The Way of the Cross

12^th Sunday in Ordinary Time

Cycle C

This morning we hear once again Jesus’ admonition that if we are to be his disciples we must take up our cross daily and follow him. And the idea we have of taking up our crosses is a very negative one. We relate it with great suffering. A cross is something we have to endure, something that won’t go away, like a debilitating illness or a bad relationship. We know what Jesus’ cross was, a necessary evil, but something he had to go through in order to be glorified in the resurrection. So, being a Christian is to suffer.

Is Jesus saying that only martyrs can be his disciples? Is suffering what defines being a Christian? Actually, Christianity is all about life, not death. Jesus doesn’t want us to suffer. If he wanted people to suffer, why did he cure so many of them? If He wanted us to die, why did he redeem us? Jesus himself didn’t want to suffer, either. But the reality is that we do and he did.

Jesus’ Way of the Cross didn’t start on Good Friday. He took up his cross much, much earlier, and his journey to fulfill his destiny began much, much earlier. Jesus carried his cross every day of his life. We read the gospels and can get the idea that Jesus’ only suffering occurred in that single day from the agony in the garden until his death on the cross. We don’t often think about what his everyday life was like. Jesus suffered all the same little things we all do every day in the cause of doing God’s will. 

What do you think it was like growing up in the small village of Nazareth, where all your neighbors knew that your mother was pregnant before she was married to your father? His own neighbors tried to throw him off a cliff once, and a couple of times people tried to stone him. His mother and family actually thought he was crazy. And how many days did he sweat under the blazing sun as he taught and healed the crowds, and how many nights did he spend shivering under the cold, open sky because he had no home to lay his head? How much gossip at the hands of the Pharisees did he have to endure? Even his closest friends misunderstood him.

The way Jesus chose to travel through life was never easy. His destiny was not to live an easy life and his purpose was not to live well but to die. We were created to live, Jesus was born to die.

And so, Jesus was not telling the disciples they were required to take up that heavy wooden device of torture, drag it and themselves through the streets of Jerusalem up to the top of a hill and be nailed to it. He was telling them that if they were to be true disciples they had to emulate the master in everything. That meant that every day they were to travel the Via Dolorosa of everyday life. They were to endure all the small sufferings and enjoy all the little triumphs that punctuated their lives and still keep their eyes on the goal. And the attitude they were to have is one of submission to the will of God and small denials of their own wills.

When Jesus told them they must deny themselves he didn’t mean they had to completely lose their identities and become something they were not. It was not that they had to give up everything pleasurable in their lives, either. It was the opposite. Jesus is the ultimate expression of self-denial. His nature as the Word of God is divine, yet he denied himself and became man. St. Paul says that even though Jesus was in the form of God, he did not consider that something to be grasped at. Instead, he emptied himself, taking the form of a slave. He didn’t have to, he wanted to. Jesus denied himself and became us. And he didn’t think he was giving up anything; he was gaining something.

On the other hand, when we deny ourselves we become like him. We don’t know what it means to deny ourselves anything, do we? We are into immediate gratification. I not only don’t deny myself, I glorify myself. It is a culture of me, me, me. I am the center of the universe. I am the master of my destiny. I am the self made man. The purpose of my struggles and suffering is to eliminate my struggles and suffering. I do not have to deny myself anything. How difficult it is for us to understand this passage. As usual, what we see as loss is actually gain, and what we see as gain is actually loss.

What Jesus is calling us to deny is the part of ourselves that keeps us from him. He is calling us to deny ourselves all the passions and things that keep us from becoming truly human, truly free, and truly God-like. All the things that we think will make us happy are the very things that deny us happiness. Jesus was not asking the disciples to give up anything, he was telling them what they could and should become. We are to take our eyes off ourselves and keep them on others. Just like he did. We are to give everything we are in order for others to find God. Just like he did.  We are to humbly travel with him every day towards a fuller understanding and relationship with the Father. We are to become Jesus for the world.

And just like Jesus, our Ways of the Cross are filled with triumphs and defeats. Sometimes we are heavily burdened, sometimes someone takes up our cross for us and helps us along. We often fall and are bruised, but we find the strength to get up and journey on. We meet people along the way, some who spit on us and mock us and try to keep us down, and others who offer us some small act of kindness and compassion. And through it all we keep our eyes focused on Calvary. Jesus saw that hill as the culmination of his purpose. He knew it meant death for him but life for us. We see Calvary not as a place of our suffering but of our redemption.

We feel pain and sorrow whenever we think about what Jesus went through on that day long ago, and that’s a good thing. It is good that we are humbled by his sacrifice. It is good to remember the great love he showed us on that day, because we always have the knowledge of how it all turned out. We always have Easter.

Being a disciple of Christ is not so difficult. It does not necessarily require martyrdom or torture. It just requires the understanding that our daily lives have purpose; that even our small sufferings and triumphs are to be offered up in the service of God and our brothers and sisters. It requires letting go of the incomplete images we have of ourselves and realizing that we are so much more than the things we possess.  Jesus emptied himself to become man. We empty ourselves to become more than we ever dreamed possible.

Christ became us so that we can become Christ.