soupablog: stations 1 & 2
Of course, Jesus also instituted foot-washing, but most chose not to adopt that as a recurring symbol of faith.
O God, who for our redemption gave your only-begotten Son to the death of the cross, and by his glorious resurrection delivered us from the power of our enemy: Grant us so to die daily to sin, that we may evermore live with him in the joy of his resurrection; through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.
_The Book of Common Prayer
Easter: Faith & Theology
In short, Easter does not eliminate Good Friday, Easter illuminates Good Friday; the resurrection is not the reversal of the crucifixion but the disclosure of its eternal significance.
Finally, the resurrection begins an insurrection led by the Crucified, who in a world of vengeance does not settle old scores but speaks words of forgiveness and peace; who in a world of suffering does not hide his wounds but exposes them to human touch; and who in a world of escapism does not protect his followers but sends them out as agents of liberation.
Easter: prodigal kiwis
“[The resurrection is] the beginning of the possibility of a totally new human story…It is the possibility of a…previously unimaginable human story, a re-reading of all human stories from a radical perspective that had previously been hidden…hidden by the reality of death…”
James Alison
“Now [because of Jesus’ death and resurrection] it is possible for us to live at peace, to be God’s agent of reconciliation in a violent world. We are able so to live not because we have all the answers to all the world’s troubles, but because God has given us a way to live without answers… ‘It is finished.’ But it is not over. It is not over because God made us, the church, the ‘not over.’ We are made witnesses…”
Stanley Hauerwas
Easter: moot
CHRIST IS RISEN
Christ is risen! Lift the song
Of our Easter gladness;
With the bright triumphant throng
Cast away all sadness,
Springtide flowers tell us how
We must leave the sighing,
As we pass the sorrow now
Of our earthly dying.
Lo, the Marys in the gloom
Weeping, bowed with sorrow,
Little dreaming at the Tomb
What their joy tomorrow-
Whom they sought the Lord they found
Now no more in sadness;
Where did woe and grief abound
There He brought the gladness!
Lo, that eve in sorrow went
Two disciples walking,
All their mind on Jesus bent,
Of His Passion talking-
Till a Stranger on the road
To those hearts now burning,
Told of suffering here for God
Into Glory turning!
Easter: way out west
Extract from the Rowan Williams' Easter address from the BBC
Life or death
The
Bible is not the authorised code of a society managed by priests and
preachers for their private purposes, but the set of human words
through which the call of God is still uniquely immediate to human
beings today; human words with divine energy behind them. There are
places in our world where conversion to Christianity is literally a
matter of putting your life on the line. We have all been following
the story of Abdul Rahman in Afghanistan and we know that his story is
not unique. We can say with absolute certainty that whatever the
Gospel means in circumstances like that, it isn't a cover-up for the
sake of the powerful.
go read the rest
Easter: e~mergent kiwi
Easter Sunday sermon. My third Easter and with a bit of trust built, time to take seriously the Resurrection.
If you're looking for a tidy faith, well wrapped and beautifully packaged, you've come to the wrong place.
If you want a faith all neat and beautiful, You won't find it in the Resurrection Garden...
Easter: pomomusings
"The story of God’s self-sacrifice…is the story with a cross at its center, but not at its end:
it’s plot moves toward the…Great Reversal in which the dead Jesus was raised from the tomb,
and along with him our hope that death be swallowed up by life eternal."
Jurgen Moltmann, Theology of Hope
adam
The Via Crucis is Complete - Easter is Here !
Resurrection
by Solomon RAJ, India
Seven Stanzas at Easter
John Updike
Make no mistake: if He rose at all
it was as His body;
if the cells' dissolution did not reverse, the molecules
reknit, the amino acids rekindle,
the Church will fall.
It was not as the flowers,
each soft Spring recurrent;
it was not as His Spirit in the mouths and fuddled
eyes of the eleven apostles;
it was as His flesh: ours.
The same hinged thumbs and toes,
the same valved heart
that--pierced--died, withered, paused, and then
regathered out of enduring Might
new strength to enclose.
Let us not mock God with metaphor,
analogy, sidestepping, transcendence;
making of the event a parable, a sign painted in the
faded credulity of earlier ages:
let us walk through the door.
The stone is rolled back, not papier-mâché,
not a stone in a story,
but the vast rock of materiality that in the slow
grinding of time will eclipse for each of us
the wide light of day.
