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Showing posts with label roman. Show all posts
Showing posts with label roman. Show all posts
Wednesday, July 30, 2008
Tuesday, May 1, 2007
EIGHTH STATION: Jesus is helped by the Cyrenean to carry his cross
EIGHTH STATION
Jesus is helped by the Cyrenean to carry his cross
V/. Adoramus te, Christe, et benedicimus tibi.
R/. Quia per sanctam crucem tuam redemisti mundum.
From the Gospel according to Luke. 23:26
And as they led him away, they seized one Simon of Cyrene, who was coming in from the country, and laid on him the cross, to carry it behind Jesus.
MEDITATION
He was returning from the countryside, perhaps after a few hours of work. Awaiting him at home were the preparations for the holy day: sunset, in fact, would mark the beginning of the Sabbath, as the first stars began to shine in the evening sky. His name was Simon; he was a Jew, a native of Cyrene, a city on the Libyan strand which was home to a large community of the Jewish Diaspora[23]. A curt order by the Roman soldiers escorting Jesus stops him in his tracks and forces him to take a turn at carrying the cross of that half-dead convict.
Simon was a chance passerby; he did not know how extraordinary that encounter was to be. As someone once wrote[24], "how many men over the centuries would have wanted to be there, in his place, to have been passing by just at that moment. But it was too late; he was the one who had passed by and over the centuries he would never have yielded his place to others." Here we see the mystery of the unexpected encounter with God which happens in so many lives. Paul, the Apostle, had been intercepted, seized and "overcome"[25] by Christ on the way to Damascus. And this led him to ponder anew those astonishing words of God: "I have been found by those who did not seek me; I have shown myself to those who did not ask for me"[26].
* * *
God lies in waiting along the paths of our daily life. At times he knocks on our door and asks to sit at our table to eat with us[27]. Even a chance encounter, like that of Simon of Cyrene, can become a gift of conversion. Indeed, the Evangelist Mark will name of the sons of that man, Alexander and Rufus, as fellow Christians[28]. The Cyrenean is thus the emblem of the mysterious embrace of divine grace and human effort. In the end, the Evangelist paints him as the disciple who "takes up the cross behind Jesus" and follows in his footsteps [29].
His gesture, carried out under constraint, becomes a symbol for every act of solidarity with the suffering, the oppressed, the weary. The Cyreanean thus represents the innumerable host of generous persons, missionaries, Samaritans who do not "pass by on the other side" of the street [30], but bend low to assist the suffering, to lift them up and to give them support. Over Simon's head and shoulders, bent beneath the weight of the cross, echo the words of Saint Paul: "Bear one another's burdens, and so fulfil the law of Christ"[31].
All:
Pater noster, qui es in cælis:
sanctificetur nomen tuum;
adveniat regnum tuum;
fiat voluntas tua, sicut in cælo, et in terra.
Panem nostrum cotidianum da nobis hodie;
et dimitte nobis debita nostra,
sicut et nos dimittimus debitoribus nostris;
et ne nos inducas in tentationem;
sed libera nos a malo.
Tui Nati vulnerati,
tam dignati pro me pati,
pœnas mecum divide.
[23] Cf, Acts 2:10; 6:9; 13:1.
[24] CHARLES PÉGUY, The Mystery of the Charity of Saint Joan of Arc (1910).
[25] Philippians 3:12.
[26] Romans 10:20.
[27] Cf. Revelation 3:20.
[28] Cf. Mark 15:21.
[29] Cf. Luke 9:23.
[30] Cf. Luke 10:30-37.
[31] Galatians 6:2.
*** Moment of Silence
PRESENTATION
OPENING PRAYER
FIRST STATION
SECOND STATION
THIRD STATION
FOURTH STATION
FIFTH STATION
SIXTH STATION
SEVENTH STATION
EIGHTH STATION
NINTH STATION
TENTH STATION
ELEVENTH STATION
TWELFTH STATION
THIRTEENTH STATION
FOURTEENTH STATION
BLESSING
*** Back to Main Page
Jesus is helped by the Cyrenean to carry his cross
V/. Adoramus te, Christe, et benedicimus tibi.
R/. Quia per sanctam crucem tuam redemisti mundum.
From the Gospel according to Luke. 23:26
And as they led him away, they seized one Simon of Cyrene, who was coming in from the country, and laid on him the cross, to carry it behind Jesus.
MEDITATION
He was returning from the countryside, perhaps after a few hours of work. Awaiting him at home were the preparations for the holy day: sunset, in fact, would mark the beginning of the Sabbath, as the first stars began to shine in the evening sky. His name was Simon; he was a Jew, a native of Cyrene, a city on the Libyan strand which was home to a large community of the Jewish Diaspora[23]. A curt order by the Roman soldiers escorting Jesus stops him in his tracks and forces him to take a turn at carrying the cross of that half-dead convict.
