Today is our most solemn day of the year, the day when we recall that great act of Divine Love which is the basis for our freedom as Christians. On the Cross, Jesus pays the price for our sins by giving His perfect human life for us with the infinite, divine love of His Sacred Heart. The Cross is central to our faith because it reminds us just how far God has gone out of His great love for you and me. Our blessed Lord allowed Himself to be betrayed, beaten, jeered at, humiliated, tortured and killed. And He loved us through it all, never wavering from choosing to undergo that suffering for our sake.
When we gaze upon the cross, we look at the perfect image of love and the invitation to enter into that love. Pope Benedict XVI once said that it is from the pierced side of Christ “that our definition of love must begin. In this contemplation the Christian discovers the path along which his life and love must move.”
Today, let us stand at the pierced side of Jesus and recognize the immensity of the love pouring forth. That stream of blood and water still flows out upon the whole world today, telling you and me that God the Son has poured out everything for us. His love is able to heal the sin and death which has been the scourge of humanity ever since our first parents.
There was a study done with elementary school students where researchers observed the behavior of children on a playground both with and without a fence. The results were somewhat unexpected. With the fence around the playground, the children used the entire space and ran around freely. Without a fence, the children tended to stay closer together and didn’t use the entire space.
Our true freedom lies in remaining close to that open side of Christ, receiving the love flowing from His wounded Sacred Heart. The crucified Lord stretches out His arms to us, inviting us to remain within their embrace. I pray that we let the arms of our crucified Lord be the boundary that gives us the freedom to run the race – as St. Paul said – and truly live in His love.
In our sin, we turn in upon ourselves and give in to the false notion that doing whatever we want will make us free. Instead, it leaves us enslaved, isolated, broken, even spiritually dead. But in those depths of darkness, the Lord reminds us that we are never alone. When we find ourselves burdened with the weight of sin and call out, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” Jesus joins His voice to ours from the cross. In His great love, He experienced the feeling of forsakenness to let us know that He is there to rescue us from those low points, to gently lift us back into His arms.
Within those loving arms, let us leave today with the call of His heart reverberating in ours. From the Cross, Jesus cries from His heart to yours and mine: “I thirst.” He thirsts for you and me to thirst for Him, to respond to His Divine Love with our love. He helps us respond well, gives us all the grace we need to cooperate with that Love that was poured out so perfectly that Jesus declared: “It is finished.” Let us embrace that perfect love and ask the Lord that through the precious blood of His Holy Cross, our hearts would be purified to respond more perfectly to Him today and always.
+ We adore you, O Christ, and we bless you, because by your Holy Cross, you have redeemed the world. +