Good Friday: Befriending Jesus’ Cross

“Behold, behold the Wood of the Cross, on which is hung our salvation.” – Good Friday Liturgy

It is, to me, a sign of providence that the Church came to commemorate Jesus’s birth on December 25th. Because the Church placed the feast of the Annunciation exactly 9 months before Christmas on March 25th, we always celebrate this feast in Lent, or within the Octave of Easter. Since we are in the midst of the Triduum, this feast will not be celebrated in the Church’s liturgy this year, but it lies beneath...the Incarnation and Resurrection refusing to be silent for long.

This Lent, I have prayed for friends who have lost loved ones: a sibling, grandparents. I have congratulated friends and given thanks for healing, for the births and conceptions of children and for birthdays that friends and families have celebrated. Even this weekend I will celebrate the wedding of a dear friend, snuck in between the Veneration of the Cross and the Great Vigil. I have struggled for solemnity on a Lenten Friday when my son rushes up, lightsabers in hand, to battle the forces of evil (narrowly missing the dog). Tumbled in this mix of cross and empty tomb, pain and joy, my prayer is not to rush too quickly to the disciples’ revelation in Emmaus, which is so much more inviting than the lonely cross.

I pray that I will be able to join with the disciples in their confusion and disillusionment and learn from it. I pray that I will be able to be with the Twelve in their fatigue, fear, and even their shame from the Garden to Golgotha. I know that what I want is their joy at recognizing Jesus, their courage to burst out of the upper room at Pentecost. I don’t want to sit with my own doubts and fears, my failings and self-judgment at the foot of the cross. I want Easter Sunday, I want Christmas Morning, I want beautiful Magnificats. I want the moments of quiet satisfaction with my wife that I imagine Mary and Joseph had, maybe on the way home from Egypt, or from a pilgrimage to Jerusalem. Instead, today I’m asked to befriend Jesus’ cross.

As I walk forward to venerate the cross this afternoon, I hope to let God sit with me in the midst of the things I’d rather not think about: the uncertainties of life, the possibility of loss, and the challenge of vulnerability. I hope that by doing this, I can experience the Cross as Jesus’ yoke, which Jesus promises, when born alongside him, becomes easy and light...but the lesson isn’t learned without the bearing.

How does Jesus speak to you at the cross? What part of the cross scares you?

Jason Coito

Holy Thursday: Jesus with Me

"I give you a new commandment, says the Lord: love one another as I have loved you." — Jn 13:34

I encountered Jesus in the olive garden again today.

Jesus placed me before him and invited me to pray.  But instead of praying, I drifted off to sleep and entered a dream.  In my dream unfortunate events in my childhood replayed: from the age of six to sixteen, I was molested by different members of my family.  At the end of every molestation scene, I saw Jesus standing there, watching.

My dream continued into my adulthood.  I had closed myself off from God, from the world, and from myself.  I heard Jesus calling me but I ignored him.  Jesus wouldn't give up.  He followed me everywhere I went.  I was annoyed and decided to face him one day.

"You were there weren't you Jesus?  You showed up at every scene and you saw everything that happened, yet you chose to do nothing.  You just stood there and watched.  Did you enjoy watching my childhood Jesus? Did you?!!!  What kind of friend are you?  You said you love me but why didn't you protect me?  Was it fun watching it happen? Did it excite you Jesus? Explain it to me because I can’t comprehend it!!!"

Jesus said something, but I didn't bother.  I continued, "Liking myself has been a great challenge because I think of myself filthy, unlovable, and unworthy of anything.  I want to overcome these negative thoughts, but I’ve lived with them most of my life, I don’t know how to get rid of them."

Tears raced down my cheeks. I suddenly felt weak, my knees wobbled.  I turned away from Jesus and plummeted.  Yearning for a loving embrace, I wrapped my arms around my knees and rocked myself until exhaustion carried me off to sleep.

Jesus moved.  He sat next to me, and put his arms around my shoulders.  I started rocking again and Jesus rocked with me.  His tears dropped onto my arm.

Jesus spoke softly: "I do love you very much Maddie.  When those people violated you, I wasn't just there. I was in you.  What they did to you, they also did to me.  They molested me."  Jesus was quiet for a moment then spoke again, "What hurts more is that I love those people and was also in them, so when they violated us, I felt like I was the one who hurt us, hurt you, the one I love.  I'm so sorry Maddie."

I heard commotions and woke from my dream.  Looking, I was terrified because Jesus was being taken away.  I remained in the garden remembering Jesus’ declared love for me.