And if we will have an angel at the tomb,
make it a real angel,
weighty with Max Planck's quanta, vivid with hair,
opaque in the dawn light, robed in real linen
spun on a definite loom.
Let us not seek to make it less monstrous,
for our own convenience, our own sense of beauty,
lest, awakened in one unthinkable hour, we are
embarrassed by the miracle,
and crushed by remonstrance.
[Written for a religious arts festival sponsored by the Clifton Lutheran Church, of Marblehead, Mass.]
(Verse, 164-165.)
Via Crucis Grid Blog: The Corner Stations 13 & 14
photo from
Eloi, Eloi, lama sabachthani | Greenbelt 2004
taken by Steve Collins
I do not want him taken off that cross. I spend most of my spiritual energy keeping Jesus on that cross, victorious, filled with hope. When I get the chance to preach, a buddy of mine always says to me "...get to the hope faster...". This is odd feedback for me - I am an optimist and filled with enthusiasms galore.
For me, there is no more true statement of faith than "the Gospel is bad news before it is good news". The son of God was killed by those he lived with, those who awaited his glorious reign. The authorities looked for a way out, for a loophole that would allow them to let this prophet go free. But we villagers would have none of it. So we killed him. And now he is dead.
Via Crucis Grid Blog: World of Your Making Stations 11 & 12
Jesus is laid in the tomb
It is now over. Body buried, neatly tombed. Spices ready.
Cloths
in proper place. Little things are done. No one can face the larger
agonies, of loss, of loneliness,of anxiety. Faithful friends busy with
tiny things. Jesus Christ is dead.
Jesus, our brother,
you have shown us that you are a
fellow-sufferer, a fellow participant in the agony of creation. We
could not know it then. But in faith, we know it now. You suffer from
the inside of creation and not simply from the outside. If we matter
to you and to your Father in this life, (and we do), then we must
matter to you and to your Father forever.
Jesus, Lord, your gift accepted,
In three days you resurrected,
You did first what we should do.
Via Crucis Grid Blog: Surviving the Workday Stations 13 & 14
From a metaphorical perspective, this time during Holy Week, Holy Saturday, is the time of mourning and transformation, of mystery and secrets. This is the time when Jesus is truly dead and we grieve. Yet, some suspect that change is in store and that he may rise again.
I've tried to focus this week on how we all make a journey through life, complete with falls and touched by moments of comfort. For many of us, that journey takes place in work because that is simply where we are for a large part of the day.
During this journey, most of us experience something devastating at work: being fired or laid off. And this is the time, our own metaphorical Holy Saturday, when we have to cocoon and find a way to be reborn, in another job, in another workplace, or in a different profession. This is the period of growth and rebirth. This is our time of mourning and of transformation.
Via Crucis Grid Blog: sententiae et clamores Stations 11 & 12
How many mothers are cradling their sons in their arms now, their bodies pierced with bullets or knives, broken by sticks or rods, disfigured by torture? How many women stand at a distance and watch cruelty unfold as it has for centuries? Mater Dolorosa, ora pro nobis.
Via Crucis Grid Blog: Things of Infinite Importance Stations 11 & 12
One Good Friday in seminary a friend of mine, Christine McSpadden, showed me some papers that she said she brought out every Good Friday. They were medical descriptions with drawings of what the crucifixion actually was -- what actually happened to Jesus' body. She said it was helpful for her to meditate on those because it became a little less abstract. I don't know if that's the answer -- the gore of Mel Gibson's The Passion of the Christ didn't seem to do much to help identify Christ more with the oppressed of the world -- but at least the intention is in the right direction.
It doesn't matter what I write in this space. Because in the end what I write will just be words and they will have no connection in reality to what this day is about -- which is pain and death and Christ being in the middle of it suffering and dying.
Maybe what we need is fewer words. Fewer thoughts. Fewer ideas.
Maybe we just need to stop talking ... and make it stop.
Via Crucis Grid Blog: _awakening Stations 11 & 12
Jesus came to inaugurate a kingdom - one not built through oppression and domination, but one propelled by love and compassion. And his way was the way of the cross. The cross was the triumph of the kingdom - the putting on display of the kingdom kind of life.
A kingdom of hope over a kingdom of despair.
A kingdom of freedom over a kingdom of bondage.
A kingdom of liberation over a kingdom of oppression.
A kingdom of generosity over a kingdom of greed.