Simon was a chance passerby; he did not know how extraordinary that encounter was to be. As someone once wrote[24], "how many men over the centuries would have wanted to be there, in his place, to have been passing by just at that moment. But it was too late; he was the one who had passed by and over the centuries he would never have yielded his place to others." Here we see the mystery of the unexpected encounter with God which happens in so many lives. Paul, the Apostle, had been intercepted, seized and "overcome"[25] by Christ on the way to Damascus. And this led him to ponder anew those astonishing words of God: "I have been found by those who did not seek me; I have shown myself to those who did not ask for me"[26].
* * *
God lies in waiting along the paths of our daily life. At times he knocks on our door and asks to sit at our table to eat with us[27]. Even a chance encounter, like that of Simon of Cyrene, can become a gift of conversion. Indeed, the Evangelist Mark will name of the sons of that man, Alexander and Rufus, as fellow Christians[28]. The Cyrenean is thus the emblem of the mysterious embrace of divine grace and human effort. In the end, the Evangelist paints him as the disciple who "takes up the cross behind Jesus" and follows in his footsteps [29].
His gesture, carried out under constraint, becomes a symbol for every act of solidarity with the suffering, the oppressed, the weary. The Cyreanean thus represents the innumerable host of generous persons, missionaries, Samaritans who do not "pass by on the other side" of the street [30], but bend low to assist the suffering, to lift them up and to give them support. Over Simon's head and shoulders, bent beneath the weight of the cross, echo the words of Saint Paul: "Bear one another's burdens, and so fulfil the law of Christ"[31].
All:
Pater noster, qui es in cælis:
sanctificetur nomen tuum;
adveniat regnum tuum;
fiat voluntas tua, sicut in cælo, et in terra.
Panem nostrum cotidianum da nobis hodie;
et dimitte nobis debita nostra,
sicut et nos dimittimus debitoribus nostris;
et ne nos inducas in tentationem;
sed libera nos a malo.
Tui Nati vulnerati,
tam dignati pro me pati,
pœnas mecum divide.
[23] Cf, Acts 2:10; 6:9; 13:1.
[24] CHARLES PÉGUY, The Mystery of the Charity of Saint Joan of Arc (1910).
[25] Philippians 3:12.
[26] Romans 10:20.
[27] Cf. Revelation 3:20.
[28] Cf. Mark 15:21.
[29] Cf. Luke 9:23.
[30] Cf. Luke 10:30-37.
[31] Galatians 6:2.
*** Moment of Silence
PRESENTATION
OPENING PRAYER
FIRST STATION
SECOND STATION
THIRD STATION
FOURTH STATION
FIFTH STATION
SIXTH STATION
SEVENTH STATION
EIGHTH STATION
NINTH STATION
TENTH STATION
ELEVENTH STATION
TWELFTH STATION
THIRTEENTH STATION
FOURTEENTH STATION
BLESSING
*** Back to Main Page
Sunday, April 15, 2007
PRESENTATION
It was a late spring morning, somewhere between the years 30 and 33 of our era. In a street of Jerusalem -- which in centuries to come would be known simply as the "Via Dolorosa" -- a small procession was winding its way: escorted by a patrol of Roman soldiers, a man condemned to death advanced, carrying the patibulum, the horizontal arm of a cross whose vertical arm was already standing amid the stones of a small, rocky promontory called in Aramaic, Golgotha, and in Latin, Calvary, "the place of the skull".
This was the last chapter of a familiar story whose central figure is Jesus Christ, the man crucified and humiliated, the Lord risen and glorious. It was a story that began in the darkness and gloom of the evening before, beneath the olive branches of a field called Gethsemane, "the olive-press". A story that quickly unfolded in the strongholds of religious and political power and culminated in a sentence of death. Yet the case of that condemned man was unlike that of so many other victims of the brutal torture of crucifixion, which the Romans reserved for the punishment of revolutionaries and slaves. Not even the tomb, offered by a man of means named Joseph of Arimathea, could be the end of the story.
There would in fact be another chapter, astonishing and unexpected: the condemned man, Jesus of Nazareth, would splendidly reveal another nature hidden beneath the features of his human countenance and body: that of the Son of God. The end of the story was not the Cross and the tomb, but rather the brilliant light of his Resurrection and his glory. As the Apostle Paul, a few years later, would say: the one who renounced his glory to become powerless and weak like us, and abased himself even to accepting a shameful death by crucifixion, was exalted by the Father, who made him the Lord of earth and heaven, of history and eternity (cf. Phil 2:6-11).
For centuries Christians have retraced the steps of the Via Crucis, a path that leads to the hill of the crucifixion, with their gaze fixed on its ultimate goal, the light of Easter. They have made that journey as pilgrims along that same street in Jerusalem, but also in their cities, their churches and their homes. For centuries writers and artists, both famous and forgotten, have sought to touch the hearts of the faithful by bringing to life those steps or "stations", making them moments of meditation along the way to Golgotha. They have painted pictures ranging from the striking to the ordinary, from the sublime to the simple, from the dramatic to the plain and unaffected.