Thank you, Jesus, for loving me, for sharing in my experiences, and for taking ownership of my sins even though you didn't commit them.

Once again, you invite me to love as you have loved, but I’m not yet capable of such love.  Help me to keep my focus on you and to allow your love to flow through me so that all that pains “us” can be transformed into gifts of life and love.

Maddie 

Wednesday of Holy Week: Beyond Betrayal

“Surely it is not I, Lord?” – Mt 26:22

In Greek, to “betray” means to hand the other over to suffering. Judas’ betrayal handed Jesus over to suffering. Peter’s denial leaves Jesus to suffer alone. Almost all of the other male disciples abandoned their teacher as well. In various ways, each of them is a source of sorrow for Jesus, despite their protestations, “Surely, it is not I, Lord?”

When listening to the Passion narrative on Palm Sunday, I was struck by two gestures of Jesus. First, he asked the one who handed him over to suffering, “Judas, are you betraying me with a kiss?” Second, he turned and looked at Peter with forgiveness and love, prompting his close disciple to weep bitterly. In different ways, Jesus drew each of his friends with tenderness and mercy, beyond their betrayal.

It is difficult for me to honestly look at how I hand others over to suffering, especially those close to me. Intentionally or unknowingly, I betray as Judas or deny as Peter. I overprotect, cling too tightly, minimize burdens, or hold unrealistic expectations of people I profess to love. Judas handed Jesus over to suffering partially because he wanted to force Jesus to become a political Messiah; Peter denied knowing Jesus because the cost of discipleship seemed too much for him. I neglected to lend an understanding ear to a friend because it inconveniences me; I dismissed another’s suffering with a kiss.

It’s so tempting to focus on fear, on a world beset by terror and broken political systems, or on personal disappointments and busy-ness. Yet, when we are willing to confess that we often hand those we love over to suffering, even against our best intentions, we can encounter Christ’s forgiving love. When we allow Jesus’ gaze to draw us with tenderness and mercy, beyond our guilt and shame, our hearts can be consoled and purified. In turn, we will be more ready to forgive those who, often against their will, hand us over to suffering.

Lord, help me see the ways I cause others to suffer; draw me closer with your merciful gaze.

Tuesday of Holy Week: Hell-bent

“After Judas took the morsel, Satan entered him. So Jesus said to him, ‘What you are going to do, do quickly.’” – Jn. 13:27

I’ll admit, it’s pretty easy for me to point the finger at Trump in terms of a ‘Judas’ figure today. But isn’t that the basic ugly human tendency trying to perpetuate itself here — this never-ending blame game. Somehow, it doesn’t get old. I don’t deny, it’s fascinating witnessing this man’s ability to stir up a cauldron of dark emotions for both those on his side and those who disagree with everything he stands for. Thus, it pains me to realize, he’s mostly working with what’s already there.

Looking inward, I’m disheartened at times. I wonder what malicious feelings are doing lurking there in my soul?

Several weeks ago after dinner, a wise man asked me, “Do you know what runs deeper than anger?” I lowered an eyebrow, pensively. My Chicagoan friend wiped his lips and continued, “Disgust.” Leaning towards me slyly, he mimed with his hand as if holding a knife. “When you can do this,” the air knife entered me, “and not bat an eye and say, ‘You disappoint me and this is what you deserve,’ and walk away. That, my friend, is Evil.”

No doubt, this stuck with me. It seems true. Prolonged anger — or any toxic feeling — doesn’t just sit there. It stirs. It soaks in like a marinade. Our soul ‘meat’ takes on a whole new flavor. Cynicism, apathy, hopelessness, egotism, fear — especially fear — so many emotions left unchecked potentially nurture a climate of nihilistic disgust. Something like a petri dish disposed to grow hate.

We enter the gospel this Holy Tuesday, a scene drenched in darkness. Every bite shared between friends a bittersweet morsel. Brethren looking around distrustfully at one another. The air is sick with grief yet to come. “Surely, not I, Lord.”

I don’t know about you, but sometimes I find myself rehearsing aloud what I need to say to someone before I see this person, particularly when a person ‘has it coming.’ In my mind, somehow I am convinced that I’m justified in every way to say “xyz.” But even if I’m right “according to the world,” what about according to Love? What would Love do?

When I reflect, how many times has Jesus, with heavy heart, looked into my eyes — eyes resolved and hell-bent to carry out my own “justice” — and said, “What you are going to do, do quickly.” 

Lord, save us.  Save us from ourselves.