A kingdom of love over a kingdom of power.
A kingdom of light over a kingdom of darkness.
Via Crucis Grid Blog: The Corner Stations 11-12
Woman, behold your son.
by James B. Conjunct
Things like this did not happen in their gated, manicured, protected worlds. When people died, it was in hospitals or nursing homes or over there, in the city they had all moved from when it got over run with those people. No things like this did not happen.
It took the boy 183 minutes to die. 11,000 seconds. About the length of the last game that his team played at school. He usually sat that long on the bench, hoping to get in. Now he hung that long, waiting to die.
Via Crucis Grid Blog: Best & Worst Stations 10-12
There was the velvety blackness that comes with closing your eyes in dim light, and then it was darkness, total darkness and I saw him – Jesus. He was standing, without a shirt, and I stood there and drank in His presence. He invited me “Open your arms”. Slowly, I opened my arms, a bit out to the side, and he took my right arm, stretched it out, held my hand, picked up a ball hammer and a nail, and put the nail to my palm. It hurt, and the blood started to flow, and then I disputed with him “but they say that it must have been in your wrist?” and he grinned, the echoes of “as you wish” in the silence and moved the nail to my wrist. First one side, and then the other, blood streamed, the pain caused me to catch my breath, and then he was behind me and the nail went through him too before it went into the wood.
In the total darkness surrounding us, where He was there was Light. And I knew that was where I wanted to be, in His Light, with Him. And from His place behind me, the both of us fastened there, He said “You know how to lift up your heart……..now open your arms…live in the wound…..as I do for you and all others. Live in the wound of the world.”
Via Crucis Grid Blog: Lo-fi Stations 10-12
Jesus of Nazareth was crucified at 9:00 AM in the morning,
approximately. He was charged as a criminal; he was punished as a
criminal. His dedication to the realm of God, however, remained firm.
There would be no compromise for Rome, the Religious Leaders, or the
Mockers. People were - and are still - more important than dogma. Jesus
was hung there on the cross for living this mantra as truth. His truth
lives on, but it is getting harder and harder to breath.
go read the rest
Via Crucis Grid Blog: World of Your Making Stations 11 & 12
O Lord, Thou didst strike my heart with Thy word, and I did love Thee.
See them strike his hand
Drive the nail into the tree.
Jesus your nails pin down all my selfish thoughts
They stab my guilty conscience and awaken me
to the mystery of your love.
See the crown of thorns
Soldiers stand and watch him bleed
Hear the cold and desperate cry,
"My God, O My God, why hast Thou forsaken me?"
O Lord, Thou didst strike my heart with Thy word, and I did love Thee.
Via Crucis Grid Blog: Surviving the Workday Station 11 & 12
I think it's worth reflecting on the relief that death can bring. No
matter if we don't believe in God. No matter if we believe only in the
humanity of Jesus. No matter if we believe in the divine spark within
all of us.
This is the point in the week where we bear in mind that we will all journey home soon.
go read the rest
Via Crucis Grid Blog: sententiae et clamores Stations XI & XII
When
Jesus is about to die, the land is covered with darkness and after he
dies, the earth shakes and the Temple veil is rent. What else could be
expected, but the shudder of the world itself upon the death of the
incarnated God? The darkest hour in the history of the universe.
go read the rest
Via Crucis Grid Blog: Complex Christ Station 11 & 12
'It Is Finished'
Death, terror and self-determination.
On this Good Friday, I thought a link to this reflection was appropriate.
Peace.
Via Crucis Grid Blog: Cirque de moi Station 11 & 12
On this Good Friday, I remember why He died. I remember his agony in the garden. Why must we meditate upon his suffering? Why not just recall the Resurrection? For me that answer is simple. I need to recall my part in His death. I need to "see" again my sins that cost Him his life. I need to "feel" the pain that our Lord chose to endure to help me to amend my life and resolve to not commit that sin again, with God's grace. Thank you Lord for all that you have done for me. Help me to live my life completely for you and to embrace the crosses that you have blessed me with.
Via Crucis Grid Blog: One Room Stations 5 & 6
Both Mary and Veronica do seem to imbue a loving presence to Jesus beyond words. Consolation - to be with the lonely one. The simple act of wiping someone's face when facing sickness, suffering or death. Again, as Nouwen would point out - not cure, but care.
