Lenten Homilies AD 2010
The Stations of the Cross
Introduction:
Setting the Scene – The Eve of the Passover
The Stations of the Cross are one of the most popular Christian acts of worship outside of the Mass. When we go to Our Lady’s Shrine at Walsingham it is rare to find anyone who doesn’t wish to participate in the Stations of the Cross in the beautiful Shrine grounds. In the Stations of the Cross we are brought close to Jesus in his final and inexorable journey to suffering and death.
We pause 14 times and reflect on incidents that happened along this sorrowful journey, but this journey has a background to it. This journey becomes necessary with the fall of man and woman into sin, and the resulting rupture of the relationship between God and his creation. God, even at the beginning, knew that this journey would be necessary, and yet this journey is a far longer one than we sometimes realise. The fourteen incidents that we mark as the observance of the Stations of the Cross are but the final phase of this journey. For our Lord this journey begins with the preparation for it throughout the Old Testament Era where God prepares his people through successive partial revelations of himself for his full and complete revelation of himself in his Son, Jesus Christ.
That full and complete revelation of God himself takes place in a cave beneath an inn in Bethlehem and that is where this final journey begins. Here in humility and poverty the Word is made flesh and dwells among us. Throughout his infancy, childhood, adolescence and early manhood our Lord dwells among us and gets to know the people he has created in a way mankind could never have envisaged. This is a journey of love for his creation, which begins formally and publicly with his Baptism at the Jordan and continues with his travelling ministry throughout Galilee and Judea. Eventually, as he knows he must, he comes to Jerusalem: the place which has seen so many of the prophets sent by God rejected and killed. It is here that the final phase of this long journey to secure our redemption takes place and which forms the basis of our observance of what we have thought of as his final journey but which is in reality the culmination of a long journey undertaken by Christ out of love for the world.
But there are other acts and journeys taking place behind the scenes that lead up to this final phase. There are the journeys of the religious leaders of the day to Galilee to report back to the High Priest and the Council about the activities and speeches of this young Rabbi from Galilee. There are the journeys of the Apostles that are sent to prepare the Upper Room for the Last Supper. There are the journeys of Judas who collaborates with the High Priest and Council in betraying Jesus. There is the sublime journey of the Master who walks around the table pausing to stoop to wash the Apostles feet. There is the journey to the Garden of Gethsemane both by Our Lord and the Apostles, and subsequently by the heavy feet of the soldiers accompanied by Judas who come with spears and swords to arrest him who is the Prince of Peace. There are the journeys to the House of Caiaphas and Annas, the High Priests, to Herod and finally to the judgement hall of Pontius Pilate. Yes, the enemies of righteousness have been engaged in a lot of journeys to make sure this final phase, which they have longed to see, becomes a reality.
But also behind the scenes there is a lot going on. It is the Eve of the Passover: a time of preparation. Rather like the hectic preparations that we engage in to prepare for Christmas. There is an atmosphere of great excitement and that wonderful feeling that people, for want of a better word, describe as “Christmassy.” Food is being purchased, homes are being decorated and others are also on journeys to join their families in Jerusalem or simply just to be there for the Passover as part of a spiritual pilgrimage as we might long to spend Christmas in Bethlehem or Holy Week in Jerusalem.
Excitement prevails, but there is also tenseness in the air. The occupying Roman forces are nervous, for Passover is a time when the Zealots, the freedom fighters have cause to remember their loss of freedom and when nationalistic tendencies come to the fore. And there are other, darker forces at work in league with evil... forces which plot the defeat of goodness because of jealousy, spite and fear – fear of the loss of influence and power.
At the heart of all this hustle and bustle to do with a celebration of God’s deliverance of his people in ancient times there is an unseen and powerful plot to destroy the one who will ultimately and finally deal with the problem of sin. But this plot is all the more misguided as they know not what they do, or who it is that they are determined to do away with.
And so we find ourselves walking these steps with Christ – walking with him in spirit along the final phase of this long journey to win our redemption. While treading these steps with him we are drawn into a great mystery – the mystery of suffering and redemption. For, as we tread these steps with him we find that we are drawn even closer to the one who knows the depth of our own suffering even more than we know it ourselves. And yet as we bear our own cross with him we find ourselves drawn out of ourselves into the very real suffering of others – the appalling tragedies that so many in our world face on a daily basis.
This is how it should be as we contemplate the final journey of the One who is to die for the whole of mankind. He who takes this journey to die for others literally empties himself of his glory, in order that he, by his suffering and death, will redeem the world. If, as we take this journey with him, we simply think of ourselves and Christ being with us in our struggles we miss the point of this journey for, as Christ shows us: this is, as it was always intended to be, a journey undertaken on behalf of others.
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