Martin Ngo

Monday of Holy Week: Being with Jesus

“Mary took a liter of costly perfumed oil made from genuine aromatic nard and anointed the feet of Jesus and dried them with her hair.” – Jn. 12:3

Mary of Bethany, sister of Martha and Lazarus, is one of the most beautiful characters in the New Testament. In Luke’s Gospel, she was the sister who sat by Jesus’s feet listening intently to his words while Martha was busy with hosting duties and complained Mary was not helping her. In today’s Gospel, John describes Mary as anointing Jesus’s feet with so much perfume that the fragrance filled the house and humbly wiping his feet with her hair. These two stories give us a glimpse to how much she loved Jesus as to becoming totally present to him and lavishly ministering to him. Because of her single-minded devotion to Christ, she may be considered among the first Christian contemplatives.

As we enter Holy Week assessing how we lived out Lent this year preparing for the passion, death, and resurrection of Jesus, we may have found some of our promises and devotions lacking the enthusiasm it had during the start of Lent. Our intentions were undoubtedly well-meaning, but life distractions and weariness may have disrupted our plans. But it was precisely OUR plans – our plans to pray more, to volunteer more, to give up sweets, to give up Facebook, to be in solidarity more with the poor however it may have looked like. I look at the ashes of my own Lenten plans and notice how it may have been a subtle form of navel-gazing.

Mary of Bethany provides us a beautifully simple model of preparing for the Paschal Mystery – not only the Paschal Mystery of Jesus, but also the ones we experience daily – our daily toils, death, and rebirth however big or small it takes shape. Holy Week is an opportunity to perhaps reinvigorate our Lenten commitments, but it may also be an invitation to set aside whatever Herculean acts of sacrifice that allows us to be proud of ourselves and simply be present to Jesus as Mary of Bethany was during his final days. Beyond Holy Week, each of us may be called to different acts of sacrifices and services, but all of us are called to a love of Jesus that resembles Mary’s simple way. God does not long for our extreme sacrifices. God longs for our hearts.

Lord Jesus Christ, may the example and intercession of Mary of Bethany help us to be with you beyond ourselves.

Michael Jamnongjit 

Palm Sunday: Loved In My Entirety

"It is you who have stood by me in my trials." – Lk. 22:28

Reflecting on today's Gospel, I imagine Jesus saying to his disciples and to me, "I see you. I see you with all your goodness and all your meanness, with all your wholeness and all your brokenness, with all your talents and all your shortcomings. I see you with all your loves and all your fears. I see you with all the pains you experience and all the pains you cause. I see your faithfulness and your abandonment. I see you all - and I love you. I see you all - and I choose you."

My participation in Palm Sunday moves me because it reveals our complex relationship with God, ourselves, and others. I begin the celebration, palms in hand, ready to welcome and embrace God, as the Jews welcomed and embraced Jesus when he entered Jerusalem. Moments later, I shout, as so many others have shouted before, "Crucify him! Crucify him!" And throughout it all, I hear a relentless love saying, "I give you my kingdom," and "you will be with me in Paradise."

This way of loving and being loved leaves no room for shame, doubt or fear. It is a love that proclaims, "no matter what, let's be together; let's go and grow together."

God, help me see me as you see me - completely and with a patient, persistent faithfulness and love. I ask for the grace needed to respond to myself and others with mercy.

Vivian Valencia

Solemnity of Saint Joseph: Living Out God’s Dream in Ordinary Life

“When Joseph awoke, he did as the angel of the Lord had commanded him and took his wife into his home.” – Matthew 1:24

Sister M. Madeleva, CSJ writes a revealing statement about St. Joseph: “Quiet, living on the verge of mystery. He was left with dreams and the work of his hands.”  Joseph represents the largest part of Jesus’ earthly existence: his hidden life. Moreover, as foster father, Joseph greatly shaped Jesus’ hidden life, in a small town, in the backcountry of Galilee, in quiet, simple, ordinary, and unspectacular life as a carpenter.

Yet, through this everyday, almost uneventful existence, the invitation to live life fully unfolds. Trying to live wholly the common, even mundane moments of our lives takes us into the mystery of God’s dream for our life.It involves openness to dreaming about our unique roles in the mystery of God’s liberating and transforming love; it also entails working attentively towards its fulfillment. At times, following these dreams takes much risk and pain; at other times, it draws out of us faithfulness in the tedious, humdrum tasks of everyday life. There are times in my life that I, like Joseph, struggle to understand, trust, and let go of my own plans. Reflecting upon these experiences teaches me that faithfulness in the little moments builds trust that prepares me for the bigger decisions.