Via Crucis Grid Blog: The Corner Stations 9 & 10
Mark at Cowpi Journal remixed the Via Crucis Grid Blog image. I love the contrast.
It reminded me of a line from the the book The Outsiders, which was written in the 1960s by S.E. Hinton, a then 15 year old girl. The book was adapted into a movie in the '80s. In the scene, Johnny (played by Ralph Macchio) tells Ponyboy (played C. Thomas Howell)
Stay gold, Ponyboy. Stay gold.
Stevie Wonder took this line and did a a wonderful song based on it.
Via Crucis Grid Blog: sententiae et clamores Stations Ix & X
I
was in Jerusalem on September 28, 2000 when Ariel Sharon went into to
the al-Aqsa Mosque, provoking what came to be known as the second
intifada. There was a riot and the army occupied the area around the
mosque and the Western Wall. Seven Palestinians were killed by the IDF.
The next day the city was tense and quiet. Soldiers were everywhere,
and everyone's nerves were shot. There was no noise except for the call
to prayer broadcast from loudspeakers on the minarets that looked over
the city.
It was Friday and normally on that day the Franciscans would do the Via Crucis through the Old City, retracing what were traditionally thought to have been the steps of Jesus on his way to Calvary. Because of the situation that day, however, they did not venture out onto the streets, but rather carried out the whole procession inside the Holy Sepulchre, instead of just the end of it.
It was a strange and sad evening inside that strange and sad church. Huge and labyrinthine, home to so many denominations -- Greeks, Catholics, Armenians, Syrians, Copts, Ethiopians -- that night it was crowded as the Franciscans and Armenians both processed in different parts of the building, forced to share the space because of the chaos outside. The clear Gregorian hymns of the Franciscans mixed with the haunting Eastern chants of the Armenians. Outside, the people I had gotten to know over the past week were getting ready for the killing that would be practiced by both sides.
Via Crucis Grid Blog: World of Your Making Station 9 & 10
Help us do more, we must do more, to comfort the dying and heal the afflicted.
Via Crucis Grid Blog: Lo-fi Tribe Station 10
Roman crucifixion was designed to be as humiliating as it was painful. Yes, torture and capital punishment are fused. Why? Well, to send a message to all those would be subversives, of course. Injustice was defended with the constant threat of humiliation and death. Not only were “criminals” nailed to wood, but they were stripped naked first. They were left hanging there, a visual and human object lesson to all others. Rome left you there too … as food for birds and dogs. A lack of proper burial was part of the humiliation too. The luckier ones at least were thrown into a mass pit and covered with lime. Anything is better than becoming mere carrion for beasts of air and ground.
Jesus was not special in the eyes of power-brokers. He was just another subversive peasant. He would be humiliated too.
Via Crucis Grid Blog: Argent by the Tiber Station 9
Meditation
The
great weight of the world's sin crushes You down to the dusty earth a
third time. Dust from which Adam was formed. Dust to which I and my
hapless race return. Where would our souls go but down to Hell for Eden
was lost by our usurpation. But You, Perfect God and Perfect Man would
not leave our souls in Hell, and would now willingly walk this
torturous way for Death's death. Spring my heart from the prison of
pride. By the merits of Your Suffering, win back for me paradise that I
may never leave You.
Pater noster, qui es in cælis: sanctificetur nomen tuum; adveniat regnum tuum; fiat voluntas tua, sicut in cælo, et in terra. Panem nostrum quotidianum 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. Amen.
Eia mater, fons amoris, me sentire vim doloris fac, ut tecum lugeam.
Via Crucis Grid Blog: Things of Infinite Importance Station 7
Station VII - Jesus Falls for the Second Time
Remember that you are dust ... and to dust you shall return.
We began Lent with these words. A reminder of our own mortality. No matter what happens. No matter how high we soar or how low we sink, we all return to the same place -- dust.
It's a reminder that is meant to humble us. A reminder that the proper response to the maxim "The one who dies with the most toys wins" is "Wins what?" In the end, we're all worm food.
But the inevitability can lead to resignation, too. Jesus might never be quoted more out of context than when he said "The poor will always be with you." People have used it as an excuse to do nothing. And why not? It certainly seems like no matter what we do all those words are true. No matter how much we labor, the poor are still with us and in the end we're all just dust.
Via Crucis Grid Blog: Ianua Station 10
I know the pain of this one.
The humiliation of a broken battered body on display.
Standing in front of people who despise you, bare and vulnerable.