In Rome, this spiritual journey in the footsteps of Jesus sets out anew each Good Friday, led by the Pope, the Bishop of this City and the universal pastor, in union with Christians the world over. This year's reflections for each station are narrative and meditative in character, and follow the story of the Passion as recounted by the Evangelist Saint Luke. They have been written by a biblist, Monsignor Gianfranco Ravasi, prefect of the Ambrosian Library and Gallery in Milan, a cultural institution founded four centuries ago by Cardinal Federico Borromeo, Archbishop of that city and a cousin of Saint Charles Borromeo. A century ago, among its prefects, was Achille Ratti, the future Pope Pius XI.
Let us now begin together this journey of prayer, not simply for the sake of remembering past events and a tragic death, but to experience the crude realism of a story which nonetheless speaks of hope, joy and salvation. Perhaps others who are still searching, uncertain and troubled will make this journey alongside us. And as we make our way, step by step, along this path of suffering and of light, we will be able to hear an echo of the stirring words of the Apostle Paul: "Death has been swallowed up in victory. Where, O death, is your victory?… But thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ!" (1 Cor 15:54-55, 57).
*** A moment of silence
PRESENTATION
OPENING PRAYER
FIRST STATION
SECOND STATION
THIRD STATION
FOURTH STATION
FIFTH STATION
SIXTH STATION
SEVENTH STATION
EIGHTH STATION
NINTH STATION
TENTH STATION
ELEVENTH STATION
TWELFTH STATION
THIRTEENTH STATION
FOURTEENTH STATION
BLESSING
*** Back to the main page
This was the last chapter of a familiar story whose central figure is Jesus Christ, the man crucified and humiliated, the Lord risen and glorious. It was a story that began in the darkness and gloom of the evening before, beneath the olive branches of a field called Gethsemane, "the olive-press". A story that quickly unfolded in the strongholds of religious and political power and culminated in a sentence of death. Yet the case of that condemned man was unlike that of so many other victims of the brutal torture of crucifixion, which the Romans reserved for the punishment of revolutionaries and slaves. Not even the tomb, offered by a man of means named Joseph of Arimathea, could be the end of the story.
There would in fact be another chapter, astonishing and unexpected: the condemned man, Jesus of Nazareth, would splendidly reveal another nature hidden beneath the features of his human countenance and body: that of the Son of God. The end of the story was not the Cross and the tomb, but rather the brilliant light of his Resurrection and his glory. As the Apostle Paul, a few years later, would say: the one who renounced his glory to become powerless and weak like us, and abased himself even to accepting a shameful death by crucifixion, was exalted by the Father, who made him the Lord of earth and heaven, of history and eternity (cf. Phil 2:6-11).
For centuries Christians have retraced the steps of the Via Crucis, a path that leads to the hill of the crucifixion, with their gaze fixed on its ultimate goal, the light of Easter. They have made that journey as pilgrims along that same street in Jerusalem, but also in their cities, their churches and their homes. For centuries writers and artists, both famous and forgotten, have sought to touch the hearts of the faithful by bringing to life those steps or "stations", making them moments of meditation along the way to Golgotha. They have painted pictures ranging from the striking to the ordinary, from the sublime to the simple, from the dramatic to the plain and unaffected.
In Rome, this spiritual journey in the footsteps of Jesus sets out anew each Good Friday, led by the Pope, the Bishop of this City and the universal pastor, in union with Christians the world over. This year's reflections for each station are narrative and meditative in character, and follow the story of the Passion as recounted by the Evangelist Saint Luke. They have been written by a biblist, Monsignor Gianfranco Ravasi, prefect of the Ambrosian Library and Gallery in Milan, a cultural institution founded four centuries ago by Cardinal Federico Borromeo, Archbishop of that city and a cousin of Saint Charles Borromeo. A century ago, among its prefects, was Achille Ratti, the future Pope Pius XI.
Let us now begin together this journey of prayer, not simply for the sake of remembering past events and a tragic death, but to experience the crude realism of a story which nonetheless speaks of hope, joy and salvation. Perhaps others who are still searching, uncertain and troubled will make this journey alongside us. And as we make our way, step by step, along this path of suffering and of light, we will be able to hear an echo of the stirring words of the Apostle Paul: "Death has been swallowed up in victory. Where, O death, is your victory?… But thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ!" (1 Cor 15:54-55, 57).
*** A moment of silence
PRESENTATION
OPENING PRAYER
FIRST STATION
SECOND STATION
THIRD STATION
FOURTH STATION
FIFTH STATION
SIXTH STATION
SEVENTH STATION
EIGHTH STATION
NINTH STATION
TENTH STATION
ELEVENTH STATION
TWELFTH STATION
THIRTEENTH STATION
FOURTEENTH STATION
BLESSING
*** Back to the main page
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