that he was preaching. He took upon himself the cross voluntarily as a token of fidelity to God and humanity. Prophet Isaiah says, Jesus bore our infirmities, our sufferings he endured, by his stripes we are healed, he took upon himself our guilt and counted among the wicked (Isaiah 52:13-53:12). Therefore, when crosses come on our way, we must accept them and see how best we can be liberated from them.  

4. Proclaiming Cross in today's context

How then can we preach the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ today?

1. It is basically to commit ourselves and all our energies to a world where love, peace, justice and a community of sisters and brothers could be established. It is where when we strive for a world openness and self-surrender to God are manifested. It means we are ready to denounce the situations that generate hatred, division, violence, apathy, exploitation, subjugation and atheism that propagates a valueless society of ideologies. It means proclaiming and practicing in commitment toward love and solidarity justice in an economic system, social relations, political structures and religious affiliations. The engagement in such situations will be crisis, suffering, confrontation, and cross as experienced by Fr Stan Swamy, Sr Rani Maria, Fr A T Thomas, Dr. Graham Steins and many others in our country. Saying yes to the cross means being ready to carry the cross of our Lord by way of suffering, enduring for the sake of the cause we support and the life we lead.
2. The cross of our Lord is carried continuously by men and women of our day. They are called martyrs of our time, true witnesses of the Gospel. They suffer and are crucified for the sake of the justice of this world. They break open the closed corrupt system, which does not allow to flourish fraternal charity, well-being and good. 
3. To carry the cross as Jesus carried means taking solidarity with the crucified world- with those who suffer violence, who are impoverished, dehumanized, and need to leave their homes as refugees because of crime, war, political and economic instability, religious persecution, etc. Here to carry the cross of Jesus means to defend these people, to attack those inhuman systems, to work for the cause of liberation. Jesus suffered the fate of the cross because he sided with those people who suffered from the oppressors. 
4. Our God is not indifferent to the pain of the victims of history. Out of love and solidarity, God becomes poor, is condemned, crucified and murdered. "For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish, but have everlasting life" (John 3:16). God does not want us to suffer, impoverish, and crucify other human beings. Therefore, "If God so loved us, we also ought to love one another," says the closest disciple of Jesus, John (1 John 4:11). To come closer to God means to go closer to the oppressed (Matthew 25). If God has taken up the cross means how much God loves us. God loves sufferers so much that he suffers and dies along with them. Therefore God is not indifferent to the sufferings of humanity. 

The message of Good Friday is very clear. The death of Jesus on the cross does not go in vain. It gives meaning to the message of the resurrection. Death may look meaningless. Yet death has a future. Ultimately, only good and truth will prevail and will have eternity. Let us not lose hope. This is what St Paul puts it so beautifully:

"We are hard-pressed on every side, but not crushed; perplexed, but not in despair; persecuted, but not abandoned; struck down, but not destroyed...dying, and yet we live on; beaten, and yet not killed;  sorrowful, yet always rejoicing; poor, yet making many rich; having nothing, and yet possessing everything" (2 Cor 4:8-9; 6:9-10).

We adore you, O Christ, and we bless you 

Because by your Holy Cross you have redeemed the world.

Olvin Veigas, SJ

14th April 2022