Standing bare, beaten, with nothing more left to give. Nothing to hide, no place, no safe thing to hide it.
Exposed, raw, ashamed.
Via Crucis Grid Blog: Church Geek Station 9
Richard Fox in the introduction to his book Jesus in America, writes:
{Jesus} identity is elastic. There is no single Jesus, in America or elsewhere. He can lead crusades like a warrior he can turn the other check. He can thrash about in the temple and cup a blind person’s face in his hands. He can withdraw into the desert like John the Baptist and he can gather the little children.
It seems that the trick is not to always presume that we are right and that we automatically have Jesus on our side. It is, rather, to humbly allow Jesus to speak to us, to challenge us, and to discern one with another what Jesus might or might not be saying about this or that thing of concern.
Via Crucis Grid Blog: Cowpi Journal 1
The last vestige of the world is removed from His body. Jesus stands before us in His poverty, about to give the last thing He can claim to have.
Via Crucis Grid Blog: The Phaith of St. Phransus Station 10
Get this video and more at MySpace.com
Via Crucis Grid Blog: Ron's Bloviating Station 1
After experiencing many Easters as a Christian, I still struggle to fathom the love of God. That the Father would let His Son be sacraficed, and that the Son would willingly do the will of the Father is, to me, incredible.
Via Crucis Grid Blog: sententiae et clamores Stations 7 & 8
The
way has a rhythm, it is marked by falls. The body weakened and
weakened, the trip, the stumble. Is he solitary? Is there anyone to
help him up?
The frustration being too weak to walk even to one's own execution. The taste of dirt, mixing with the blood from cuts and dusty sweat. Woe to the solitary man.
Feet bleeding, the cross heavy even with the aid of the stranger. Friends and apostles are nowhere to be seen, only the scourge of the soldier as all Jerusalem watches him stumble towards his death. Woe to the solitary man.
Via Crucis Grid Blog: lo-fi Tribe Stations 7 & 8
In this ‘kingdom’ or ‘realm’ of God, women were equal to men. A woman was much more than a mere incubator into which a man planted his ego and future. A woman was a human being whose gifts and talents were not only welcome, but also an actual and functioning part of the very foundation of the community. A woman could be a woman in the realm Jesus pointed toward, even if she “lacked” male representation. Jesus, in fact, compared this Kingdom of God to a woman or women on a few occasions during his journeys to make his very radical point socially clear.
Via Crucis Grid Blog: Ianua Station 1
his second fall
Read those words again.
his.second.fall.
Wasn’t once enough?
I mean, we get it Jesus—you were human. You, perfect and holy, were frail and mortal and flesh and bones.
You didn’t just fall once.
You fell again. (And later—still again).
Via Crucis Grid Blog: Spencer Burke Graphitti Stations
Spencer_Burke_Graphitti_00070
Originally uploaded by cavepaint.
#1 - Stations of The Cross, Christ is Condemned to Death. Graffiti photographed by Spencer Burke
Spencer_Burke_Graphitti_00089
Originally uploaded by cavepaint.
#2 - Stations of The Cross, The Cross is Laid upon Him. Graffiti photographed by Spencer Burke
Continue reading "Via Crucis Grid Blog: Spencer Burke Graphitti Stations" »
Via Crucis Grid Blog: Things of Infinite Importance Stations 4 & 5
I can't imagine Simon was that thrilled carrying the cross that day. More likely, he cursed his rotten luck and probably said more than a few choice words under his breath to God that day.
But if he was even a little bit open to it, I wonder if he didn't take something away from the experience. If being compelled to carry another's burden even for a little while didn't shape him in some quietly profound.
We'll never know, of course, but I wonder. Because the heart of compulsion is losing control. And when we give up control -- amazing things can happen.
Via Crucis Grid Blog: Jason Clark Station 7
How many of us have grow weary and fallen down in the act of following Jesus, into his mission, through his body, the Church. From being overwhemed with the need to experience the ‘life’ the world sell us, with it’s nevery ending stream of sales pitch images that fill our minds and souls, whilst we struggle for signifance.
So we and the church lie fallen in the dust under the weight of the religion of consumerism.
Via Crucis Grid Blog: Dry Bones Dance Station 8
Weep for yourselves, because the guys who write this down won’t bother with your names. Weep that you must live in a world that says you are less. And weep for a world where soldiers will force the Simons of the world to participate in grave injustice just because they can.
