Love is the Cross
The Franciscan Jacopone daTodi whom some believe authored the Lenten hymn Stabat Mater wrote that “Love is nailed to the cross and he will not come down.” That has lead some to say that it was not nails that fixed Christ to the cross, but his love for us. During his passion Satan used the people mocking him to tempt him “Come down from that cross and then we will believe you. However, Jesus proved his divinity by staying on the cross. As Catholics, the crucifix takes on particular significance. The crucifix is a more powerful image for us over a cross because it reminds us of a statement that Blaise Pascal once made, “Christ is on the cross as long as there is suffering in the world.” No one suffers alone.
I think one can also say that Christ is on the cross as long as there is someone who is still feels unloved in this world or rejected or persecuted. This is important to keep in mind in light of the Gospel passage from we heard at Mass. Take up your cross daily and follow me. To take up the cross means to bear ones own burdens as well as the burdens of others and to do that we must love. We cannot sustain this out of sympathy or guilt, only love. Love truly is our greatest cross, and the more we love the greater the cross becomes, but the mystery lies in the reality that the burden becomes lighter because we realize that we are only to bear our own crosses and those of others because Christ is bearing them with us.
Everyday provides us with a new lesson in love to learn, a new test in how much we love, and a realization that our love for God or other will never be full in this life. That thought ought not make us despair or become neurotic. It ought to inspire to seek new ways to express that love through prayer, acts of generosity and reparation. St. Teresa of Avila reminds us in her autobiography that we will ultimately be judged on not how much we knew or how much we believed, but rather how much we loved. Maybe that can become for us a daily measure of whether we have grown closer to or farther away from God. The Crosses that life gives us always presents more opportunities for holiness. Lets not pass them up, but hold on to them, realizing that Jesus is holding onto them with us.