Like Joseph and Jesus, we are called to follow God in hidden, simple, ordinary, and unspectacular life. Slowly slowly, as we walk in faith and in trust, the path of God appears beneath our feet.

Lord Jesus, help me to be faithful and find you in the ordinariness of my life today. St. Joseph, pray for us!

Friday, Fifth Week of Lent: Daughters and Sons of God

“But the LORD is with me, like a mighty champion” - Jeremiah 20:11

“The Father is in me and I am in the Father.” - John 10: 38

The Prophet Jeremiah and Jesus could not have brought better news than they do in today’s readings. Jeremiah speaks words that could probably inspire me through hell on earth. Jesus speaks words that show, when I really reflect on them, he really wants each of us to be able to say about ourselves: God lives in me. I have a feeling, though, that most of the time very few of us let these words take root. I sure don’t.

Most of us have heard things like, “Don’t worry, God is with you” many times, right? I almost hear it so much that I am numb to it. They just become words with no real power. Maybe we use them just to say something when we think someone needs kind words. Or maybe they come up when we really have nothing else to say. Whatever the case, I have a deep feeling that this whole Jesus story is more than those words could ever communicate.

“I am the Son of God,” Jesus says. But have you ever said that about yourself? Have you ever admitted that you are the Son or Daughter of God? We like to take “the” out of there to avoid sounding crazy, right? But here’s the thing about today’s gospel: we don’t need to take “the” out of that statement when speaking about ourselves. And we also don’t need to take “the” out of it when we speak about others. The most beautiful news about the Incarnation is that it very clearly shows us that when the Father gazes upon us in our humanity, the Father gazes upon His Son. When God looks at us, it is as if God is looking in a mirror. That is the salvation. That is what frees us. The cross we are about to celebrate is the lasting sign of that. We don’t need to try to impress anyone, and we especially don’t need to try to impress God. We are already participants in the Trinity.

Tony Cortese 

Thursday, Fifth Week of Lent: God’s Promise

"I will maintain my covenant with you." - Genesis 17:3-9

To appreciate God’s promise in the first reading, we are invited to take a step back and understand Abraham’s journey and longing of having a family. God made a covenant with Abraham that he would become the father of a great nation. It meant him and his barren wife, Sarah, would be blessed with children. At a time when others in their community were having grandchildren or great-grandchildren, Abraham and Sarah will finally become parents. This promise left them in awe of how nothing is impossible for God.

When I think of Abraham and Sarah, I am encouraged to live my faith in such a way where I do not have to explain or reason. It is easy to say I believe God is a God of miracles, that nothing is too difficult for him, but when my circumstances seem dire, hopeless, and uncomfortable, I am forced to wrestle with this truth in the deepest corners of my heart and begin feeling increasingly vulnerable. During those times, I am reminded of God’s faithfulness. He is faithful even when I am faithless. And when I defy closing my heart or relying on my own resources to trust Him, He gives me faith to rest in the promise that He is working all things together for my good and His glory. It requires total trust in His covenantal promise to continuously unfold in my life and realizing that knowing God’s will is not enough, but doing God’s will is essential.

As I reflect upon my past, I could see God’s hand in every step of my faith journey. But back then, when I looked towards the future, I could not make peace with uncertainty. Yet nothing in the biblical narrative tells us certainty is part of the deal. I am slowly learning with each passing day to leave my hands a little more unclenched because if I cannot trace His hand, I can always trust His heart.

Lord, help me to remember Your promises, to wait with patient trust, and to hold out for Your miracle.

Tam Lontok 

Wednesday, Fifth Week of Lent: True Freedom

"If you remain in my word, you will truly be my disciples, and you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.” – Jn 8:31-32

True freedom is the freedom of the children of God. To reach that freedom requires a lifelong discipline since so much in our world militates against it. The political, economic, social, and even religious powers surrounding us all want to keep us in bondage so that we will obey their commands and be dependent on their rewards. This is not their overt message; but in subtle and gradual ways, we are seduced into this bondage.  But the spiritual truth that leads to freedom is the truth that we belong not to the world but to God, whose beloved children we are. By living lives in which we keep returning to that truth in word and deed, we will gradually grow into our true freedom. By getting in touch with this bedrock experience of who we are before God, we take another step towards true freedom.  What shows that you belong to God, not to the world? Get in touch with this foundational experience…

Adapted from Henri Nouwen