Via Crucis Grid Blog: Musing Mysteries Station 5
I have often imagined Simon as the Roman soldiers grab him, shoving him toward Jesus who is struggling beneath the weight of the cross. The moment that they lay their hands upon him, I can almost see the fear in his eyes, the terror! He was just a passerby coming in from the country. Had he ever even heard of Jesus? Did he know anything that Jesus taught? Did he have any idea who this man was or what he had done? Did he, perhaps, even worry that Jesus was an atrocious criminal? The cross was heavy as he took it from the shoulders of the laboring man--did he fear his own inability to carry that cross? Would the Romans strike him if he failed?
But at the same time, didn't he feel deeply for the man that he had been called to help? No matter what that man had done, wasn't the cruelty of the sentence beyond any measure?
So, Simon feared for his own safety at first, but he had to give up
that fear because he had no choice. Simon, I believe, took up the cross
that day and forever after felt the weight of it on his shoulders as he
learned more about the man, Jesus, that he had helped. I have no doubt
that it changed the whole course of Simon's life. And, for some reason,
I do not believe that he ever feared again. I believe that he gave up
himself, that day, for the kingdom of God and he never looked back.
That even though he knew that sharing that cross could cost him his
life at any time in the future, it was a cross he never wanted to put
down ... never. The worst moment of his life was probably the moment
that he did relinquish the physical cross at the place called The
Skull. I can almost feel his tears as he witnesses the rough treatment
of this scourged, weakened man, as the Romans force him down and
stretch out his arms on the cross.
go read the rest
Via Crucis Grid Blog: Crossroad Dispatches Station 6
The Stations of the Cross today mark a pilgrimage route in Jerusalem that traces Jesus' path to his cruxification and resurrection. At station six, there is a chapel commemorating a woman. Pictured here is its doorway.
I have set before thee an open door,
and no man can shut it. - Revelation 3:8
"In an instant someone from the bystanders broke ranks. It was a woman. She came running to Jesus holding in her hands a piece of wet cloth. She wiped Jesus' face from sweat and blood. She did not bother to look at the soldiers, she did not care about her own safety. She did it instinctively..." - Franciscan Cyberspot, "Jerusalem The Way of the Cross"
No one knows for sure whom this woman was, but the veil she used to wipe His face, according to the Catholic Encyclopedia, was said to bear the likeness of the image of Christ's face, and the revered relic "was called vera icon (true image), which ordinary language soon made veronica." The Basilica of St. Peter's in Rome and a Capuchin monastery in the village of Manoppello, Italy both claim possession of the authentic veil. (More of Veronica's story at the Via Crucis grid blog).
The woman now known as Veronica knew a true image, vera icon, of God in human form when she saw Him: a human and a Being. His Presence was so radiant that it was not totally obliterated in her eyes by the current situation.
Via Crucis Grid Blog: Wanderings of a PostModern Pilgrim Station 5
Get
someone else to carry the cross-beam for him. He’s becoming too weak. A
moment of humanity on the part of the troops leading Jesus to His
death...
or is it?
In an attempt to place a better face on
the Romans in the story, that may have been one of the reasons for this
part of the story being included. But more to the point, I think, it is
just another example of the cruelty of the Romans themselves. An
innocent bystander has to do something against his will.
You! Over there! Yes, you! Come here. Right now. Here. Take the cross from him. Don’t argue. Because I say so!
Via Crucis Grid Blog: Martha, Martha Station 5
i remember the very first time i watched The Passion of the Christ
and saw through tear-streaked eyes Simon of Cyrene being pressed into
service for Jesus to help carry the Cross. my first thought was total
disbelief: how could he (simon) not wish to help? how could
he be so reluctant when told - he had to be told? - to help Jesus carry
His Cross? he had to be forced to help; he had no intention of getting
involved.
what is that saying - we despise most in others what we should despise most in our selves?
how many times in my life have i been simon of cyrene? how many times
have i had to be pressed into service for another person, and out of
reluctance (peppered with petulance, i might add) i have helped
begrudgingly.
go read the rest
Via Crucis Grid Blog: Baby Priest Station 5 1
Jesus never asked Simon to carry the cross.
Roman soldiers did.
Nor was Simon asked all that politely.
He was compelled, a verb Matthew uses at 5:41: and if anyone compels you to go one mile, go with him two miles.
go read the rest
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